July 4th, 2017.

*At Maglieaux in Natchitoches, LA, ilyAIMY consisted of me and Kristen and her old partner in crime – Collier Hyams of 50 Man Machine!*

*some fountains running down to the river outside of the venue. It was a beautiful night, warm and muggy but we had a fun show and encountered friends of friends and had delicious food to boot.*

I’m staying IN tonight.

We got home early on Monday, July 3rd. I technically COULD have raced on over and run my open mic tonight but a) I didn’t want to and b) I’m glad I didn’t. Brennan had it well in hand, I could use the down time and when I’d gone to pick up my car it wasn’t working in any case.

I’d had to leave my Saturn over in a friends’ driveway because BGE (Baltimore Gas Electric) has been doing random construction in our area for months and when we called to see if our street was going to get ripped up (and our cars towed) while we were away, they informed us that they couldn’t assure us of when or where construction would possibly be in the upcoming week, much less month, and that we shouldn’t worry about it, their tow trucks rarely if ever damaged vehicles and since they’d tow to some place in the neighbourhood rather than a lot, we’d only be charged for the tow, not any kind of storage fee.

*So – the beast of Natchitoches isn’t an Irish Wolf Hound – it’s a Scottish Deerhound – and Collier’s beast is a magnificently Loving mammal!*

So yeah. Saturn. Friend’s driveway. Fuckers. However, on Monday when I went to pick up my fearless steed, the beast heeded my key but not my gear shift. Kristen’s car won’t stop. My car won’t go.

July 28th: So it all went wrong at the Denny’s. Cause it took them almost 40 minutes to realize they had the wrong leafy greens to make the salad I’d ordered…Then there was a little something I’ll just call Denny’s II: The Aftermath and the slightly better sequel, Denny’s III: Cobb Uprising… but working out that last installment meant that we got to chatting about the truck fire on route 40 just shy of the Tennessee line. The whole interstate is closed, which is why we took a detour and have taken up Arkansas’ most awesome motorsport: Passing Big Ass Farm Equipment. And it was all going so well till we met the Cow Thrasher…. shortly after this was a massive freight train that blocked our route further… this, that and the other. It was a long, long drive.

It being the day before July 4th and late in the day, of course my mechanic wasn’t picking up and there was no way I was getting it towed. My friend Ray and I spent much of today ripping open the car’s transmission chassis and looking for trouble and then he spotted a fairly obvious problem – a shattered shaft of metal where an axle ought to be. I vowed to call my mechanic and AAA in the morning and called it a day.

So – the artillery fire of a patriotic day rarely celebrated patriotically began at midnight last night and continues on into the evening. Whistle, whine, concussion, sizzle… we can’t see any from our house which is sort of a shame… but I’m also kind of EXHAUSTED so maybe it’s not such a bad thing. I’m worried about the car. It might finally be a killer. Don’t wanna go car shopping till AFTER the wedding.

So yeah. I’m staying IN tonight.