Lorraine Says: Traffic Monster

In three months of working at HaryCarumba I’ve been late one time, and that was by three minutes.

Today, I had an early appointment in Miami and on the way from there to work I hit all of the traffic ever invented. Plus, despite living north of the area practically all my life, I know absolutely nothing about navigating Miami. I had my GPS on and was driving with my seat back at a 90° angle, my hands at 10 and 2, no music playing, and was strictly obeying the speed limits. Yes. I was that person.

At some point when I was supposed to be taking an exit to get onto I-95 north, the GPS gave me the following directions: keep left at the fork. Keep right at the fork. Keep right at the fork. Keep left at the fork. Keep right at the fork.

WTF.

How much cutlery does this highway have? 


 

Needless to say that I was freaking out a little and that’s when my boss called. The GPS faded on my screen and “Rill, Rill” started to play. I ignored her call immediately, so I could make sure that in the two seconds that I’d lost navigation, I didn’t somehow end up in Utah, or something.

By the time I made it into a recognizable area, and combated 2 more areas of congested traffic, I called my boss back. This one time I’m late to work, she was looking for me everywhere. She was out of the office, meaning I was the only one who could get to the server room for the security people. Great.  Seriously, the one time in several months I’m significantly late.

I decided to tell you this story for a few reasons. And because I haven’t whipped it out in a while, why not a 1, b, cat list?

1.) Traffic really baffles me. I mean, I get traffic due to an accident or debris in the road or something like that. It’s that traffic that slows down for a while and then suddenly, you hit some imaginary border and BOOM- people start moving again.

Why? GUYS, WHY? Why did everyone decide to drive like a slow douche for a few miles?

Today, as I was crawling along the 826, I decided to blame an invisible traffic monster. He invisibly stands on the roads and causes traffic. Here, I drew him for you:

Ugly bastard.

b.) Sometimes I have these, “this only happens to me!!” or “every. single. time.” moments. They are very self pitying because of course I know that getting stuck in traffic happens to everyone. I also know that sometimes I’m late and no one cares.

Anyways, I thought I’d share another “every single time” moment: I always arrive somewhere, turn off the radio, turn off the car, climb out and then realize about three seconds later that I’m still belting out whatever song I was last listening to. Just loud-as-all-get-out, public singing.

I realize this, fade out slowly, maybe do a little camouflage cough and quickly look around to see if anyone was around to hear me. Every single time.

cat.) I told this story because I didn’t have a better story to tell. In past times, I would complain about the pace of life, about this inevitable slow down, the restless feeling, the lack of blog fodder, the painful realization that I don’t have much to say.

Not this time, folks. I’m enjoying every uninteresting, quiet, calm moment. I’m enjoying this calm after the storm, because that last one was a pretty bad ass storm.

I know life never stays quiet, but I’ve learned to enjoy the quiet while it lasts. I’m getting all my ducks in a row, using this time to suck it up and do the little things. That’ll probably mean more stories about traffic and other mindless things, at least until the next adventure. Sorry I’m not sorry.

Speaking of storms, apparently there is a hurricane that could affect the area I live in? Uh, let’s hope not. If you all don’t hear from me on Monday, it might be lack of power or something. Yick.

I hope your weekends are traffic (and hurricane!) free.

I like all of your faces.