I think I'm the last person that would consider making a charge of sexual discrimination, and keep arguing with myself that I'm possibly just a crabby bitch and over analyzing things. However, I started a new job about 3 weeks ago, and since the first week have felt EXTREMELY uncomfortable about the way the office is run, to the point that I've actually started keeping a list of annoyances.

I was hired as a requisitions officer, which means that I coordinate the billing process for all the active construction projects every month. Construction billing is more than just sending out an invoice, so the job is one of responsibility and accountability.

Within the first three weeks I have noticed the following -
- The controller consistently calls me on the intercom to come to his office to tell me inane shit that he could have said over the intercom.
- The controller has called me into his office on 2 occassions just to make him copies.
- There is a list up in the kitchen for kitchen clean up duty. Only the women in the office are on the list.
- There is a rotating schedule for reception coverage. Only the women in the office are on the schedule.

I feel that if I say anything to the effect that "I wasn't hired to make copies for anyone and cover the phones or clean the kitchen" I'll come off as a bitch that doesn't want to help around the office. However, I wasn't hired to be anyone's secretary and had I been told that that was the case, I wouldn't have taken the job. I feel that my authority in working with the project managers will be diminished if they think I'm simply some glorified secretary and I won't be able to do my job effectively.

As of now, I've decided to keep track of all the irritants for the next three months and bring it up at my review if I'm still bothered.

Am I overreacting?

So I'm gonna get some satellite radio. If anyone is familiar with both, a question:

Which is better, not taking Opie and Anthony or Stern (eventually) into account. I'm talking overall programming, service, etc.

I've been listening to both online over the weekend, and as far as programming alone goes, Sirius so far is FAR better. I haven't even looked into cost, hardware, etc, just want to hear some thoughts.

tonight at 10:00 on A&E

This SHOULD be the best show on TV

EVAR!

Tuesday, January 4:

On the way to my 2nd day of work at my new shit job, I get into an accident with some spic driving a '69 Ford Galaxy without a license. Though he was without a license, the accident itself was mostly my fault...mostly. The front end of my 88 Camry is mangled enough as it is, but is now even more so. Right side of the hood is all crumpled and separated, right light is fucked, blinker gone, grill fucked, front driver door opens only about 30% of the way, find out later the radiator is fucked. Having been involved in quite a few crashes, I didn't think the damage was too terrible at the time, only to find out from an estimate that it's totalled. It is still driveable though, so I drive it home with the right headlight basically pointing straight up.

Thursday, January 6:

Take the car in for a second opinion, the temperature getting about a half-inch above red all the way because of the radiator damage. Still, it makes it in for the estimate: TOTALLED. So I leave the car there for a couple of days and go to Enterprise (in the same place as the body shop) to rent a car for the time being: $27/day for a Sebring.

My dad knows a shitload more about cars than I do and has a friend Mike that does bodywork for fun for super cheap. Of course, my parents are on vacation for another 2 weeks. I didn't have the money to buy a new car and didn't want to rush into something even if I did. Plus, my final unemployment check was deposited a few days ago and I don't get paid until the 28th, meaning I'll have absolutely no income for the entire month.

Saturday, January 8:

Drive the Sebring to the body shop. Get there at 12, right when the tow truck said they'd be there. Figure that would be plenty of time to get back by 1:30 to watch the Rams-Seahawks wild card game. Tow guy gets there at 12:30, loads the car on, then it takes 45 FUCKING MINUTES to get my credit card authorized, so I end up missing the first quarter and a half. 2 hours and $80 later, the car is towed to my parents place.

Tuesday, January 18:

Parents get home from vacation. Dad will talk to Mike and see if anything can be done. Still, we're 95% sure I'll probably be needing to buy a new car.

Friday, January 21:

The 5-year anniversary of the day I totalled my previous car, an 87 Tercel. With my dad, drive the Sebring and Camry over to Mike's place to drop it off. Don't need anything fancy. No paintwork, no new parts, nothing. Just a junkyard light and radiator, straighten the hood if possible, just the absolute barest minimum.

Friday, January 28:

Finally get paid the most pathetic paycheck I've ever received. $33 more a week than I was getting on unemployment. Dude is still looking for parts. At this point I'm 98.87% sure I'm going to have to buy a new car. Of course, there is no possible way I will be able to do this given my current financial situation. So first of all I need to return the rental, which ended up running $700 after taxes and government fees and all that crap. There's no way I can afford that AND the cost of a new (used) car. So, the only real option to me was to cash in my bonds which I've had for anywhere from 15 years to forever. End up getting $1765 on them, which I figure will at least help with a downpayment should I need to buy a car, and to pay off some of the rental as well. Or best case scenario, help pay to get the Camry fixed.

Thursday, February 3:

Dad driving me to/from work all week. Mike still not able to find anything yet. Let him know if he can't get the stuff by tomorrow, forget about it and we'll trade it in. Now 99.97% sure I'm going to be needing a new car.

Friday, February 4:

Get a call around 8:30. The car is fixed! New black hood (on a gray car) which doesn't fit quite perfectly, but more than good enough. New headlight, repaired the original radiator. Some screws and bolts on the bumper holding it together. Only problem is the blinker is still hanging loose and not working. Big fucking deal. $600 cash, can't beat that. So $600 + $700 for the rental + $80 for the tow = $1380, which still beats going through the pain in the ass of buying a new car.

Wednesday, February 16:

Go to court and pay $280 ticket from the accident and sign up for online traffic school for another $39.

Tuesday, February 22:

On the way to work, car dies while stopped at a light. It starts up, but once it gets gas, it sputters out instantly. So I'm stuck in the right lane at Sahara & Decatur. Call for a tow, and 2 minutes before it gets there the car starts up again and is able to drive around for a few minutes, no problems. Weird. So the tow truck guy doesn't charge me anything and suggests I take it up a few blocks to Desert Toyota to get looked at. So I do that, then get a shuttle from Toyota to work, 2 hours late. At this point, I'm thinking there's something really fucked with it that's going to cost another few hundred bucks and that it was time to cut my losses and finally get a new car. At around 10:30 or so, about 2 hours after dropping it off, I get a call from Toyota expecting the worst. Turns out it was a "pretty simple" problem - the air intake tube had come loose, so they just had to reconnect it. Probably took them all of 5 minutes to do. The bill: $65. Not too bad though considering it's the dealership, and considering it would have cost $98 for them to just look at it had I chosen not to have anything fixed.

Saturday, February 26:

Complete and pass online driving school while getting completely shitfaced.

Monday, February 28:

Go outside at 7AM to head off to work. Car is gone. GONE! Stolen. Unfuckingbelievable! I call 311 and report it, along with everything that I had in the car: cell phone, mp3 player, glasses, prescription sunglasses, cassette tapes, my jacket, jumper cables, baseball bat, change, and my friend's computer case/motherboard and 125 burned DVD's which were in the trunk. He had just moved Sunday and I was going to copy some movies from him and use his spare case as a test box.

Now, my initial thought was: who the fuck would steal a beat up 88 Camry? Of all the cars in the parking lot, they pick THAT ONE to steal? Older Camry's are of course one of the most stolen cars in the country. But it's mostly for the rarity of the parts, especially the front end, which, of course, was completely torn apart on mine. So next my mind wandered over to spicboy from the accident, but realized there's no way he'd have my address since my license has my parents' address and the registration my brother's. Mike? I paid him cash and my address was nowhere in the car, so there's no way he'd even know where I live. On the other hand, the first question Toyota asked when I took it in was if I'd been there before, and the second question was what my address was. By Monday night I had myself convinced this was an inside job by some spiggers at Toyota. They opened the hood, saw the engine and everything was still in very good shape, and knew they'd be able to make some serious bank by stripping it down and selling whatever they wanted. Or maybe they know someone who was desperate for parts. So they either picked the lock and jumpstarted it or had it towed sometime late Sunday/early Monday morning. It's just way too much of a coincidence that the car gets stolen less than a week after taking it in to them. And there's absolutely nothing that I could do to prove it; this isn't the fucking movies and I am not Buford Pusser.

Tuesday, March 1:

Now 100.00% certain I'm going to need to buy a new car. This after pissing away $1700 and bonds on the Camry. What a bunch of horsecock. So, spend the next couple of days car shopping and filing the homeowners claim on the stuff that was in the car. Somehow am able to make it through without murdering anyone or wrecking any furniture/appliances.

Thursday, March 3:

Go from work to Henderson Hyundai and get an '02 Accent out the door for $7000. My parents have perfect credit and a deck of cards, so they charged it, will transfer it to a 0% APR and I'll pay it off over the next few years.

Get home around 9 as I had every day this week. Check my messages and there's one from the police dept from 7:30 in the morning, reporting that they FOUND THE STOLEN CAMRY (WHAT THE FUCK!) and it was towed. So I call the towing place (ironically the same place that I used in January). I can come in and look at the car for free, but it'll cost $195.50 to pick it up tomorrow or an extra $30 on Saturday. They had no info on whether or not the car was even driveable or what kind of condition it was in. So I call the police and they can't see in their system the kind of condition the car is in either. Just where it was found - about 10 minutes from me and in a very good neighborhood. So, I'll need to go down Friday during lunch to see what's left of the car.

Friday, March 4:

Go down to the tow place, once again expecting the worst. The car is still in one piece, no more additional damage to the front end or anywhere. The only kind of damage to the car itself was that the rear view mirror was taken off and in the back seat for some reason. The front license plate was kind of loose, and the ashtray was pulled out. That's it. No damage to the ignition, the starter; anything. Of course, all of my shit was gone, save the bat, some cassette tapes, and the jumper cables. And the douchefuck left a pair of gloves and a winter hat in the car, too. So I pay the $195.50 (cash only) and drive it back to work, where I now have 2 cars. Drive the Hyundai home after work and get a ride back to work a few hours later and drive the Camry home as well.


So to sum up, in about 2 months time my car has been:

totalled
broken down in traffic
stolen

and yet, it is still alive and well. It is the car that just will not die; it will simply not go away. It is drawn to me by some sort of cosmic force or something. Every single time I think the end has been reached, it comes back again and again. It is invincible.

Of course, I've got quite a dilemma now, being stuck with 2 cars. I am tempted to hold on to the Camry; out of just pure respect. If the first 2 months of the year are any indicator, something completely bizarre and fucked up will happen and I will end up having no car at all in a matter of weeks. Stay tuned...

<div align="center"></div>

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.mercora.com/">http://www.mercora.com/</a><!-- m -->

P2P radio, check it out.

Guess how much I will win or lose. closest gets a milkshake.

Looks like my insurance company is writing the vehicle off as a total loss.

So what should I get?

I was looking at the Ford Escape...