The Perfect Storm

You know that gif from Avengers that's an endless loop of the Hulk thrashing Loki up and down? I feel like I am Loki and yesterday was the Hulk. 

It started out normally enough. My alarm went off at 3:45 a.m. (my normal is different from yours) so I could be to work by 4:30. I sold gadgets to people all morning and goofed off with my coworkers by reenacting Lord of the Rings in gangsta voices. (Have I mentioned how much I love being the only girl in our Brookstone team? Because I love it a lot.) Same old, same old, nothing to write home about.

After work I get in my car and start driving home. Everything's fine until I get on the interstate, and then I start feeling like the car is having trouble accelerating. I have felt this way occasionally ever since it happened to me with my old car, so I wasn’t overly worried. I mean, I got this car less than a month ago. I did what I usually do, which is accelerate to prove to myself that I still can accelerate. Well, that didn’t go as expected. There was a sharp noise and suddenly Houston, we have a problem, the problem being that now I am coasting down the interstate in a lane with no shoulder. Luckily such a shoulder did appear soon enough for me to pull into it before the engine died completely. I had no phone, due to my one being dead except for when it is literally plugged into the wall and the other being not activated yet. So I sit there just being like, “What.” I had never been in such a situation, but I wasn’t afraid. The cars are flying by and although I have no way to contact anyone, no idea who I should contact, and no idea of what to do, I never felt afraid. I felt more awkward than anything. I sat there just being kind of bored and occasionally brainstorming. I nearly fell asleep. What a weirdo. (In my defense, I did get up at 3:45.)

 Anyhoo, I got out of the car and walking towards the exit, with the end goal of getting down to the Ramada I could see and finding a phone to use. I wasn’t sure if I would have to risk life and limb by running across the traffic or what, but it turns out there’s a nice cement divider that you can walk in and not die. Party on.

So I get down to the Ramada and attempted to call my roommate but it isn’t a local call so that was a no go. I ask the desk guy if he had a phonebook and he said he had the internet, which was better (cute and helpful!) so I told him my situation and I was soon on the phone with Gavin, who promised to send me a truck. So I hike back up to my car and then a highway patrol guy pulled over. I had been doing so good with staying calm, but talking to this guy made me cry, not because of anything he did but just the stress of not knowing what to do and the tow truck not showing up. The officer called the tow place and assured me that yes, someone was coming. Good bye, officer Perfect Teeth. (The dude seriously looked like Ponch from CHiPS.)

The tow truck did show up soon, much to my relief. The driver was so nice to me and let me use his phone, although for some reason I still couldn’t call Amber but I faked half of a brief conversation because I was too embarrassed to admit that I apparently couldn't remember my roommate's phone number. I directed him to a mechanic near my house, we got my car squared away, and off he went.I started walking home, but was picked up by my roommate. Once we were home I immediately reactivated my phone and called the mechanic to give him a contact number. The guy says it was definitely the dealership’s fault, because the oil filter they put in was wrong and so currently there is no oil in the engine. Oh, what a delight. I'll deal with it tomorrow.

I hitched a ride with Amber to Fashion Place and was introduced to Tyler, who I would be closing the store with. I'm extremely not a mall person I can't remember the last time I've been in a mall and been happy about it. Probably middle school. But I didn't think it would be that different from my airport store.

Ladies and gentlemen, mall stores are evil. Evil, evil, evil. Do not ever work in a mall store. They have a million items I’ve never heard of, for one thing. It was like being a brand new employee again, and I HATE feeling useless. I was so happy whenever anyone would look at the sand or the headphones or the projector and be like, “I KNOW HOW TO SELL THAT.” Because everything else was just me fetching Tyler or making stuff up. Also there are a lot of hoodlum teenagers who steal sand displays (who steals sand displays?) and no one has to leave until they feel like it, unlike the airport where you have to have a boarding pass to get in and there are flights to catch, so people don't linger overly long. I was fine at the registers (wow, they do ten thousand times more returns than we do) but not so great on the floor and so tired I wanted to cut my feet off and die. I’d been going nonstop for seventeen hours, my car was broken down, and if one more person asked me where the food court was I was going to lose it. Luckily I did make it to 9, and then I just vacuumed and double counted the deposit. Home again. 

Well, not yet. I sat and waited for Amber and Mickie to come back from their gymnastics meet and failed at buying candy from a vending machine much to my annoyance and realized my phone was on silent so I couldn’t hear calls but eventually we did meet up and drive home, where I sat on the floor eating a peanut butter sandwich before going upstairs to pass out. [Run on sentences are fun.]

So that was yesterday. *deep breath* Quite possibly the most exhausting and stressful day I've ever had. Certainly in the last year or two. I require chocolate stat. So much chocolate.