"A tired song keeps playing"

Halloween (Yesterday)

1) 8:45 a.m. -- I'm on my way to work in stop-and-go traffic. Suddently, a scream comes out of my mouth as my car jerks forward into the car in front of me. It was a five-car pileup, and I was smack dab in the middle of it. No injuries thankfully, although I definitely got a little whiplash. Actually, my car wasn't too badly hurt either. Bumpers are amazing! Consider that I was hit hard enough to hit my car into another car and that car into a fifth car, and I'm basically left with a dent near the license plate. I drive on to work without any further incident.

2) 1: 15 p.m. -- I'm at work and I get a message from Lisa who I had just spoken with not an hour before. She says, "I've got bad news, so please call me back." I immediately assume someone has died because of the sound of her voice. Instead, her new Company informed her that she was "laid off" and they are eliminating her position. They told her they couldn't afford to pay her and didn't have enough for her to do. That was it. Yes, this is the Company for which she quit her other job one month ago and missed our family vacation. She got screwed.

November 1 (Today)

3) 8:25 a.m. -- I get in my car to go to work. It doesn't start at all. The lights and CD player come on, but no go. I assume this is somehow related to the accident, as it didn't at first appear to be the battery. I guess I'll work from home today.

4) 9:00 a.m. -- I, in my sock, step in a huge steaming pile of Grace's poop in our office. It gets all over my jeans.

5) 11:15 a.m. -- Upon closer inspection, the battery was the issue. We push it into the street so we can get Lisa's car out and we jump it. It starts so we're off to the Collision Experts to get an estimate -- not wanting to risk it not starting again. On the way, the battery light comes on. Oh, crap. I've jumped several times in my 8 year driving history, and I don't remember seeing that light afterwards. Normally you've drained the battery but once you get it going it is OK. We make it to the car place. While we're inside giving them our info, the car dies. We're told this is likely a bad alternator, not accident related so it won't be covered and they quote us at $475 ($300 for the part, $175 for labor).

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Praise the Lord, it turns out to in fact be a bad battery, which is only $125. This is received as extremely good news after 30 hours of bad news.

Interestingly, the only thing out of the past two days that REALLY made me angry was stepping in the dog poop.