Craft Rage

A lady I work with, Jessie, got a new car about a month ago, and since then, every time we go for lunch, she drives.

The reason for this is twofold; one, she's in love with her car (I can't blame her) and two, I am a horrible, horrible, garbage magnet. Or rather, my car is. I personally am not a garbage magnet, because that would be gross.

I drive an old Cavalier Z24. I like to make sure I always add in the "Z24" because it makes the car sound really fast and stylish, when in reality, it's just a '94 Cavalier with a lame little spoiler attached to the trunk.

Anyway, questions of speed and coolness aside, I can't seem to keep the thing clear of junk - I'm not sure how it happens, but I've cleaned it out four times so far this summer, and it's STILL crammed with gas receipts and coffee cups, though I religiously throw them away every time I get a new coffee.

Yesterday I finally did some basic cleaning, just enough to clear some room on the front seat. And this afternoon at lunch, I insisted on either giving Jessie gas money, or taking over half of the driving duty, because it doesn't seem fair to always be booting around town in HER car. After a brief argument, which I might have ended by threatening to sing "I'm Henry The Eighth I Am" at the top of my lungs for the rest of the afternoon, and demonstrating a couple of verses in the parking lot, she finally got into my car and we took off for lunch.

I should add; nobody ever rides in my car. The Hotness has a company pickup truck that we use for the odd trip to town, and we have his old pickup truck for everything else, but my car is usually too messy to ride in. And it's not cool enough for The Hotness to be seen in. But mostly, it's just the mess. Essentially, this constant lack of witnesses allows CrazyRachelle to behave quite poorly towards other drivers.

Anyway, Jessie and I are driving along, planning a strategic hit on the buffet, when some lady with big hair pulls into the busy street, right out in front of me, slams on her brakes, then pulls out a map. A MAP! IN THE MIDDLE OF A BUSY STREET!

CrazyRachelle surfaced instantly. Without thought, I slammed on the brakes, screamed "WHAT ARE YOU DOING, JACKASS?" out my open window, and laid on the horn.

Almost immediately, I realized that I wasn't alone in the car, and I looked over at Jessie, to see if her head had exploded. To my utter amazement, she's sitting there looking at her fingernails, wondering if she should change her polish color, completely unfazed by our near-but-not-really-near death experience. I'm all "OMG, I'm so sorry!" and she's all "WTF are you talking about?" and "Who cares?"

CrazyRachelle has finally found a wingman!

Unfortunately, it appears that CrazyRachelle might be going off the road for awhile; I went to a few garage sales on my way home this afternoon, and after the last one, I started to smell something strange coming from the vents. Kind of an...electrical smell. I turned onto the road that leads to the highway, and suddenly there were great clouds of greasy blue smoke billowing out of the vents, smelling vaguely like burned dog-crap (yes, I know what that smells like - another post, I'll tell you about it.)

Apparently, the sewing I planned to do this weekend has been replaced by dismantling my dash and seeing if I can find the cause of the smoke.

I wonder if I didn't subconsciously mess with my car so that I could engage in more Big Dress Avoidance, a term I learned from Brooke, who is also making herself two wedding dresses.

Oh well, at least it's leftovers tonight, so I don't have to cook dinner, and can run to my sewing room right now and finish the window seat for the cats. Now that IS Big Dress Avoidance at its best.

Labels: Big Dress Avoidance, CrazyRachelle

I had a near miss fender bender today - the guy in the turning lane next to me got a little ambitious, and tried to force himself into the space my car was already occupying. I straightened him out with a honk and a one finger salute glare. I personally do not give people the bird, so when such a thing happens, I blame it on CrazyRachelle.

See, there's Rachelle (that's me), and then there's CrazyRachelle.

I, Rachelle, am mild mannered, easygoing, and largely unconcerned with what's going on around me unless it directly affects me. When people are bitchy or rude, I normally barely notice, (which is probably bitchy and rude of me - oopsie.)

CrazyRachelle, on the other hand, is a traffic-fuelled rage-monkey. She only comes out when I get behind the wheel, but this chick is NUTS, yo!

Tailgaters beware; if she's in the slow lane and you're so close to her that all she can see in her rearview mirror is the hood of your car, she WILL take her foot off the gas and coast along however fast the car takes her, until you finally pull around her. And if you're in a really expensive car, talking on your cellphone while you're tailgating her with an empty fast lane beside you both, she might consider slamming on the brakes briefly, just to watch you drop your phone and scream.

That big empty lane beside you? The fast lane? They call it the fast lane for a reason, you jackass. Move over into it - there's no traffic over there, and if there is, THEY want to go as fast as you or faster.

And speaking of the fast lane - CrazyRachelle wants to make absolutely sure you are aware that they call it the fast lane for a reason. CrazyRachelle doesn't care that you're behind the wheel, watching a Disney movie on the drop-down widescreen, in-vehicle theatre in your giant, gas-sucking, minivan, and that you and the kids are singing "Bare Necessities". CrazyRachelle loves that song, too, and wishes she could hear it.

But there are two problems with what you're doing, and CrazyRachelle isn't even going to BOTHER talking about the fact that you're hurtling down the road in a two thousand pound vehicle which currently contains the fruit of your loins, and you're not watching the road.

She worries about your children, and hopes they make it through the trip, but frankly, what really pisses her off is that you're doing this IN THE FAST LANE. At 10KM below the speed limit.

She has two pieces of advice for you - one, GET OUT OF THE FAST LANE, DUMBASS, and two, before a long road-trip with the kiddies, take them to the library and let them pick out some books on CD. CrazyRachelle reccommends the unabridged versions of Charlotte's Web or Harry Potter (CrazyRachelle knows, you have the movies in your minivan, but trust her, there's stuff missing in there, including YOUR SAFETY!)

Anyway...

Nothing illustrates the difference between Rachelle and CrazyRachelle like the incident that happened to us last summer.

So there we were, turning left. CrazyRachelle waited our turn and got about halfway through the intersection when a Canada Post van came careening around the corner, across two lanes of traffic, and slid into her.

CrazyRachelle pulled over to the side of the road, and got out to survey the damage. She was so angry she was shaking, and when the mailman got out of his truck, she proceeded to ream him out, very rudely. She screamed said things like, "Where did you get your driver's license, Wal-Mart?" and "Maybe if you were tall enough to see over the dash AND reach the pedals, this wouldn't have happened!"

The mailman made a half-hearted attempt to blame the accident on CrazyRachelle, but the skidmarks on the road made it pretty obvious that it was his fault.

Fortunately, other than the fact that we were I was a little shaken up, there was really no damage to the vehicle, just a small flattened area and a smear of paint transfer from his white truck to my purple car, which rubbed off without a problem. By the time the mailman brought out his insurance information, CrazyRachelle went away, and I resurfaced. Unfortunately, for the unsuspecting mailman, that wasn't about to improve his situation.

The poor guy walked over to me, looking lumpish and mortified, clutching his insurance card. I gave him a toothy grin and said "You know, there's not much damage - I'm probably not going to claim anything, so if you want, we can just skip the whole insurance exchange thing." He brightened visibly, and said thank you, then started to turn to go back to his van, but I was suddenly wracked with guilt for all the mean things CrazyRachelle said.

So what do I do? Well, rather than just letting the guy go away with his dignity intact, I blurted out "Wanna hug it out?" then didn't bother to wait for a response - I grabbed the poor guy and awkwardly hugged it out, including some side-to-side rocking, and some enthusiastic back-patting.

Awk-ward!

Rachelle? Nice, but kind of creepy. CrazyRachelle? Not nice. And kind of judgmental.

Labels: awkward moments, CrazyRachelle