I am so smart, S-M-R-T

On Saturday morning, I woke up to rain tapping against my window. Ordinarily I love this sound, but at that time it was pretty much the last thing I wanted to hear, because my dining room table was set to be delivered between 11:30AM and 3:30PM.

Fuck, I thought grumpily as I stepped into the shower. They're gonna track dirt all over my freakin' carpet. As is true of pretty much every apartment dweller in America, I have that beige carpet that stains if you so much as burp, and the thought of scrubbing mud and ground-up snail shells out of it didn't particularly appeal to me.

So, after I'd dried off and gotten dressed, I decided to go to Sears and buy one of those "boot scraper" doormats. I figured that it wouldn't keep crud off my carpet entirely, but it would probably help immensely.

Anyway, I went to Sears, bought the doormat, and drove home. I unlocked my passenger door from the inside, and then I walked around and took out the doormat. It had a huge price tag on it, so I ripped it off and walked over to the dumpster, which was about ten feet away. I threw the tag in the dumpster and turned around just in time to see my passenger door close of its own accord.

Huh.

So I walked back to my car, pulled on the handle, and lo and behold, it was locked. I patted my pockets for my keys, but they weren't there. I looked in the window, and my purse was sitting on the passenger seat.

My keys, somehow, had landed on the floor.

With rising dread, I rushed to the driver's side and pulled on the handle.

Locked.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

Let us recap, shall we?

Not only were my keys and my purse locked in my car, but my cell phone, containing the number for AAA, was locked in my car.

I ran upstairs to my nice, warm, dry, spare car key-holding apartment, flung that stupid fucking doormat down, and yanked on the knob on the supremely off chance that I, a notorious anal retentive, had left the door unlocked.

Of course not.

So I ran down to the manager's office. She's never there on weekends, but I figured I'd better at least try.

Nope.

I had no idea what to do. I had no access to a phone, so I couldn't call AAA. And I didn't have a watch on, but I'd gotten home a little before 11AM, which meant that Furniture 'N' More could very well show up at any time.

Also, as previously mentioned, it was raining.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

So I went back upstairs and knocked on Art Model's door. I was pretty sure she wasn't there, since her car was gone, but maybe I'd get lucky.

Nope.

Finally, in complete desperation, I knocked on the door of the apartment directly below me. I'd never even seen or spoken to these people, but any port in a storm...literally.

And praise Jesus and Ganesh and all the saints, a little old woman answered the door. I quickly explained my situation, and even though I was on the verge of hysteria and my hair had frizzed out into a wild halo from the rain, this angel in a housecoat let me inside her home and gave me her cell phone, a phone book, a pen, a towel to dry off my hair, a cup of very weak tea, and a pad of paper. After hunting for what seemed like hours for AAA's number, I got hold of them and they said they'd send someone right out. I gave the woman her phone back and thanked her profusely. She offered to let me stay in her apartment, but I didn't want to impose on her any further, and I had to go outside and watch for AAA anyway.

To my absolute astonishment, a truck showed up about ten minutes later, and the huge, bald, tattooed driver unlocked my car in the same time it would take me to put on mascara in the morning. I thanked him, tipped him five bucks, and went upstairs, where I collapsed on the couch.

I'm getting my nipple pierced...and hanging my keys from it.