Maura's Illuminated Manuscript

Here's a solid piece of good news: Allstate Insurance has paid for my stolen catalytic converter, minus the $100 deductible, and plus the anti-theft device, which the folks at Toyota said was unlikely to happen. So yay for Allstate, and yay for my nearly $4K debt being paid.

It's occurred to me that an expense like this might have ruined tens of millions of Americans. Not only can they not put nearly $4K on plastic for a few weeks, they can't afford the insurance to pay it off. And they depend on their cars as I don't. Even my son has the option of bumming his mother's car, even if he isn't on her insurance as a driver, or in less germy times mass transit.

A whole lot of things have gone wrong here, and fixing any of them would be an improvement. Living wages and decent transit systems would be an excellent start.

This all started as the Wendling was leaving the Devil Girl Pad as usual around noon on Wednesday. He said the car was vibrating (?!) so against his parents' wishes, he took mass transit back to his mother's. He thought it was because the car was nearly out of gas, which is patent nonsense.

When I started the car this morning, I realized that something was seriously wrong with the car: it was much louder, and I could smell exhaust. One of my neighbors, duly masked, heard the noise and came out to tell me that my catalytic converter had probably been stolen. We looked under the car, but we didn't see anything obviously broken or missing.

So, I made an appointment at Toyota of Seattle for ASAP and made the harrowing drive over a bridge and through a tunnel. (Punch line: there was something wrong with a railroad crossing signal, blinking but open. Someone from BNSF came out in a pickup and turned it off.)

Said the service tech:

1. "Thousands" of Priuses have had their catalytic converters stolen recently.
2. Because of the recent rash of thefts, the part is back ordered. It'll take a while.
3. It'll also take $3K-$4K. Oy.
4. However, insurance may cover it.
5. There are shields that you can by to prevent this kind of thing.
6. The thieves aren't selling the catalytic converters as parts; they're going after the platinum inside. Therefore, spikes in the price of platinum drive spikes in catalytic converter thefts.

Poo emoji. Well, at least this all happened just days after I drove the car for beautification two weekends in a row.

I had the day off today, and a good night's sleep last night. Circumflatulation etc. ensued.

Le sigh: I talked with Good Sister. She still doesn't know the status of our attempt to get Mom's house away from the reverse mortgage company, and she dreads explaining the situation (again?) to Mom. This means that I can't spend any tax return money that I get this year until further notice. I guess I'm going to accrue some interest.

Good: The idiot light in my car is most likely the result of the Wendling's failure to screw the gas cap on tightly enough, according to the distractingly attractive young lady at the Toyota dealership who met me at the door to their garage. Instead of chilling there all afternoon as I expected, I hit the nearby used rekkid store.

Aw, yeah: I pulled the trigger on buying a plane ticket to London. I'll be there April 9-22. I've been warned that I won't want to come home. I'm hoping I get to meet some of the trans women I've typed at on the Bird Site.

Not anticipation: I have all my W-2s, I think. I've printed out my 1040 & Schedule 1. That's right: time to do my taxes.

Anticipation: There shall be Neapolitan pizza with salad and beer this evening, courtesy of my son. He insisted on buying because I never told him what I wanted for my birthday. Honestly, I couldn't think of anything aside from that pizza. And a round-trip plane ticket to London.

Oh, and about the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: We queers owe him a huge debt that we must not forget*. He showed us the way, and that way involved getting in trouble and pissing people off. Fun fact, gleaned from KEXP: Stevie Wonder did a song called "Happy Birthday" that's about MLK. Wonder helped lead the campaign to get MLK Day made into a national holiday.



*You want to repay that debt? The closest you'll ever come is actively fighting racism.

My son is all right. My car may be totaled.

This all started on Saturday afternoon when I got the oil changed in my trusty 2006 Toyota Prius, a.k.a. the Sanctimobile. The service tech showed me a bulge in the left rear tire and recommended I get it replaced soon. I had plans that night and last night, and that bulge could have been there for weeks, so I figured I could get it taken care of this coming Saturday. I drove the length of Seattle a couple of times going to various Halloween festivities.

This morning, m'boy was on his way to school, going from southbound I-5 to eastbound I-90, when one of his tires blew. He lost control of the car, and as I later pieced together from multiple phone calls and texts, he hit the barrier, then another car, then the barrier again. He called me. I called AAA from the bus. The Seattle police showed up and called a tow truck. He cancelled the AAA tow. Ex picked up my badly shaken son and took him home. He'll be staying the night at her place.

Since this morning, I've found out that one of the axles broke, which must have made the car damn nigh impossible to control, a nightmare scenario for a driver. Ex generously paid for the tow, and I've since phoned in the insurance claim. Because of the broken axle, there's a good chance the insurance company will declare it totaled.

I've learned something that makes me feel better, if not my poor son: the tire that blew was one of the front tires. The one with the bulge? The left rear, if you'll recall. Replacing that one tire, which I was planning on doing*, would have done him no good.

Poor kid. This was a learning experience for him, but I wish it didn't have to be quite so scary. And he's understandably mad at me, or at least he was a few hours ago.



*Yeah, you're supposed to replace them in at least pairs and preferably full sets, but they were pretty good for tread. I'm pretty sure they were within their projected lifespan.

Bah:
Cracked passenger side mirror while trying to shimmy into tiny space next to column to pick up Nibs after her infusion.

Yay:
Mysterious growing mole is not any flavor of skin cancer. Whew!
Harvested quinces (I'm lucky my bush is smaller than kathrynt's.), spuds (a couple dozen), and apples that had previously hidden in the twilight.
Took rotary cutters to fabric without screwing up.
Mashed up the beginnings of a style sheet that I can use for all of Nibs' upcoming web site.

Lots of people around me are having moderately bad to really bad days lately, and this needs to stop. Even Nibs may have either gall stones or another ulcer. She was stranded at home yesterday when the Sanctimobile wouldn't start. It needed its main battery replaced, mostly under warranty, thank Bob. (We had to pay for the tow and the diagnosis.)

Me? I'm doing pretty well. I fixed my first bug, and I reported another one. I got my first XML schema to work. The commute isn't getting any better, but that's solvable.

Nun plan: tonight, CHAC & maybe Merc, with a remote chance of Re-bar. After last weekend's travel and extravagance, I think it's time for the increasingly inaccurately named Usual Haunts. And, of course, techno.

It's time for me to watch out for falling shoes.

ETA: Hey kathrynt, wasn't yesterday Cheese Weasel day?