breaking even

Yesterday was the first lucky day I’ve had in several years.  Nothing lifts your spirits like a lucky day, I was euphoric.  Notice, I said was.  Today was an unlucky day.

It all started on Wednesday.  I had been wanting some new shoes for awhile, mostly because I ruined my leather loafers in the snow and my sneakers were wore out.  I put a lot of thought into this new pair of shoes over the last few weeks and even had my next THREE pairs of shoes planned out.  I was on top of my shoe game.  So Wednesday I went to the mall to pick up my new sneaks; black Chuck Taylor high-tops.  I was a little uneasy about getting them at first but the more I wear them, the more I enjoy them.

Yesterday I spent an hour or so preparing for a pop-quiz I expected to have in my annoyingly difficult chemistry class.  An hour of studying wasn’t enough and I felt unprepared for the quiz.  Ten minutes into lecture the fire alarm goes off.  A smile helplessly gleamed across my face.  “This type of thing never happens to me!” I thought to myself.  Everyone grabs their stuff and starts to head outside.  With everyone thinking about a possible quiz no one dares to leave and stays to stick out the false alarm.  Once outside, I realized that false alarm fires never last more than 15 minutes.  I then began to calculate how much time we would have left in class and if it were enough to still take a quiz.  There was plenty.  The fire trucks come screaming around the corner at an alarming rate, and “I think wow, they are taking this serious.  Maybe it’s a real fire.”  It was.  Then I recalculated the time and realized that there was now no way they could let us back inside in less than 30 minutes.  I had dodged a quiz.  Later, the professor tells us to have a good weekend and we are free to leave.

I couldn’t believe it.  I was ecstatic, everyone was ecstatic.  With my good fortune on my back, I headed over to the parking department to appeal a $40 ticket I had gotten the night before.  I have an “A” parking pass and parked in a D spot.  Before going inside, I prepared an argument, “Well Ms. parking dept. worker, according to the alphabet, A is higher than D; therefore my pass should have been valid.  Yea yea, that’s good. Play the dumb card.”  I strolled in confidently like I was walking into a strip club for business, not pleasure.  After stating my argument, I filled out a two line form and was on my way.  The parking ticket was cleared, my pathetic excuse had worked.  My spirits were high, I was having a lucky day.

This morning I awoke at 10 am and laid in bed until 11.  I opened my blinds and saw what a beautiful day it was.  My brother said it was going to be 70 and sunny and he was going to go for a motorcycle ride.  I was headed to the library for the day.  Before leaving I decided to play some upbeat music on my computer; Jason Mraz and Julia Nunes.  Happy tunes, indeed.  I left my bathroom door open so I could sing along in the shower.  I was literally dancing as I was brushing my teeth.  I decided that this music would be great to listen to in my car, so I grabbed my phone and began downloading some music.  At first, I got on itunes and was going to purchase the Jason Mraz and Julia Nunes albums for $10 each, but I thought “let’s see if they’re on Limewire.”  They were.  I stole them.  I transferred them to my brand new phone and started playing them immediately through the phone’s speakers.  I headed down to the garage.  On the steps (inside my garage) leading from my house down about 2 feet to the garage floor, I sat down to put on my new Chuck Taylors.  I have to tie my chucks, something I’m not used to doing because I usually just slip my shoes on.  So I sat down and sat my phone on my lap.  I didn’t sit it on the steps because I was afraid a piece of sand or the rough surface would scratch it.  I put the left shoe on first.  Tied.  I brought my right leg up to put on the other shoe.  As I did so, my cell phone slips off my lap and falls off, bounces off the step and hits the wall, falling into a 2 x 4 inch hole in the cinder block foundation of the garage.  Let me explain this more clearly.  To the right of the stairs is a dry-wall, wall that sits on top of a cinder block wall.  The cinder blocks barely stick out, exposing a small hole that my beloved, beautiful new cell phone magically falls into.  I know, epic fail.

After realizing what had just happened, and Will Ferrell’s voice playing in my head, “THAT JUST HAPPENED!”  I began repeating WTF over and over again.  I tried to stick my hand in the hole but it wouldn’t fit (That’s what he said).  So I ran inside to get a pair of grill tongs, determined to get it out quickly.  I stuck them in and realized I couldn’t see the phone and the tongs weren’t hitting the bottom of the hole.  I grabbed a flashlight and shined it down.  The hole went below the floor of the garage.  It was 4 feet deep and I see my phone, face up playing that happy Jason Mraz tune.  Fuck you Jason Mraz.  You put my phone in a hole.

After realizing the tongs wouldn’t reach, I began to come to terms that my phone was gone, lost in a hole in my own garage.  But a storm of determination swept over me and I got into my car and raced to the hardware store.  I say raced because I was so pissed I did like 60 in a 30 all the way there.  I found a saleswoman and asked her where I could get a big long stick and something grippy.  She showed me the stick and some 3M sticky tape.  I was much obliged.  I purchased a stick and some tape.  $9.53.  Almost ten dollars for a fucking stick and tape.  Pissed, I folded down my seat and stuck the 8′ long stick through my trunk and up through my back seat.  The stick reached from the end of the trunk to my windshield.  I got in and sped home.  On the last intersection before my house, I hit the gas which caused my backseat to slam backwards, snapping my big long stick into two medium sized sitcks.  FML.  I got home grabbed the sticks and tape and spiked them on the floor.  I rigged up a couple of sticky chop sticks and started playing “Operation” in the hole.  The sticks were too wide and kept getting stuck between the wall and the cinder block, so I had to cut them, after breaking them twice, retaping them, and fashioning a flashlight to one, I was ready to go.  Maneuvering the sticks was no easy task, but after taking one out and putting a bunch of sticky shit on just one stick I stuck it to the face of the phone and began to pick it up.  “It’s working!  It’s working!  Omg, It’s almost to the top!  Holy shit!  YES!”  When it was 3 inches from the top of the hole, I went to grab it with my right hand, but the stick moved slightly and sent a vibration down the shaft knocking the phone off and back down the hole.  I screamed obscenities for a solid ten minutes.  I then tried again, only to realize that the phone had now fallen under the floor impossible to reach.  I screamed obscenities for a solid half hour.

I went inside and wrote a note to my brother saying to call the phone insurance company and order me a replacement phone.  I threw my credit card on the counter.  I tried to regain some composure and finally head to the library after being lost in a whirlwind of stupidity for nearly three hours.  While driving I couldn’t help to think about karma and how my lucky day yesterday was so quickly offset by my unlucky day today.  I began to analyze and calculate.

Getting my parking ticket cleared:  +$40

Stealing music from the internet:  +$20

Insurance deductible for losing my phone:  -$50

Price for a big stick and some tape:  -$10

This weekend, I broke even.  But tonight, when I return home and pull my car into the garage, I will be haunted by Jason Mraz emanating from the depths of my house because my playlist was on repeat and my cell phone’s battery lasts about 3 days.