Car Problems, Part Three

When I last stopped complaining about my car it had broken down twice in a matter of weeks, been repaired by the world's most incompetent mechanic and subsequently had its soul drained by my room mate's car. Well, as almost anyone who's ever owned a car, especially an old one, could have predicted it wasn't over then.

Oh yeah. The face palms are back!

About a week after all that went down, I decided to drive to Raleigh so I could help two different people move all their stuff. A friend from my undergrad years was moving from her town house to an apartment on Saturday; and as a small Asian girl with a small car, there was no way she could move a queen size mattress, a sofa, etc. all by herself. And my room mate's dad was moving to Raleigh and had a moving truck full of stuff that needed hauling.

Yeah, it sounds like a great weekend right?

Well, as part of this whole deal I had to borrow another friend's truck. And when I say truck, I really mean tank. Because whatever kind of truck he has should come with a slot for a turret gunner. I'm not just joking about how unwieldly and difficult to park it was. When I got there on Friday, he had actually been involved in an accident.

What was the damage you ask? His front bumper was dented and an NCSU vanity plate had to be replaced. "So it was just a fender bender right?" you say, sure that the other car was similarly lightly bruised. Oh no. He punted that car twenty yards, bent two of its tires under the car and broke its front axle.

Forget "right of way", he had "might of way".

So on Saturday he drove my car to work and I attempted to not destroy anything as I helped my friend move. That went more or less according to plan. He had to call me because the car wouldn't start (it has terrible battery leads) and I had to pull forward, cut it, and back up like a million times to fit into non-tractor trailer sized parking spaces.

Well, Sunday afternoon as I'm preparing to leave Raleigh I say all my goodbyes and thank him again for letting me use his truck and what not. That's when I discover that I can't get the car out of the "park" gear. It started fine, but just wouldn't come out of gear.

Fan-Fucking-Tastic.

I pop the hood to see if perhaps the oil had finally run out and maybe my engine was ruined. The oil dipstick's handle breaks off in my hand. The dipstick is still in the tank. I can't check the oil.

Great. Just what I needed. (sarcasm)

Okay. Okay. Calm down, go back inside and start asking for suggestions and turning to the magic of the interwebs to solve my problem. Google, do your thing. Text another friend who knows his way around a car's insides. Shouldn't be that big of a deal. Fingers crossed.

The friend must have been blazed, because he somehow thought that my car was stuck in "a park". Like a fucking state park with one of those gates and a sign that says "Gate closes at dark" or some shit. After like three or four more texts to clear that up, he says "Press the brake pedal when you're trying to change gears."

No shit, Sherlock. I know how to change gears.

Well, after a while, he finally says "Just pull really hard on the gear shift. That might work." And unable to find any help online, I am just desperate enough to try it. Right as I'm sure that the gear shift stick is about to snap in half, the car goes into drive! Huzzah! All is right in the world again! I am free!

Talk about premature celebrations.

Now, I put the car back in a parking space and turn it off so I can say goodbye to my friends, this time for real. But wait... The key won't come out of the ignition! What the fuck?

I struggle with that for another half an hour, texting, researching, hitting things with hammers...you know, things you do to fix things. But to no avail. That key is wedged in there tighter than that dorky kid in middle school's tighty whiteys after meeting the school bully.

Why doesn't this happen more often outside of television/movies?

"Fuck it!" I declare, and drive back to Greenville anyway. "I'll deal with this retarded car at a later date. I just have to get back before work tomorrow morning, and then I'll take it to a mechanic or something."

I only have one key for that car, and it was trapped in the ignition, so I had to leave one door unlocked in order to get back into the car. I disconnect the battery so it doesn't completely die on me before I can drive it to a mechanic. I'm mostly just glad to get back to the apartment without having a break down in the middle of nowhere on the high way.

Whew! Nearly looked like a fool there.

Once I finally get it to a mechanic, I tell them that I want my oil, transmission fluid, brake fluid, and whatever other types of fluids there are to be changed out. I would also like my oil dipstick fixed and my key out of the ignition. They estimate it will be like five hundred dollars or so. I swallow back some profanity and say, "Alright. I'll leave it here over night and pick it up tomorrow."

About half an hour later, they call me to say that they need to replace the starter switch in order to fix the key problem. That part and labor would cost about $1,300. If that doesn't give you a bit of sticker shock, consider that I paid $1,800 for the whole fucking car. I didn't really have an idea what they could possibly have to replace that is worth more than all four tires, the engine, the windows, doors, seats, radio and anything else that you want to list.

THIS!!! THIS IS WHAT IT IS!!!

How in the Nine Hells is that part and the labor needed worth nearly seventy five percent of an entire car? Needless to say (but I'll say it anyway) I told them to finish changing my oil or whatever and I would pick up the car right away.

After waiting an additional forty five minutes longer than they told me it would be to finish whatever they were doing, I had to get them to jump my car in order to get out of their parking lot because they had left the battery plugged in with the key in the ignition for a few hours.

"I'm surrounded by idiots!"

I was already late for class, but had all my school stuff back at my apartment. So I trudge through rush hour traffic and finally get there. But then, literally as I pull into a parking space the car dies! And won't crank. My room mate helps me push it the last six feet into the parking space. As far as I'm concerned a viable option would be just lighting it on fire and cleansing myself of this hunk of junk vehicle.

And I will dance around the flames.

Movie Mashups

If you've hung out with my room mate and me anytime in the past week or so, you've probably heard a bit about a game we've been playing. And by playing, I mean obsessing over, and spending a lot of time doing research, typing things up and brainstorming. The game is "Movie Mash Up", and it is exactly what it sounds like.

I was watching "Cougar Town" (Don't judge me. That show is pretty funny and Courtney Cox is still hot.) while at work one day, and realized that this game was totally awesome.

Thanks, Courtney.

The rules are pretty simple: you take two movies that share a word, then combine them. You then create a plot tag line and describe it to your friend, who tries to guess the two movies that went into it and what the combined title would be.

For example: "A fat orange cat who loves lasagna hears voices in his head and decides to build a baseball field." You think about the first part, and arrive at "Garfield". Then you think about the second part and get "Field of Dreams". The combined title is "Garfield of Dreams". See how the movie titles run together?

"If you build it, they will come."

Well, since my room mate and I both watch a lot of movies, love mental games of all sorts (especially word play or inside jokes) and enjoy telling funny stories to friends, we realized this game would be awesome. And the madness began.

At first we were pretty bad at the whole "last word of one movie is the same as the first word of the other movie" bit, and we stretched the rules a bit. Also, I have to admit that I stumbled frequently when trying to come up with a tagline for movies like "Hard Day's Night of the Living Dead".

"I want to hold your brains?"

So here are some of the best ones we've come up with. Some make sense, some sound like actual movies that might be produced if you whisper the plot to the right studio executive. Some are bat-shit crazy, and would a lot of fun to watch, but make no sense.

My room mate came up with the first one that really made us laugh, so I'm going to start the list off with it. Here goes.

#1) "Richard Gere has a huge dick, and a beach house in North Carolina. He starts banging this old lady who wears roller skates, and they film it. They exchange letters back and forth afterward, but he dies in the end. But he shows his junk."

Guess it yet?

"Boogie Nights In Rodanthe"!

Nick Sparks and Marky Mark's bastard love child.

#2) An all male jury must decide the fate of a young teen accused of murdering his father...while at the same time protecting Earth from aliens.

"12 Angry Men in Black"

Henry Fonda makes this suit look good.

#3) John Cusack owns a record store, and is really upset about his girlfriend breaking up with him. Then his really smart friend dies, so John rolls his ashes in with a joint and smokes it. Then he receives an admittance letter from Harvard.

"How High Fidelity"
It's definitely on the top five list of college movies.

#4) Hillary Swank is a struggling female boxer who needs some extra money...so she rents out her uterus to Tina Fey, who does not approve of things that her surrogate does, like boxing while pregnant. Hilarity ensues.

"Million Dollar Baby Mama"

"Blergh! I want you to jab, right in the tits!"

#5) Wesley Snipes may or may not be an android who hunts vampires in a dystopian future.

"Blade Runner"

"There are worse things out tonight than androids."

#6) Nicholas Cage provides the voice of a golden retriever wrongly imprisoned for killing a man, but soon finds himself trapped in a prisoner transport plane when the convicts take control. How will he ever make it to his basketball game in time?

"Con Air Bud"

"Nobody move, or Buddy gets it!"

The list goes on. Here are a few of the mashed up titles, think about some of the tag lines yourself, or just contact me and I can send you the five or six pages worth of movie mashups we've managed to brainstorm and type up.

- Freaky Friday After Next
- Tomb Raiders of the Lost Ark
- There Will Be Blood Diamond
- I Am Legends of the Fall
- Into the Wild Wild West
- Dirty Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (not a porno, I swear)
- The Empire Strikes Back to the Future
- Big Momma's House of Wax
- Blackhawk Down With Love
- She's the Man on Fire
- The Little Mermaid in Manhattan
- The Princess Bride Wars
- Deep Blue Seabiscuit
- Air Force One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
- Free Willy 'Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

And, we've also come up with some movies that we like to call "Triple Word Scores". These Triple Word Scores are three movies that link up together. They're tough to think of, so we've only got two. But they're pretty freaking good. Unfortunately I don't have the photo shopping skills to make even moderately convincing posters for these movies.

The closest I'll get to a TWS image

#7) "Billy Bob Thornton plays a gravely voiced day-walker who may or may not be a retarded android that hunts down vampires in desolate future where animal life is rare."

"Sling Blade Runner"

#8) "Johnny Depp has to care for his younger brother and obese mother...in the dustbowl of Great Depression era California...while fighting against a genetically engineered superhuman."

"What's Eating Gilbert Grapes of Wrath of Khan"

Think you've got a great movie mashup? Let me know, and maybe we'll add it to our list. If you can, think of a creative tagline to go with it, because that's half of the joke.

*Update*

I came up with a four part movie mashup recently, and I have to say that I'm more than a little proud of it. No idea how to come up with a tagline though. But here's the title and corresponding images. If you've got a plot, let me know.

#9) Total Recall of the Wild, Wild West Side Story

I really have no idea how to write a plot for this...