Holy crap, I got into another accident. As if breaking my light and denting my car last time wasn’t enough! (All that got fixed for under $100, fortunately.) This time, there was basically no damage to my car. It might have scuffed the paint a little, but that mark might have already been there, I’m not sure. I was backing out of a parking space and a pickup truck materialized behind me. I swear. My bumper dented his rear right corner just a bit. It’s the kind of thing that you see cars driving around with all the time, but we exchanged insurance information so I assume he’s going to file a claim. I already called USAA and notified them; the guy couldn’t promise anything but he sounded pretty sure my premium wouldn’t go up, since this is my first accident…with them…that they know about. Will I ever grow out of the days of countless bumps and scrapes? Will I ever end up in an accident so bad I am injured? On the way out of the city, I saw a six-car pileup, and that made me feel a little bit better. I only felt unhappy for a couple of hours; those people had their whole weekend ruined.

Following the ribbon-stealing incident I posted about earlier today, grail76 suggested a “Support Our Gay Troops” magnet. I immediately thought of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, and how that would be a great fundraiser for them. I e-mailed them and suggested it, but then I realized - I can just do it myself, and give them the cash! This is what it looks like:

This post is a solicitation. The more custom magnets ordered, the cheaper it is per magnet, so I need YOU to help! If you would be interested in having one of these magnets for your car, refrigerator, and anything else, let me know! You can comment on this post, send me an e-mail, or anything else you like. I am thinking to charge $10 for one magnet and $8 for each additional magnet. This is over the actual cost of magnet + shipping, but it’s going to SLDN, which is doing essential work during this period of wartime. Donations over and beyond the price I’m charging are welcome, I am not planning to make ANY profit, this is all going to SLDN, because they need it. (International shipping is extra, BTW - if you’re outside the U.S. just let me know and I’ll figure out the additional cost.)

Last night on my way home from the pool, my car’s Check Engine light came on. This morning, I stopped by the local gas station that has service bays, and I asked if that was something they could handle. They said yes, and it would take about two hours and cost $135. I said I had to go to work, but that I would probably be back tonight or tomorrow.

Now, I happen to know that the Check Engine light can go on for a million reasons, some of which will crash your car and some of which are really silly. These reasons are all categorized according to OBD II codes, and anybody with a reader can find out what they are. I looked online and found a fancy code reader that hooks up to your laptop for $160, and a less fancy one that just spits out a code for about $30. I figured even the expensive one would be a good investment, if going to the mechanic was going to cost $135! So I called Advance Auto Parts and asked if they sell OBD II code readers. They do, both the fancy and regular kind, so I went over there after work.

It turns out they had one in shop and they let me use it for free! I walked out to my car, plugged it in, pushed some buttons, and went back in to have them print out the results. It turned out to be P0171 which most likely indicates a dirty sensor that I can clean off myself. So it took 10 minutes and $0 rather than two hours and $135. And it’s something I can fix myself. Woo hoo!

LemonFree.com is a used car classifieds site, making it an alternative to Craigslist etc. You can search by make/model, year, and location (the advanced search adds in mileage and price). One nice feature of LemonFree is that if you don’t turn up any results for your exact search, it will automatically pull in eBay listings that it thinks are relevant to your search.

I had fun with two searches on LemonFree.com. The first was for a Mazda Protege because that’s what I bought from my mom a couple of months ago. There were none in Virginia, but there were some around the country; they all had mileage substantially higher than the 13,000 miles I bought it with. Another fun search was the “1900-1950″ search, which turned up a bunch of ancient Model T Fords and some other cars that have the sleek stylings shown in today’s modern PT Cruiser.

I just satisfied all of my auto technology needs in one fell swoop. I got a car charger for my Sidekick, a car charger for my 3G iPod, and an audio-cassette adapter for the iPod so I can play it through my car’s cassette player. Plus I got a spare home charger for my Sidekick, which is handy. All for $14.88 shipped. This definitely beats the $30 Sidekick charger they wanted to sell me at Radio Shack on Friday, and the $25 FM transmitter I bought there that doesn’t even charge my iPod. So I can return that transmitter and wait to get my stuff in the mail - all from the same eBay seller! - and then I will be one very happy camper. Or driver, as the case may be.

I got home about 1:00am and found that :MK: - my wife’s sister, who lives with us, in case you haven’t heard me mention that a million times before - had parked down the driveway. Now, normally A and I park down the driveway, and MK&R park on the street. During splatter-berry season, they park on the cross-street, because there is nowhere to park on the street where their cars will not be pummeled with messy sticky berries. On Friday night I had to park on the street because :MK: had allowed utility people to park on our driveway because she didn’t know I would be coming home so early. (It happens that they were there until after I would have normally been home, so being early didn’t actually have anything to do with it.) But my white car got all splatted up, and I need to find a car wash at some point.

Anyway, I pulled down the driveway and blocked her car and A’s car in because I was too damn tired and my feet hurt too damn much to park on the street or the cross-street. I went in and checked :MK:’s work schedule…she had to work Sunday morning. And she leaves at 5:30am. I started to write a note asking her to please move my car when she had to leave, but I didn’t want it parked on the street, so could she also move mine back down after she had moved hers up, etc. I decided that was too complicated and I should just do it myself. But I didn’t want to do the complicated stuff, so I got the brilliant idea into my head that I would move my car onto the lawn, back hers up a bit, and then move mine into its normal spot.

Yeah, that whole “onto the lawn thing” I just mentioned? Not very bright. Because, you see, I could not then get my car OFF the lawn. I ended up ripping giant holes in our lawn and the neighbors’ lawn, because I was desperately seeking a way back onto a paved surface. It was 1:00am, I was exhausted, my feet hurt, and I was really pissed that :MK: had parked down the driveway on a day when she’d have to leave for work at 5:30am. Once the cars had finally switched places - and as I came in I could see huge gashes in the lawns - I left her a note saying please do not park down the driveway unless I am out of town. Because, really, it is my parking space. If she has to bring in something heavy, I don’t mind if she pulls down the driveway to bring it in and then backs out again. But for her to park down the driveway because she is too goddamn lazy is just not okay with me. I woke up A and she agreed that it’s my parking space. (See, she owns the house, and I am her partner, and MK&R are tenants. Hence me getting the good parking space.)

Anyway, I was just absolutely furious, and I had to take one of A’s Ativan so I could calm down enough to get to sleep. Fortunately I was very tired, so I managed to fall asleep pretty quickly. Unfortunately I had a crummy day on Sunday because :MK: and I were upset with each other all day, and I’m having another crummy day today because tonight I have to go over to the neighbors’ house and apologize and offer to reseed their lawn, which I don’t know how to do. (Yes, I’ve printed instructions off the internet.) So I generally had a bad weekend, you could say.

• I am getting to play travel agent. I like playing travel agent. The numbers are alarmingly large, but I still like playing travel agent!
• I don’t have to go to the office tomorrow after all! I will either be in my normal job all day, or I will have a holiday lunch assignment at a restaurant near here, and I’ll be teamed with my supervisor who will creatively schedule my annual review around the lunch assignment so I will have a short day! And fortunately I was able to put my Diet-to-Go food back to my usual pickup location, instead of the place in McLean I’d moved it to when I thought I was going to be in Silver Spring.
• My Coexist sticker finally arrived, I put my DOD decals on, I have my own license plates on, I have insurance, and everything is happy skippy with my car. She looks good!
• I mailed my application to Gallaudet yesterday. I know I’ve mentioned it a billion times, but it’s on my mind a lot. I am excited and scared! Fortunately the school-provided health insurance is United Healthcare’s Choice Plus plan, and my current physician already accepts them, so I won’t even have to switch doctors!
• Today is a woot-off! It’s been going very slowly though.

I’ve got two sets of papers I’m working on right now.

The first is the title and registration documents for my car. The PDF forms from the website were fillable, so everything is all nice and tidy except for the handwritten parts of the sale price form. I hope I haven’t left anything out; I’m planning to go to the DMV after work tomorrow and then hopefully by Wednesday morning I will be able to get replacement DOD stickers for my car so the guards don’t have to keep peering at my temporary parking pass every morning. I’ll also be able to get on base if I need to, which I haven’t been able to do for a couple of months now.

The other forms are my application to Gallaudet. I’m trying to figure out how to handle being a returning student. I can have my transcripts sent from WMC (freshman year) and NOVA (evening classes in interpreting), but the application has a section for my high school information. When I e-mailed the admissions department to ask about that, they said “oh, well, they keep records for 10 years, they should still have yours.” So I found the e-mail address for a teacher I knew who is still there, and e-mailed her to ask who I needed to contact to see if they had my information. Hah. The forms also ask for my SAT scores, and those are no longer available online, I have to get them by calling or something. I don’t see why my college transcripts aren’t enough. Fortunately I’ve already got a few people who are willing to write recommendations for me, so at least that’s taken care of.

They wouldn’t let me rent a car this morning. Apparently my check card is not sufficient; I have to have a credit card, even though I use the check card as a credit card all the time. They ran some check on my check card and declined me for a rental, which is absurd because I have plenty of money in my checking account - the most they charge for a deposit is $400. Once I’d been declined, they wouldn’t let me rent a car in any other way, even writing a check - nothing. Fortunately A had stayed to make sure I got the car okay, so she ended up renting the car for herself (the guy sternly told us that I was not allowed to drive it) and I ended up borrowing her car again. This is all quite preposterous, but I may end up getting a credit card and just never using it.

The good news is that we’re going to Six Flags Great Adventure this weekend, just for fun.

I wrecked my car today. Oops. I’m fine, though the car is not.

I was on my way to work and I rear-ended a pickup truck in front of me. We were in a long line of cars at a light, and as I went to apply the brake, I hit the accelerator. The front of my car was immediately smashed in and it started smoking as I pulled into the adjacent turn lane. The pickup’s bumper was dented a bit but otherwise fine. We exchanged information, and I was on the phone with A (it’s her car) while the other guy was calling State Farm - fortunately we both have the same insurance, at least.

The police came to take a report, and apparently the county requires them to issue a ticket to somebody. So the officer gave me a $30 ticket for “failure to maintain control of a vehicle” which comes with a $57 processing fee. The tow truck he called brought me to a nearby impound lot, and A arrived to get me a couple of hours later. We don’t know what the car’s fate will be - whether it’s truly totaled, or worth repairing - so I took everything off the car. That included the roof rack (though not the feet, which are vehicle-specific anyway), antenna ball, license plate frame, and the entire contents (including the buttons on the interior roof). A took me to my favorite vegan restaurant for lunch, and then we came home and took a nap. To say I had a rough morning is putting it mildly.

Like I said, I’m physically fine. The airbags didn’t deploy, I wasn’t hurt at all. Tomorrow I’m going to borrow A’s car to get to work, and she’s going to borrow her mom’s car because her mom doesn’t need to go anywhere tomorrow. For Wednesday through Friday I have already set up a reservation through Enterprise Rent-A-Car, which is the first time I’ve rented a car. That’s pretty much all there is to tell.