The Ol' Life's Getting A Li'l Hectic

Ahhh! The transition to Boulder has been anything but smooth. Back and forth from Pittsburgh so many times. I came to Boulder last Tuesday for a meeting that I couldn't get out of, then back to Pittsburgh Thursday for FOX Japan in Mo-town Friday night and Gina (my cousin's) bachelorette on Saturday in Columbus. Both were good times (pics on the camera, but the cord to upload them I left in the 'burgh...not to worry, though, since I'm headed back there tomorrow. =| ), but getting back to Boulder on Sunday/Monday was a disaster. (Ask me about my travel luck sometime...actually, I have a thing or two to say about that. I think I'll add it later).

Soooo...I'm back in Boulder for the first week of classes, but am leaving again after I teach to attend Gina's rehearsal dinner and wedding this weekend. Fortunately, Monday is Labor Day so I don't need to be back for anything, and then I'm always off Tuesdays...so I could make a nice long weekend out of this if the flights look alright.

Things are pretty hectic outside of travel as well. Moving in by myself has proven a challenge, and I still have stuff in storage with no forseeable way of getting it out before the lease is up. I mean, I'll get it out, because I refuse to pay for another month's rent, but it's gonna be a pain.

Classes look pretty good though, and it looks like my Independent Study is going through as planned. All I have to do now is survive teaching tomorrow (which is pretty much my favorite part of grad. school so it should be fine) and then successfully make it back to the 'burgh (now, this has proven tricky a time or two before).

Ok, now to my travel epiphany, or more like my life epiphany. It's actually a good thing, even though it won't seem like it at first. Come with me on this.

I have the world's worst travel luck. You don't even know. I cannot explain to you the things that have happened to me when trying to fly. God/the universe literally must sit around coming up with new and innovative ways to screw with me.

Now, I know what you're thinking, and you're wrong. You're thinking, "Well Shannon, you travel a lot more than most people and you fly stand-by. Those two things combine for a lousyer than normal flying record."

Not so. I mean, those things are true, but, you see, when I fly stand-by I never have a problem. When Lisa and I got stuck in the Philly airport for the night coming back from Vegas that was really the first time there was a problem, and that wasn't bad at all because I didn't need to ba back for anything pressing.

No, no. You see what makes my travel luck so unbelievable is that it is when I PURCHASE a ticket that everything goes to shit. Weather, crew overtime, mechanical problems, delays for no apparent reason, you name it, it's happened to me. But ONLY when I PURCHASE a ticket. And I do this on relatively rare occasions: holidays when the flights are bad to go stand-by, or when I absolutely have to be somewhere on a certain day and can't chance the stand-by thing. And when I say outrageous luck, I mean it. There was an occasion this past spring break where I was in 5 major US cities in one day trying to get home--reminder, with a PURCHASED TICKET--and had a total of 12 boarding passes by the end of it from all the flights they tried to put me on. Unreal, absolutely unreal.

But, here's where the epiphany comes in, and why this is good news. I am always going on and on about how everything works out for me. But then I realized all of this about my travel luck. And I thought, I don't have to worry anymore about dying in some freak accident of a firey sort. No, no, my travel luck BALANCES OUT the everything else working out for me thing. So, I'm in the clear. Not to worry.

So, here's to having crappy luck with purchased tickets, but everything ultimately working out anyways. ;)

This is getting a little ridiculous

We've all had a good laugh at how lucky I am. How everything goes my way. Well, things are almost getting a little out of hand. It is unbelievable the way the universe goes out of its way to cater to me.

Here we go.

So, Lisa and I went out to the South Side, only to discover that she had either lost her wallet or left it at home. Either way, our chances of finding a bar we could get into without I.D. on a weekend evening were slim at best, but I decided to search for a parking spot and try and hit up Bar 11, a dive off the main drag with a really strange crowd and stranger practices.

We must have been circling the same few blocks for a half hour, narrow, one way back allies lined on both sides with parked cars. Coming up to the bar--yet again--a car was paralleling (lucky dog) to my left, and doing a piss poor job of it, I might add. I compensated (like you do) for her maneuvering by sliding a little more to my right. Well, too far apparently, because my mirror clipped that of a parked vehicle. No big deal, actually, because it's 2008 and cars' mirrors give for just that purpose. So, no damage was done to either car, but it made a really loud noise.

There was a stop sign only two cars past the one I hit, and I stopped, only to find a pedestrian cop strolling up to my car.

Shit. You have got to be kidding me. I am so tried of police officers at this point I was ready to get out of the car, leave it running, and bolt for the hills, just to avoid talking to the guy.

So, he says to me, "What'd you hit?"

"I hit something?" Playing dumb has gotten me everywhere in these situations. And I am not too proud to get out of a ticket, a D.U.I., or an insurance claim.

I looked over at my mirror, which had closed in towards the car, and gasped as if I had noticed it for the first time.

"Stay there," he said, and went to inspect the "damage" on the other car.

He had my pull over, took my license, told me it was no biggie, and sent me on my merry way. But first, I thought, hey, he's not being a prick; I'll ask him:

"Do they card to get into this bar?"

"Yeah, they do. Why?"

"She forgot her license."

"How old are you?" he turned his attention to Lisa.

"23."

"Well," said the officer who had just had me pull over because I hit a parked car, "I'll just say I checked your I.D. You can go in."

So, let me get this straight. The only reason Lisa and I were able to go out that night was because I clipped a car and a cop was there to witness it. Can anybody explain my life to me?

Yeah, I didn't think so.



The bar was cool, btw. We had a great night.