Color COVID

At what point do I get to wake up somewhere other than Vladimir Putin's America? Here it is- May 9th- and I'm swaddled in my winter clothing, picking through the woodpile searching for a few sticks to burn? It's actually flurrying with the sun out and we're all still quarantined from COVID 19 and WTF!! When I walked back from the mailbox, it was near white-out conditions...
I have begun the lovely task of assembling annuals, perennials and shrubs and vegetable plants to populate our many gardens and beds but I had to hustle them all back into my studio so they didn't freeze to death last night. And what of the hummingbirds?!  There have been a bunch of them- right on schedule!- flying around and landing on our feeder; I may have to install a nectar heater! But where do they spend the night?

This isn't half of them! The seedlings and tender things are all over our dining table and every available window sill. (We have temporary shelving on several windows...) Even today, the wind is so strong and sharp that they're all hunkered down inside.
So I had an exciting adventure yesterday morning. I called our local hardware/feed store and ordered and pre-paid for the horse food I need so that I wouldn't have to enter the building. As is typical protocol now, they said they'd leave the two bags on the rear loading dock. I drove our trusty car (running like a top!) to the back of the store, put it in reverse and hoped for the best. I say this because the driveway leading up to the loading dock is seriously narrow and surrounded on both sides high concrete walls and a chain link fence too boot. Add to the already trying circumstances is that I have my sunglasses and face mask on so that the mask was causing the sunglasses to fog slightly. I carefully calibrated that the right passenger side of the car was the trickier side to gauge my proximity to the imposing wall and backed up... BAM!!! Oh, I hit something!!
I pulled my car forward, exited and went to survey the damage. Trusty the Car looked fine but when I turned around, I realized that I had hit the corner post and it had caused the chain link fence to bow out. Yikes!

See? Nothing! Bernie didn't even get scratched! (I had feared having smashed a taillight or dented the fender area.)
Needless to say, I was mortified and knew I had to do the right thing. So I gloved up- already in my mask- and entered the store, which of course, was packed with customers and there were no sales people free. I exited and instead confessed by cell phone what I had done. I also walked to the back of the store and found three (3!!) male employees on the loading dock (all wearing masks) shaking their heads and... LAUGHING! Like "hahahaha; dumb blonde!!" In this case, I really didn't care as I confided just how stupid I felt and offered insurance information if they needed to press charges or put in a claim. But they were great and made plans among themselves to straighten it out. (In truth, it wasn't that bad!) They actually asked if I had gotten my two bags of beet pulp okay (yes, but need I remind you, these weigh 50 pounds apiece!) and told me to "have a nice day". I told Bob that the next time he went to our hardware store, he should view my signature "Damage by Rita" installation. I may avoid the store myself for a while as I'm certain they'll all be giggling at me when I come in...

Can It Get Any Weirder?

I'll tease with the above picture but start my dialog by saying, "You know how Bob and I have been having really bad luck with cars and trucks for the past few months?" Well, it only gets weirder so read on.
Our good friends Caltha and Jerry gave us their used Subaru Impreza. Gave it, as in "free"... very generous indeed! Gotta love friends like that! Thank you!!! By last Sunday, it was registered, legal and ours and in our yard, awaiting a muffler replacement, to be done by a friend of a friend (also named Bob). There were a few part-not-ordered mishaps (thanks to the AutoZone in the next town- don't get me going) but the parts were assembled and Car Bob installed the system. It only took an hour, we fired it up and it ran like a charm. I did some errands, exclaiming how wonderful it was to be a two-vehicle household again.
Monday morning I say to Bob, "Just think; I'll drive the car to work and the truck is here, ready to take you to the store or deliver a job you've finished... whatever you need to do!" Of course, nothing is that simple. The car exploded to life but proceeded to get louder and louder and wouldn't run without my foot on the gas. So I sat there thinking, "This is too much". Bob heard the car's commotion from all the way down in his studio and when I turned the car off (as there was no way I could drive it) it kept making this over-heated pinging noise and generally acted like it was going to explode. Needless to say, I took the truck.
So at lunch, I decided to drive up to the garage that had disposed of my Honda and get the $50 that scrapping the car had gotten (Pathetic). I got in the truck, looked ahead of me, saw a co-worker  standing in front of me, standing in front of his truck and I thought, "Oh, I'll never fit between him and the next car over. I'll just back up." The result is the damaged car, above.
You see, the truck is very high. When I looked out my back window, I didn't even see the Volkswagon Passat directly behind me. It gets worse.
I go into the building to find my victim, who turns out to be an elderly (and now irate) customer of the auction house who was there to consign merchandise. I sheepishly confess what I have done- really, I felt terrible (and stupid!) but hey! I wasn't trying to hit her (deep breath) brand new (as in she hasn't even had it a week) car. I mean, brand spanking new...
I will not go into the pitch of her fury or that she insisted I call the State Police, who told me that as I readily admitted that I'd hit her car and it was on private property and no one was hurt, they didn't really need to send a trooper. But she insisted; I think she was hoping the feds would haul me off in leg irons. The police officer who arrived was very nice, and I am sorry to say, entertained by how out for vengeance (or at least a pound of flesh) my victim was. He actually smiled benevolently at me and her and said, "Look: it was an accident. She (me) admits she hit your car. All you need to do is exchange information." My victim kept insisting that the police officer write up a report, treating it as a crime scene. He replied that they don't investigate or file reports on cases like this, as there was no case. She kept insisting that I be publicly stoned or taken to a labor camp or at least chained to a rock where Ford F 150's would back up into me all day long. Something, anything... she wanted justice.

(Insult to injury, absolutely nothing happened to our truck. I think that bulge in front of the license plate directly impacted her hood. Sorry!) The upshot was that she decided she didn't feel safe driving her car and would wait for a tow truck to drag her poor car all the way to Greenwich (although the police officer and a few of my sympathetic* co-workers assured her that absolutely nothing had happened to her engine, just her hood was smashed in and looked dramatically awful but it started and ran just fine.) Did I say I felt really bad? I did, several thousand times but she did her best to berate me, so much so that it got funny and even the police officer was laughing. (Discretely, but he was amused.) She actually waited for that tow truck all afternoon. Like until 4:00. We all took turns, looking out the window expressing disbelief that she was still there. Even the cop, who had kept a vigil with her finally left. (I bet she gets a bigger car next time she's in the market for a new ride.) I drove all the way home at twenty miles an hour and will only go forward from now on.
And the car? Car Bob came back out to check out what on earth had caused the Subaru to threaten to explode... but of course when Bob and Bob started it up and took it out for a test drive, it performed perfectly. Am I nuts? Did we need this? Bob and I can't believe our bad "kar-ma".

*Sympathetic to me as she really was a bitch. I mean, yes, I wrecked her brand new car and probably ruined the rest of her life but give me a break! I was very contrite! My co-workers all watched as she continued to harangue me.