Shaking my fist at the universe

I have had one lousy weekend. No, lousy’s not a strong enough word. Let’s go with shitty instead. That’s closer to how I really feel.

Let’s start with Enterprise Rent A Car, which, much like the rental car company in that Seinfeld episode, knows how to take a reservation, but does not know how to actually have the vehicle you have reserved ready and waiting for you. The admittedly very apologetic girl told me there’d been some sort of mix-up when I made my reservation online. Never mind that I had actually called that branch in person with a question and the guy told me he couldn’t give me the rate I’d been quoted online and directed me to go ahead and make the reservation that way. And what I needed was a cargo van, which apparently was very hot commodity in this area on Saturday. Thank goodness for UHaul, who I had initially dismissed in favor of Enterprise because I found their website so incredibly annoying. No, I don’t need boxes, storage, movers, a dolly or packing tape. Why do I have to tell you what I had for dinner last night so I can get a quote on a van rental? At least when I called them rather than going online (see next item) I could say that to a person and speed the process along, and unlike Enterprise, they not only took my reservation, they actually rented me a van.

Shortly following the Enterprise debacle, two of the three computers in my house decided to stop working. My laptop is still a little shaky. I’m not sure exactly what I did this time that got it started and running, so who knows if it will start again the next time I try. Goddamn Bill Gates and his crappy operating system. Seriously, all of this was because Windows just decided to stop cooperating on both machines, for completely different reasons. Two different manufacturers, two different versions of Windows, two different people using the computers on a regular basis, and they both just stopped working. Words fail me when I try to express how insanely frustrating that is.

Let’s see, we treated ourselves to takeout both Friday and Saturday nights, and on both nights, the food was disappointing.

And then today rolled around. I really did not enjoy today. John and I had a fight, which we rarely do. We’re a good fit for each other, and while we can argue over slight differences of opinion on the separation of church and state or music or interpretations of history for hours, we just don’t fight. This one was even worse because it came out of nowhere. One second I was in the car congratulating myself on buying Dunkin Donuts but not getting any for myself (sadly, this virtuousness was later rendered completely useless by me scarfing down three cupcakes and a glass of wine, but this day sucked and my diabetes can bite me, just this once), and the next, whammo, we were in the middle of a fight.

Even better, we had to go see my mom immediately afterwards. She was at the opening of her stupid farmer’s market that is outside, and yet does not allow pets – a fact she might have mentioned to me since she knows we take Seamus with us to most places where he might be welcome. There were a bunch of people who showed up with dogs in the ten minutes that I was there, so I think they are going to have to reconsider that rule. It’s a dumb rule. But whatever, at that point I wasn’t really interested in making polite conversation with her friends and fellow farmer’s-market-starters anyway. And then we got to go hang out with John’s sister and dad and pretend we weren’t mad at each other while divvying up John’s mom’s possessions and loading up our UHaul rented van with stuff to go to the dump. Actually, that part went far better than I thought it would, even pre-fight. It was good to see John’s dad, and my sister-in-law behaved herself, and she had my small, sweet new little niece with her. There was this one moment, as I sat there watching John cuddle with and nuzzle this tiny little baby, that I had to work very hard not to cry. It was simultaneously very touching and heartbreaking to see, given my current lame, barren state. And so we made it through our day, and came home to sit on the couch, in my case reading and eating cupcakes. I sure am glad this weekend is pretty much over.