Home of K-fab

Red Lights and Slow Lines

Ever have one of those days where if it can slow you down it will slow you down?

Been a comically fun day. I'm totally chilled and nuttin's gonna bother me. Just cruising along with the breeze.

I feel like writing so sit back and have a read.

Up at 7:30. In the chicken coop by 8:15. Gonna finish the wiring come Hell or high water (heat, on the other hand, wins. No bueno). Have to take dawgs to the groomer at 11a.

I finished up the coop wiring about 10:40. Perfect! Heat is just starting to be noticed.

May have talked to Bob in da shop just before heading to the groomer. Wicked flower, that one...

I get into the groomer's and Bob's just making his presence known.
There are two others in the place, picking up their pooches.

Guy behind the counter (cool dude, son of shop owner) sees me and says "Erica will be right up."
I look up and say "Uh, not for me. I'm dropping off two, not picking any up."
He looks at me kinda funny and says "No, Erica the groomer will be up in a minute to grab your dogs."
(giggled inside pretty hard at myself. I think it set the stage for the afternoon.)

Dawgs dropped off. Check.

Decide to get car washed as it's needed it desperately and I'm REALLY BAD about washing it.

Traffic is bad on Scottsdale road. Bob and I decided I'll take back roads from the groomer to the car wash. Trying to get out of the dog grooming shopping center and headed in the right direction is going to be a cluster and I don't feel like fighting traffic. Right turn out of the lot.

I get to the first intersection and the red is light. Turn right, head down Hayden to the road that I believe to be just south of the car wash. I catch both red lights at crossing intersections. I get to Deer Valley and the light turns red but I can turn right after stopping. Screech, stop, look, go. Headed back to Scottsdale road now.

Of course I arrive at the intersection Deer Valley and Scottsdale as the light turns red. I'm starting to see a pattern.

I start scoping out the area and my gut says "turn right" but brain looks left and sees what could be car wash corner. "We go that-a-way." is muttered by the control unit between my ears.

Wait for light to turn green, turn left.

Nope, wrong way. Crap. Okay, time to make a loop around the block...

I arrive at the next intersection to turn left, to start my drive around the block, just as the light goes red.
Oh fun, not only is it a long light but has a protected turn only on arrow light that's the last thing that happens through the cycle.
Argh.

What seems like 1.5 hrs later...
Green.

Go! I head back to my original "back road" and like clockwork I hit the intersection as it turns red. Damn.

Wait...
Wait...

Green. Back to the intersection that gut told me to turn right at but brain over rode. I turn right after coming to a stop at the red. It appears that if a light sees me coming, it was going to turn or be red and I was gonna hit it.

Decided to just be entertained by this instead of frustrated.

Sure enough, the car wash is right there just a few yards down the road. Gut was correct! Has to be Bob talking. After all, he has a direct link to gut.

Missed the turn in. Shit, there it goes. No biggie, there's a second turn in in another hunnert feet. It lets me go around the building and come into the car wash via "the back way".

There are three intake lines into the car wash. All three have traffic sitting in them.

White SUV in lane 2 had just backed out from behind black SUV in lane 1. I think "okay, they've been there a couple of minutes so black SUV should be done next. I'll take white SUV's spot behind it."

Black SUV driver is out and talking away to a greeter.

Another greeter comes up to me. We decide what wash package (I decided... they try to upsell and get you to join a club and, and, and) I want. Greeter points to lane 2 and says head there. White SUV driver has already exited her car and is headed inside.

I see a car coming around "the back way" that I had come in through just as I put it in reverse. I could see what was going to happen before I could do squat. New guy takes my spot in lane 2.
Screw it, I'll sit in lane 1. Black SUV guy HAS to be done any second.

What seems like 1.5 hrs later...
Lane 2 snaker is out of his car and headed inside. SHIT.

Greeter gives black SUV a ticket that's 2 feet long. What, did they sell him? An extended car warranty? Jesus!
He gets back in his SUV and drives forward to staging. I'm already pulling into lane 2. It's open and I'm gonna get in it, damnit!

Greeter moves the cone out of my way and as I pulled past him I informed him that "cones are apex and track out markers. It was safe from me hitting it." He looked confused... (surprise)

I have my ticket in hand (have had since before getting snaked), have pulled into staging, get out and head inside to get something to drink and pay.

Black SUV guy beats me to register by 10 feet. I was stupid and stopped to snag a bottle of water.
Shit.

Must have been a red light at the counter...

I stood there behind him and waited for what seemed like another 1.5 hours. Took two clerks to get him through. I kept trying to make eye contact with the one that didn't seem directly involved in what ever was going on. No such luck.

Black SUV guy finally steps away from the register and I take all of 15 seconds to check out.

Had a little giggle to myself and then after I was checked through I asked the clerk "So, did you guys sell him an extended car warranty?" Clerk looked at me kinda funny and said his card had some extra charge on it or something like that.

Got outside to see a cleaner car sitting in line under the awning. They're detailing it now. At least it was out of the washing machine by the time I got outside. Wait time would be minimal.

Then again I spent 1.5 hrs in line just a minute ago...

I walk up to the worker that's doing the towel thing that car wash attendants do with their towels and I ask if they have something to remove the rubber streaks from my last track days, as I point to the black marks on the side of the car.

"No comprende." Yeah, I saw that in your eyes the moment I started talking. I grew up in South Texas, I'm very familiar with this look. - and returning it too, on occasion. The worker doesn't speak English. Of course not! And my Espanol is limited to only finding food, the room of relief and fuel. The necessities. There's not gonna be any conversation with him. I stand there for a second and decide just to go sit down and see if anything happens.

A few minutes later a manager walks up, points at my car and looks around for whoever is gonna react. He said something but I couldn't hear over the vacuums.

There's an older guy (which is a great Paul Gilbert song, by the way) with a great comb over - that wispy seventy three hairs attached to one ear and slid over to the other one - sitting on the bench next to my car. He stands up, walks over to the guy looking for me and starts jabbering away. Manager asks him "is this your car" as he points at mine. I'm already on my feet headed towards the manager.

"Yeah, that's MY car." and I cut off Jabber Jaw mid sentence. Sometimes ya just have to step in and take over. Once he got it straight that this was my conversation he just turned around and sat down.

Manager asked me what I was asking Mr. No Hablo about.
I told him.
He walked over to his cart that's filled with an array of cleaning and detailing chemicals and pulls out a bottle of some magic potion. He then walks over to my car, sprayed the tire mark and wiped it right off.

YAY! I left the car wash feeling triumphant. Been trying to get those marks off for a while now.

Red lights all the way home and the two vehicles ahead of me fought each other off the line to 43 mph in a 50 at least three lights in a row. I thought the snowbirds had gone home.

Get home, go into my shop and start to get the solar panels ready to mount and wire into the coop.

Much to my surprise it went really well. No screw ups! Just diligent, accomplished work. Now it's just screw in eight lag screws and solder two joints and it's done. Yay! Another triumph in my day. My buddy Jay (who started this whole coop thing by giving me a bunch of solar panels) is coming over tomorrow evening after work to help mount panels. They're just heavy and large enough to be awkward and not a one man job. Especially when there's a ladder and a slick metal roof involved.

Not heard from the groomer yet.

Decide to go snag lunch. Gut's grumbling. I want a chicken Caesar salad from Venues Cafe (have been craving one for a bit). Will eat half for lunch, the other half for dinner.

I get there and it looks quiet. There's a woman standing in front of the door looking a bit stressed. "Is it closed?" I ask?
"Yes, it is." Then I remembered, "Oh yeah, it's Monday."

Shit. Another red light in my day's progress.

I stop at AJ's grocery (it's on the way home from where I'd planned on filling my belly) and grab one of the last things of sushi, a bottle of soy sauce and a 6 pack of Voodoo Ranger IPAs.

Get home, sit to eat and dawg groomer calls as I shove the first piece of sushi into my mouth. Perfect timing.

I ate, went to get dawgs and I think I may have gotten lucky and hit just one light as it turned green. There were a bunch of slow moving cars around but I didn't come to a stop. As per the norm of earlier, if I was going to go through it, it was going to become red.

I didn't want to fight traffic, which is heavy for this time of day, so once again as I left the groomer's, I turned right out of the parking lot. Been here, done this.

And yeah, you guessed it. I hit EVERY red light (4 more) on the way home except for the very last light that I drive through before turning onto my home street of Via Dona.

WIN!!!

I'm now holding down couch, typing away and watching da news.

I enjoy a randomly comical event filled day on occasion.