I have become phobic about driving my car. Seriously, after the whole tire thing--plus the engine was starting to turn on kinda slowly about every other time I put the key in the ignition--I was starting to think that driving the car was jinxing things. So I didn't drive it after last Tuesday, and I managed to weasel my way into not having to drive home over Labor Day weekend ("hey, I already have to drive next weekend....it's Labor Day....driving will be crazy...can I just take the train home?"). We went to the Scottish Games on Saturday, which was as fun as ever, and then pretty much spent the next couple of days doing nothing but watching Downton Abbey because what we were going to go to on Sunday turned out not to be open and nobody was terribly interested in doing the alternatives.

This, in retrospect, turned out to be an excellent idea.

Today I had an in-person shrink appointment (which, in case I haven't mentioned before, happens at my house about once a month and the rest of the time by phone) and she was all, "Wait, you have a phobia about driving the car now?" Uh, yeah, because I'm me and despite the car having just been checked out (which, you'd think, might mean it could be problem-free for a bit), I already had something go wrong and now I'm paranoid about the engine noise and I'm becoming the car equivalent of a hypochondriac. If I drive it, I'm gonna jinx it.

Plus this is the time of year when my rent goes up, and I feel sick having to look up the amount of money the rent went up (I'm told it's due to the increasing water bills here, but still), and feel like I am making stupid life decisions by staying here. Which I am, of course, but trying to unearth myself at this point seems even harder than digging in, so there I stay and feel stupid. But adding to my usual rent angst, I now have Can I Afford Constant Car Repairs going through my brain and shaming me. Odds of my getting a better paying job are "yeah, right," I have too much crap to unearth enough space for a roommate plus there will be Drama if I get rid of the family-inherited furniture, I don't seem to have any damn interest in running my own business, and I'm a fucking shopaholic. One of those things has to fucking change, but they all seem pretty noxious and impossible to me right now.

My shrink was trying to talk me out of the phobia. She asked how much I had in the way of savings and said that sounded like a good cushion to deal with car repairs, and I shouldn't freak out so much, and the car ignition thing was probably nothing. "All you really need to worry about is the oil light," she said. "If that comes on, DON'T DRIVE IT and call for a tow IMMEDIATELY. That's like a body running out of water." So I was all, well, all right, I'll try not to worry about it too hard.

Can you guess by now what happened when I went home after work to pick up the car to take it to the CC tonight?

Yup. Already. I'm not even supposed to need to do an oil change until mid-October, supposedly. HAHAHAHAHAH CAR HAVING BEEN CHECKED UP ON MEANS NOTHING BECAUSE I AM A JINX OF SOME SORT.

So apparently I'm going to have to get up before the crack of dawn tomorrow to call AAA to tow it to the mechanic's (they said to give them an hour for pickup) when they open at seven, and god only knows when I'm going to get to work. Oh yeah, and writing group is tomorrow night and I'm the only one who submitted anything....Fortunately, there were still cars available on Zipcar for tomorrow night and my membership there won't run out/need renewing until December, so I booked one and there's that as a backup. You know, assuming nothing goes wrong with THAT car as well or anything.

I won't be sleeping tonight.

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