Hissy-Fit Rant and my Three Day Time Out

It was Saturday morning and I found myself at the Breakfast only Café. I hadn’t been there in a month but I go there often enough that the waitress knows what I want: no straw with my water, cream with my coffee, scrambled eggs, bacon, English muffin with one tub of orange marmalade. She probably remembers me because I tip three bucks on the $9.95 bill. Why 30%? Because older women are notoriously stereotyped as being bad tippers and if there is anything I don’t want in life, it’s to be stereotyped based on gender. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I took the gunslingers’ table in the far corner of the room, my back to the wall, where I could see everyone because I’m a voyeur at heart. The annual 15K and 25K races took place in town earlier that morning and the restaurant was busy with people stopping on their way home from running, watching or cheering from the sidelines. I don’t get how and why people from all over the world come to run marathons. Where do they find the time and money for that? A woman at a near-by table was wearing a tee-shirt that read: “I make this shirt look good.” Really? She was coat hanger thin, probably ran to the restaurant from two counties over. I don’t wear message tee-shirts but if I did, I’d want one that said,” Bored women, please talk to me!” 

In this age of mass shootings I don’t understand why there aren’t fist fights over the gunslingers’ table. The people sitting just inside the door would be the first to die if a shooter came in and isn’t it a sad statement on our society that anyone has passing thoughts like this or that on the first day of school teachers have to talk about what to do if an active shooter comes in. How many more mass shootings has to take place before we all stand up and demand that our lawmakers get their noses out of the RNA’s underpants and do something meaningful? Kids shouldn’t have to decide between fight and flight. Heck, no one should! For starters, close the gun show background check loophole. It could be done in a day because back in February the House passed the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019 but Mitch McConnell won’t let the Senate vote on it. It’s just sitting there, stonewalled like McConnell did with the Merrick Garland up or down vote on Obama’s pick for a Supreme Court Justice and we all know how that ended. Mitch needs to go so we can get someone in there who will let Congress work the way our Founding Fathers intended it to work!  Rant off, well maybe not off but it's put on the back burner.

Monday through Wednesday the body shop had my car tied up to repair the hit-and-run damage to my back bumper and adjacent parts. When I went in for the estimate the guy told me they would arrange for a rental car to meet me at the body shop but when I got there to drop off my car the young Chicky-Poo at the front desk said they hadn’t done it and claimed they never do that. She was about a minute and half older than the socks I was wearing so I stereotyped her as either being incompetent or she just got the job and ‘never’ in her book only goes back a few days. She ended up driving me to the car rental place and she turned out to be a nice kid with a baby still in diapers. But in the future I’ll be keeping notes of all my conversations with service people with names and dates because who would invent a detail like them arranging for a rental car to meet me if the guy hadn’t said it? If your answer is an elderly person on the edge of dementia, don’t say it out loud.

I left the car rental place, drove home, and parked the rental in the garage which fascinated the dog when he found a shiny brilliant blue Ford in the space where my generic gray Trax usually sits. Every time he had to go outside to pee he walked around the Ford, making sure it was still there. On the third day I drove back to the rental place, putting a grand total of 15 miles on the car in three days at the cost of $75 for the optional insurance which in hindsight was stupidest decision I've made in years. When the rental rep was explaining the option he was talking at Ferrari sports car speed and I was processing the information at horse and buggy speed. It only covered the $1,000 deductible left over from what my insurance company would have covered, should I have gotten in an accident with the rental. Yes, the one that sat in my garage for three days. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! The actual rental fee was another $81 paid for by the insurance company. Damn hit and run driver that started this whole chain of events! The body work cost $991.66 and thankfully, the insurance company covered it all but they will probably find a way to up my premiums. Isn’t that how it works?

The month of May has been and will continue to be the Money Pit Month. If I was a drinking woman, I’d drown my sorrows about now. But I’m not so I think I’ll go to Starbucks instead. I’ve been wanting a S’Mores Frappuccino, which is back for the summer by popular demand. Hooray for small blessings!  ©

The quote is attributed to Gloria but I guess she didn't say it. The author is still unknown.