Snakebit Fortune

1/15/08

Main Entry:
snake·bit: having or experiencing failure or bad luck : UNLUCKY

Main Entry:
1for·tune: a hypothetical force or personified power that unpredictably determines events and issues favorably or unfavorably obsolete : accident incident3 a: prosperity attained partly through luck : success b: luck 1 cplural : the turns and courses of luck accompanying one's progress (as through life) fortunes varied but she never gave up>4: destiny fate fortune>; also : a prediction of fortune

Since I first got the blues back in the waning years of the 1980's, I've always been a fan of the lyric, "if it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all." The words, to me, are satiric, sparse, funny and telling of the simple agony of feeling that the unseen forces of the world are conspiring against you.

The way my luck has been running the last three months, right now I'd be happy with just plain bad luck. Instead, I've been running with this new kind of luck (for me), snakebit fortune. I could tell you that is no fun, but that wouldn't be necessarily true. You see, the way things have been breaking for me the past few months is that any time I experience anything that pangs of good fortune, it is quickly (if not immediately) followed by some related piece of hard-luck or disaster. I mean, I can't really say, "if it weren't bad luck, I'd have no luck at all" and have it hold true for me over the past few months. I have had those moments where I stand on top of the mountain (inside my mind), pump my fist to the sky in triumph and count my lucky stars. The problem is that these moments are always followed by bolts of dark fate that lay all my recent good fortune in their wake.

I know you, my readers, really enjoy (I mean REALLLY) the insights into philosophy and what it is that is actually going on inside my head I offer in these blogs. I also know, that as much as you (let me believe you) enjoy the philosophical diatribes, what you really love and want are tales of personal humiliation used to illuminate whatever point it is I'm trying to make. Fear not! I've got that for you too… keep reading…

*I've been on this run of luck (?) since a certain plane trip to OH back in October. In the interest of time, space and attention span, I'll limit my examples of personal humiliation to the events surrounding the first two weeks of 2008.

Since I find it hard to think about luck, without thinking of getting lucky (please tell me it's not just me) we'll start this off with a tale of romance... New Year's Eve I meet a pretty girl, Jane, who is a friend of a friend of mine in from out of town. We have drinks, fun conversation, a little peck at midnight followed by some dancing cheek to cheek… and I'm thinking, "hey, I'm feeling pretty lucky here." Then, after it has been suggested we all go back to my place (for leftover meatloaf… sexy), we go to retrieve our things and discover that Jane's purse has been stolen. Mellows harshed all around. Happy fucking New Year.

With my year off to such a fruitful start, I decided to take my luck to the one place where it could do me the most good (harm), Las Vegas. My friend, Jack, who's a big sports gambler, gave me his NFL picks (I know jack about pro football) for the weekend. One bet he listed as his sure thing, lock & key, put it in the bank bet of the weekend was the UNDER on the Steelers/Jags game a week ago Saturday. So, I bet it. When I placed the bet I noticed that the sports dealer (yes, that's their job title) keyed the bet in as an OVER wager and not the UNDER I asked for. And, I'm thinking, "boy, that was lucky I caught that before kickoff." I quickly have the dealer change my wager to UNDER and go about my afternoon's cocktailing. Had I known then, what I know now I would have told the dealer to, "take back this winning ticket and give me the losing one I asked for." The game was OVER before the end of the Q3.

Finally, same weekend in Vegas, I was late in making my transportation arrangements for the trip. I was on the fence about going out there and by the time I looked at plane tickets online, the price of those had become what I consider prohibitive for such a short trip. Still, no problem. We had a rather large group heading out from LA and surely someone would be happy to give me a ride. And, sho'nuff, my friend Kim fit the bill…. Lucky me! The day before the trip, Kim calls and sounds like she is on death's doorstep. She has the flu and is backing out of the trip. I think of cancelling myself and then remember what a resourceful mofo I can be when I put my mind to it. I go online and find a suitable option to get my butt to Vegas the next day. I go Greyhound.

Once I'm out in Vegas, I figure with the number of people from our group that are out from LA, one of them will surely be driving back and be able to give me a ride. And, I'm right. There are. One of our friend's drove out, but she was with a new bf, so I don't really want to hassle her about a ride. Another friend, has driven out, but won't be heading back 'til Monday which doesn't really work for me. Still, another girl in our group, who we are hooking up with a free room at my friend's timeshare is driving, is driving back on Sunday AND has space in her car. Lucky me! I approach her about ride back on Friday for Sunday. She can't give me a definitive answer because she is travelling with other people and isn't sure they'd be ok with giving someone else a ride. Say what? Anyway, she puts her free room to excellent use over the weekend by hooking up with and screwing strangers (yes, the "s" on the end of that word is intentional) she meets in clubs along the strip. Saturday evening, when she finally reappears and rejoins our group, she still has no answer about the ride back to LA I asked for. She does have plenty of details about the boys she's been bringing back to her free room though. Sunday morning, I call her and I ask again about getting a ride back and she tells me that with three people in the car already, she's worried someone might be cramped and, therefore, she cannot give me a ride back to LA. Ok, let me get this straight, my friend hooks you up with a free room for the weekend, you use it to bump uglies with random strangers all weekend, but when it comes to giving someone who is best friend's with your free room hookup a ride home, then you can't do it because you might be cramped?! Whatever. Dumb slut.

So, late Sunday morning I end up in the Greyhound Bus Depot in downtown LV (across from the Golden Gate Casino, home of the 99 cent shrimp cocktail) faced with a mob the likes of which I didn't think existed outside of the Southwest Terminal at LAX. I wait in the ticket line as my 12:00 departure time grows closer and closer. By the time I get to the window, both 12:00 buses have sold out and I'm told the next one doesn't leave 'til 2:30. Whatever. Give me the ticket. I know where to find the shrimp cocktail. After I get my ticket, I try to determine where the end of the line is and if there is any hope whatsoever of getting on one those two earlier buses leaving in the next few minutes. While I'm searching for the end of that line, I hear an announcement for an express bus now loading, that is going to LA and making a stop at Union Station (where I can catch my subway) rather than the Greyhound Bus Depot (where I'd have to cab it). I decide that I am getting on that bus, lines be damned. I work my way to the front of the line and then out onto the platform through an adjacent door. Once outside, I approach the GH ticket taker (I don't know this guy's job title), and play dumb when explaining that it was my intention to purchase an express ticket to LA Union Station when somehow I ended up with a ticket for a bus that is a) not express, b) not stopping at Union Station, and c) departing at the wrong time altogether. After chasing the tails of logic and reason around my story a few times, he gives up, tears my ticket and tells me to get on board the earlier express bus, so he can go about his business of tending to the correctly ticketed passengers that have bothered to queue up and wait patiently for their bus to board. All right suckers, how lucky am I?

So, after a few minutes, our driver (who looks a little too much like Pat from "It's Pat") gets on board, closes the door and takes us out onto the highway. 15 minutes or so down the road, she pulls the bus over along the shoulder of I15, opens the door, gets out and walks around to the back of the bus. She stays back there for a few minutes, and then returns, gets back on board, closes the door and we're off again. After about another 15-20 minutes, the same thing happens again… and then again twice more once we cross the CA border, including once on that scary stretch of highway going up the mountain just west of the CA/NV border. We're already running late. Now the passengers are suspecting there is something wrong with the bus.

We get to Baker, CA where the driver makes another unscheduled stop. This time she pulls off the rode and into the parking lot of a gas station/mini-mart/restaurant mega-mini-plex. Once she stops, she hustles (at least that is what imagine she was doing at her size) off the bus and promptly tosses her cookies in plain view of all the passengers. Sweet. It's not the bus, it's the driver! Well, some of the other passengers and I make our way off the bus knowing we won't be going anywhere anytime soon just in time to witness the driver losing more of her lunch behind the bus, then later, on the entrance to mini-mega-plex and again inside the mini-mega… and from what I hear from some of the other female passengers, all over the ladies restroom. At one point, there was some high desert teenager just following this driver around with a mop and bucket.

I don't how many of you have been stranded in Baker, CA or have family that lives there who you trek out to visit. Ok, that last one there is frightening. Beyond gassing up, getting a gyro at The Mad Greek or checking the temperature on the World's Largest Thermometer, there's not a lot to do… certainly nothing that would take more than half an hour. We were stranded there for over 4 hours in the mini-mega. After about 90 minutes an ambulance showed up and took our driver, It's Pat, away. I snuck away from the group and had myself a tasty gyro for lunch and then learned that Bun Boy is no more. It's now a Bob's Big Boy… and the nifty high desert gift shop that was in the old family restaurant has been replaced by a breakfast buffet bar. Gross. The gift shop at the World Tallest Thermometer was closed. All in all, not a lot going on in Baker.

After seeing our driver hauled off down the highway in a screaming ambulance, I decided to see if I could make some more luck for myself. I approached a few random folks by the pumps and asked them if, by any chance they were heading back to the Greater Los Angeles Area and could I offer to buy them a tank of gas in exchange for a ride… I learned that the fastest, easiest way to get a total stranger to look at you like you might be a serial killer, is to approach them in a gas station and offer to buy them a tank of gas. Bet you didn't know that!

Seeing that there was little or no luck to be made in Baker, CA I decided to ask the expert and approached the smokie (CHP Officer) assigned to babysit our bus while the good folks at Greyhound drove in another driver from Timbuktu.

Me: "Hey, is there any place in town where I could rent a car?"
Smokie: "Nope."
Me: "How 'bout any other buses stopping here?"
Smokie: "Nope."
Me: "Rideshare?"
Smokie: "Nope."
Me: "How 'bout a FlexCar?"
Smokie: "Nope. What's that?"
Me: "Nevermind about that. Could you give me a ride to Barstow? I'll totally sit in the back and I won't ask you to run the siren."
Smokie: "Yeah. No."
Me: "Well, do you have any tips for how I can get out of here any quicker?"
Smokie: "You could buy a used car…"
Me: "Are there any used car lots in town?"
Smokie: "Nope."

Yeah. Lucky me.