score card of my weekend, thus far.

[thejunipertree]

Friday:

- was an hour late for work.
+ after copious late nights, my paycheck was something resembling half-decent.
+ had PF Chang's take-out for lunch.
- felt a little ill afterward.
+ went out shoe shopping with two of my co-workers.
- Amanda couldn't come with us.
- almost every pair of shoes I liked, weren't in stock in my size.
+ made due with a pair of black pumps (pumps!) with silver leather lace-looking edging.
- they don't fit as great as I would like them to.
+ spoke to Thee Pumpkin Girl on my cellphone as I was driving to Target.
- lost my power steering in the middle of the conversation and almost got into an accident because it caused me to swerve into oncoming traffic.
- the car then decided to start smoking.
+ managed to pull into the Target parking lot without any nastiness.
+ got a hold of Joanna, who drove over from work to come help me.
- tried to call The Engineer, who was not home.
- called my father, who was very upset at this turn of events.
- the car apparently decided that a fountain of power steering fluid cascading all over my engine would be a wonderful addition to the underhood decor.
- it was fucking cold out as ALL HELL and I had on no coat.
- I was also wearing fishnet stockings.
+ went into Target, bought a new coat (and man, is it FABULOUS) and a pair of socks.
- had to change my socks outside.
+ Joanna's brother's diagnosis of my car, over the cellphone, was that the high pressure hose on my power steering pump was faulty.
+ Joanna drove to an auto parts store and bought me a new hose and the equipment needed to replace it.
- the new hose end strangely did not resemble the hose end currently living on my power steering pump.
+ The Engineer finally came home and called me, was summoned to the scene with some more equipment we needed and a pair of pajama pants for me to don under my skirt.
- he forgot his hat.
- he went to buy a new hat, but Target was closed by that point.
+ a new hat was constructed out of a long-sleeved thermal t-shirt in his car. Hilarity ensued.
- the old hose was not cooperative with being removed from my car, we contemplated slicing it up, then working it off.
+ we wisely hesitated before doing this, deciding instead to wipe up all the fluid we could find (which is what was causing the smoking), fill up with power steering fluid and see what happened.
+ there appeared to only be a small leak coming from the bottom connector. My car agreed to driving around the parking lot for ten minutes, without incident.
+ We went to Dunkin Donuts for celebratory sausage, egg and cheese bagel sandwiches.
+ the man working the counter decided to give us free donuts because it was his birthday.
+ I was dropped off back at my car to head home and everything seemed fine.
- two miles away from my apartment, the battery light flickered on, the power steering went out again, and the coolant temp light decided this looked like a banging party, so it came on too.
- smoke issued from under the car hood in great, billowing clouds.
+ I made it into the parking lot of a gas station without crashing the car.
- the gas station was closed.
- my radiator was bone dry.
- my cell phone had one bar of power left.
+ sent the Engineer to the nearest 24-hour store to buy anti-freeze.
- argued with the Engineer about where one pours anti-freeze into the car.
- pouring anti-freeze in the radiator produced no effect, unless you count merrily gushing out the bottom of my car as an effect.
+ got a hold of my father, who said he'd call our mechanic to come tow me.
- the mechanic didn't answer his phone, so my father had to leave a message.
- tried to call Joanna, to see if she had any further advice, but got her voicemail.
+ Joanna called me back.
+ Joanna also recommended that I put anti-freeze into the run-off tank instead of the actual radiator, to let it cycle through.
+ This seemed to work.
- around the corner from my apartment, the power steering once again decided to fuck off for parts unknown and more smoke came out from my hood.
- I almost hit some one driving as I made my right turn, due to no power steering.
+ there were no other cars in front of my apartment building, so I was able to park without having to rock the car back and forth like I normally do.
+ found my break-glass-in-case-of-emergency half a Xanax and was mercifully granted a full night's sleep.

positives: 25
negatives: 28

Saturday:

- this is the one year anniversary of my mother dying, I already knew it was going to be a sucky day.
- slept through my alarm clock, which was set for nine.
- was instead woken up by my brother, who had been woken up by my alarm clock, which apparently had been beeping for about an hour.
- fell back asleep and didn't wake up until eleven-thirty.
- called the mechanic for a tow, but got his voicemail.
+ he called me back in five minutes.
+ the mechanic told me that someone will come get my car.
- this could be today, Sunday or Monday.
+ my BPAL order arrived.
+ my brother brought the box in and put it on the kitchen table, instead of leaving it outside our apartment door for someone to steal.
+ watched the rest of The Devil's Rejects with the Engineer, who hadn't been able to watch the whole thing the other night.
+ he liked it as much as I did.
- he didn't want to watch the second disc of extras.
+ he did, however, agree to drive me to Target since last night's trip to the store had been aborted.
+ my velvet jeans are positively falling off of me now.
- the holiday aisle depressed the fuck out of me because this was my mother's favourite holiday.
+ three words: Cinnamon. Roasted. Peanuts.
+ bought a tin of trio popcorn (cheese, caramel, and butter).
- when I opened it later on, each flavour is in its own bag and thusly, there is a lot less than I am used to seeing in this sort of thing.
+ went to Red Lobster for dinner, where I had never been before.
- spoke to my father on my cellphone, who told me he's thinking of getting rid of the Eldorado because of the new problems with it. This would leave me out of a car and no funds with which to get one. This has me depressed on numerous levels.
+ successfully won a debate with the Engineer over how my Eldorado is me in car form.
+ didn't feel sick after eating shellfish (which I normally do).
- accidentially bit through my bottom lip.
- drove to PetCo, but they didn't have what the Engineer was looking for.
+ they did, however, have baby rats.
- all of them were girls (I'm looking for boy rats).
+ drove to Bill's Wonderland of Pets, who had what the Engineer was looking for.
- they didn't have the cat food I needed.
+ they did have ferret food, though.
- speaking of ferrets, Howard decided to celebrate my arrival home by kicking all the litter out of both of the ferrets' litter boxes.
- one of the cats, Misty, climbed up the Engineer's back when he went to say hello to my rats.
- skulked around the apartment for the remainder of the night, in a pisser of a black mood.
- the Engineer went to bed early and I'm wide awake.
- I don't have any more Xanax, to help me sleep.
- don't know how I'm getting to work on Monday, or the rest of the week for that matter.

positives: 16
negatives: 20