I ran out of gas.
IN OUR DRIVEWAY.
Details?
6:30ish PM, Saturday:
I got home from the store Saturday evening where I had picked up essentials to make it through the Sabbath (bread, dishwasher soap, gum, tampons and caffeine) and jumped out of the car to run them into the house. I left the car running because I thought, at the time, that I was going to run back out of the house to go grab a DVD.
Flash forward to ...
8:51 AM, Sunday:
As we leave to walk to church, I notice the car is still in the driveway. Stalled. Key in the ignition, in the "on" position. The frost and snow from the night before has not been able to accumulate because the hood remained heated. Out of gas.
I had forgotten I wanted to leave again after dropping off the groceries. I came into the house, but everything away, wrangled the kids for dinner, sat down to eat, ate, played, laughed, hung out, put the kids to bed, played on the computer, watched some TV, read a little and went to bed. The whole time my car is in the driveway, idling away 1/4 tank of gas. Yep. Once it ran out, it still had the ignition turned on, fan running. I nearly ran by battery completely down to nothing.
Recent History:
I have ran out of gas three times in 6 months.
The first time it happened was out of misplaced confidence. I thought we could make it home. We were running late, we had to get home to our 12 year-old babysitter and relieve her of duty. I had a car full of friends (including our lovely pregnant friend Lisa) and we made it 4 miles from their house. That time, everyone was real nice. They didn't all send me to fetch fuel by myself while they waited, even though they could have. It was the end of summer so it was still pretty warm and so we all took a walk together about a mile up the road to the filling station.
The second time was about a week ago. I took my old white Honda to work, low on gas. I figured there'd be enough left to get to a gas station later. I got to work and put the transmission in the park position and then turned off the engine. This car is so old. Sometimes it decides it wants to keep the keys and won't let go of them. It doesn't want to give them up once you turn off the car. You can't do anything about it but sit there until it decides to cough them up. You can turn them, start the car up again but you can't even get it into D or Reverse or anything. You are stuck. It's kind of like having a crazy girlfriend who, just before you leave, takes your wallet or keys somehow without you knowing and puts it in her sofa so you can't leave until the items are found just so she can finish breaking up with you. So, at times, I have to let the car idle while it decides it wants to acknowledge that it is, indeed, in park and then releases its grip on the keys. The best way to get it to release them is to let it idle. For some reason, a warmer car is more generous. It was while I was waiting for this POS 1987 Honda Accord to warm up and surrender my keys that it just stopped idling. Out of gas.
The incident in the driveway is the third time. Needless to say this running out of gas thing has happened way to much. The frequency would be too often if I was a retarded gorilla let alone a 36 year-old writer who claims to be intelligent.
Is this what I have become?
Hope not. Please, someone tell me they have done something remotely as dumb. Please?
