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Is this proof that my car is evil? (Part II)

A continuation of Part I...

(Warning: Another long post ahead)

We continue this story at the car repair place, where it's pouring rain & I've just backed into someone else's car and left dents & realized that I've locked myself out of my car with the engine running...

I figured that this was a perfect time to use another one of my AAA calls (remember the last time my car was left running with the keys locked in it?) and as I rifle through my wallet, I realize, I don't have my Triple A card with me!

(more after the jump...)

I figured that I could just call Yoshi and get the membership # that way, but since I left my cell phone at home, I had to borrow the car repair place's phone & I hated tying up one of their lines while they were trying to do business. I must've freaked Yoshi out because all I said was, "I've had the worst morning. Give me the Triple A membership number because I can't find my card." Yoshi was smart enough to just give me the number and leave me to share the details later because I ended up being on the phone with AAA (still using the car repair shop's phone) for half an hour on hold while waiting for someone to help me. Once I gave them my info, they said, they'd put a rush on my call and that someone would be there between 5-30 minutes.

The guys at the repair shop were feeling really sorry for me and were trying to jimmy my car door open with a wire hanger, which was not working. I told them not to worry about it since AAA was on their way. It was at this point that the older gentleman who had been talking to me earlier had to leave the shop and he came up to me and said, "I'm sorry about your incident just now. Don't worry, you have a good spirit in there." That was really nice and not that weird, so at least I could smile at that and just kind of laugh at the whole situation.

Then came the waiting...

Though the skies had conspired against me minutes earlier by pouring so much rain I wanted to start collecting animals two by two, all of a sudden the drops stopped falling from the sky. I decided to wait outside for the AAA truck.

After about 20 minutes, there was no Triple A yet (they are extremely busy due to the inclement weather here) and I noticed a tallish young red-headed man walk into the shop & look for someone to help him. Instantly I knew that this was the guy who owned the Civic that I hit. He waited for someone to help him for a few minutes, but since he came in on foot, I don't think anyone noticed him. He walked towards the white Civic and I followed him to the car to apologize.

He was sitting in the driver's seat and looking in the glove compartment when I got to the car, and I said to him, "Excuse me, is this your car?"

"Yes."

"I have something to tell you," I said guiltily.

"What?" He had panic all over his face.

"I backed into your car a few minutes ago and I left some small dents in the side of your car." I started pointing at them. "Here and here."

A look of relief washed over his face, as if he was saying, "Is that all?" He looked at me and said, "Don't worry about it, these things happen in the rain. I'm not worried about it at all, you shouldn't either."

I still felt horrible and said, "I don't like knowing that I caused damage to your car, even so slightly. If you want me to pay for its repairs, I will."

He insisted again, "Please don't worry about it. I appreciate your honesty and that you came up to apologize to me with the truth."

So then I insisted, "Let me send you a little something, even if you aren't going to get that fixed. Consider it a late holiday bonus or something, ok?" So he gave me his address so I could mail him a check. I was glad when I could tell the car repair guy that we'd worked it out and that he didn't have to do any additional work in that regard because of me.

A few minutes later, AAA showed up and was able to open my passenger side car in an instant. The alarm went off and wouldn't shut off so the AAA guy reached through to open the driver's side door for me. I opened the door and reached for the keys in the ignition and there was nothing there.

WHERE ARE MY KEYS?! If they aren't in the ignition, where could they be?! I start digging between my seats and on the floorboard and nothing was there. My car alarm was still blaring because I didn't have my keys to disable it.

I reached into my right coat pocket and found my keys, where they'd been sitting for the last hour since I backed into that Civic. THE KEYS HAD BEEN IN MY POCKET THE WHOLE TIME!

I felt like SUCH a fool and was too embarassed to let the car repair guys know where I found the keys, I acted like I discovered them on the floor and jumped into my car in a rush.

You would THINK that this story would be coming to an end at this point, but you would be wrong.

As I'm trying to get settled back in my car to hit the road again (I was supposed to have an appointment with someone, but I was NOT going to do it, lest I screw up our meeting big time), a different older gentleman walked up to my open driver side door and asked me, "Are you a Bruins fan?" I had been holding my old blue & gold UCLA umbrella since my big black umbrella snapped in two while we were in Santa Barbara.

"Huh?" I asked for a second. "Oh yeah, I went to UCLA."

All of a sudden, with my engine running and my butt in the driver's seat, ready to back out again, this guy unleashes with a UCLA sports conversation. "That was some basketball game last week, wasn't it? Actually two games!" He went on and on and I was sitting there stunned that he did not get that I. just. wanted. to. leave. I actually had to say to him, "I'm trying to leave now, sorry I have to go," and he was like, "What? Why?" What do you mean WHY?!?! Geez!

Anyway, I just mumbled something about getting on the road since the rain had subsided temporarily. And finally, FINALLY I got to leave and go home.

I kept thinking about what a dumbass I was for wasting an hour and a Triple A call when I had my keys in my pocket the whole time, but I realized the silver lining was that had I NOT been waiting for AAA, I never would have met the owner of the white Civic & wouldn't have been able to apologize to his face. If it hadn't been for that, I would've been paying several hundred more dollars to repair those little dents. So I guess it wasn't all bad, but I still felt like a doofus.

This ends this really long story, but my day was less than half over at that point. Believe it or not, my day actually got worse after that when I got some really bad news. In fact, the news was so bad, that I am not able to write about it yet. So maybe later I can pull myself together enough to share the rest of my day with you.

If you read this far, thanks for indulging me.