When I was in grad school, I would gauge how bad my day was going to be by how early in the morning I started drinking Coke. (I had a similar gauge when I worked at the public library - how insane the day was going to be by how early I was sent to Tim Horton's for the coffee run. Anytime before we opened was not a good sign.)
Yesterday, I should have started drinking Coke as soon as I got up.
I'd only had three hours sleep. My bad - Karen and I started watching Jersey Girl at around 10:40, and it was going to be late when we finished. Knew that, wanted to watch anyways, and then ended up talking for another two hours after the movie ended. So, right off the bat, I was tired. Not sleepy-tired, but hideously giddy-tired. Giggling maniacally, I got ready for work.
Now, Saturday night when I got home from church, it wasn't that bad weather-wise - the temp hovered around -10 or so. Over the next three hours, the temp dropped 20 degrees, and the wind picked up. I didn't plug my car in because I wasn't going anywhere Sunday, but I did run down Sunday afternoon to plug it in. Did you know it takes less than 10 seconds for your nostril hair to freeze when the temp with the windchill is -46 degrees? I know that now.
Knowing that it was bloody----ing cold*, I made sure I got down to my car good and early. Went to the driver side door, and it wouldn't open - terrific, it's frozen shut. Again. The passenger side door did open, and after unplugging the car, I started it. The car made an awful noise, started, and continued to make funny noises. I walked around the car to try and open the door again, and noticed this black soot-like stuff under my exhaust pipe. Uh-oh - soooo not good.
It turns out that none of the outlets on that side of the parking lot were working, so although I plugged in the block heater, nothing happened. Fabulous. I ended up calling a cab and being 45 minutes late for work.
Karen was home sick, so in my giddy state, I started prank calling her and leaving messages on her answering machine that consisted of lines from movies we'd seen recently. Such as, "You dress in the manner of a male prostitute!", "Of course, it doesn't have the long-range capabilities of, say, a sword...", and "Am I to understand that you have inserted your father's skull in that ball for bowling?" "No, the guy at the pro shop did that."
Someone offered me a ride home, but that fell through. Fortunately, I was able to get a ride home with someone else. By the time I got home, the outlets were working again, but I still couldn't get the door open.
(An example of how cold it was: when the door wouldn't open, I tried pouring a little bit of water around the frame to try and melt the ice some. For everyone who is cringing and hollering, "NO!" let me assure you that I know better than to do that now. By the time I put the lid back on the bottle and put it down on the hood of the car, the water around the door had frozen. Solid.)
Karen was able to pick me up for dinner at her parents and then curling, where we had the late start time. At one point, I was throwing a take-out rock*** and slipped at the last second. I almost took out the team on the sheet beside us. We were so thoroughly trounced that we just called the game after the sixth end. The scoreboard only goes up to 15, after all.
(And, can I say that I seem to be turning into a curler? Last night I realized that I was yelling at my rocks when they weren't curling properly. "CURL! DAMNNIT! CURL! NOW! NOW! NOT THAT WAY!" Hence, the cursing and swearing.)
Then, I didn't get home until after 11, at which point I thought I'd read a chapter of my book. At 12:30 I looked up and said, "Huh. It's past my bedtime now."
I'm more tired today, so at least I'm not giddy. And no Coke or cola products were consumed before 8am - a hopeful sign.
(And my car door opened this morning. Yay!)
* I'm disguising the fact that I used a Bad Word because my mother's going to read this. Hi Mom!**
** It's a good thing she wasn't at curling last night - I used a couple of words that didn't have asterisks in them.
***Throwing the stone fast and heavy - you want to knock the opponent's rock right out of the rings.
