Saturday, December 20, 2008

Double Negatives

Remember learning in math that two negatives cancel each other out and become a positive? Today, I found a real-life application of that worthy principle!

So it's a Saturday and I'm running around like crazy trying to get everything all pulled together. My friend Jim has called and invited me to a chamber orchestra concert in a cathedral in Green Bay for the evening, and I have a birthday party for my friend Ella on the east side of Appleton right before that. Timing-wise it should be fine - ok, it's been snowing like ca-razy all day, but hey, that's the way she rolls in my lovely home state. Somewhere during the day I hit the "trunk unlock" button on my remote keyless entry thingy instead of my door unlock button (maybe something to do with the heavy mittens I'm too hurried to take off before using the remote??). Of course I don't figure it out till I'm actually in my car and the 'door ajar' light is on, but there's no way at that point I'm getting back out of my car to go shut my trunk - I figure I'll get to it the next time I'm out. So, I find a present for Ella, wrap it, and head over to the party. Have a great time, but finally figure out that I should have changed for the concert BEFORE coming to Ella's because now I barely have time to run home (west side of Appleton), change, and head back to Green Bay in the snowfall. I head out to the car, start it up, and realize there's too much snow on it to be able to just windshield-wiper it off. So I hop out, hit the door unlocker button, shut the door, and just as it closes realize that I had just hit the LOCKER button (I didn't know it would let you do that with the car running!!). So now I'm standing outside a running car, in the snow, on the wrong side of Appleton, trying the door desperately to make sure the handle isn't just joking with me, and wondering which of my friends who has a key to my place would be willing to come over here, get me, take me back to my apartment for the key, and bring us back to the running car.
Then it hits me! The trunk is open! And because I have this lovely Focus with the pass-through back seat, there's a chance I can push it forward from inside the trunk. You can guess the rest - there's no graceful way to reach yourself in around random trunk collect-y stuff, skis in the back seat, and into the car enough to reach the back door. I can only imagine what the neighbors thought, but I am happy to report that I was able to clear off my car, make it back to my place, change, NOT join the cars in the ditch on the way to Green Bay, and get to Jim's in time to hit the concert. And it was a lovely concert, at that. Merry Christmas!

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