Anyway, so the day before yesterday, I jogged my 2.1mi circuit and made it about 1/3 of the way without stopping, then I slowed down from a jog 3-4 more times. Not bad, but I need to do better. On the way back, I checked Christine's and my cars: the Meadows has a bad habit of ticketing cars for not having a permit -- even when in unmarked visitor spots. I can understand ticketing them if they don't move, but these cars moved quite a bit. They were clean. I went back inside and went back to work.
Yesterday, I went to jog again and I noticed that Christine's car was gone. Upon closer inspection, it was clear that it had been towed. !!!! Normally, there's a 48-hour waiting period -- not this time. Sometime in the 24hr window, they had ticketed and towed her car, which is not their normal procedure. So that had to be rescued. My car had a ticket with a 48hr warning on it. I'm not sure what's up with why hers would have been towed...
Anyway, so I also joined AAA a couple weeks ago, when all this trouble started with my car. I got my papers in the mail yesterday, and called a locksmith out to unlock my car. (When all this trouble started with my car, it was towed, and the tow truck company or the driver lost my keys. I had a spare ignition key, but not a key to unlock my car. Nissan didn't have my car on file, so I had to work with a locksmith.) He came by in about an hour, and made quick work of unlocking my car and making a new key -- $150 later, I can now lock my car again.
So after this, he left, and I moved my car to the street. I went back inside my house -- or tried to. I had locked myself out of my house. Ironic, to say the least, that the locksmith had unlocked my car, but I had now locked myself out of my house. I searched for the spare key, but it was gone. I tried a couple things, but I was about fed up with my luck for the day.
I drove my newly-unlocked car out to Eric's workplace, just up the road. He drove back with me to our place. On the way back, my car died. I was hoping that wouldn't happen, but it did. So I was following Eric, and then I had to swerve out of the flow of traffic and park on a neighborhood street for about 45 minutes for my car to start again. By this point, I was actually mad. I was so steamed that I fell asleep -- which was better than staying awake at that point. I was already tired, so I just shut down for a few minutes. I'm not sure how long I was out total, but I drifted in and out of sleep for an hour or so, each time, trying my luck with the car. It wasn't more than an hour, at least I hope not. My patience for these games was wearing thin, and I still had to get back to my house. Jonathan said that he would drive me out to pick up Christine's car, and it's rude to keep people waiting (it's also hypocritical of me to say that, being the guy who is perpetually late).
Now, I should add that my cell phone has gone missing since last Thursday. I can't call people or receive calls. So I couldn't receive Eric's call when he noticed that I was no longer following him from the office, nor could I receive Jonathan's call when he called to make sure I was home. Alternately, I couldn't call AAA to send a tow truck to get my car back home.
So I made it to Battlefield Towing, and paid another $150 to get Christine's car away from them. Talk about an expensive day. If I were a dishonest man, I'm sure I could have gotten the car for nothing, but I don't think that dishonestly.
On a side note, I've discovered one of the least-liked services rendered by one man to another: the enforced towing of another man's car by one man at the other man's expense. It's a racket. I didn't ask for a tow truck. The place I live at decided to set me up with some extra bills this month. So nice and thoughtful of them. Good thing I have those piles of money just waiting to be spent.
So I signed back into work at about 11PM, and I'm still working -- I'm just taking a break to rant. I need to get this off my chest.
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