In the ‘Everything Goes at Once’ Mode, He Needs a Whine Fix

I am driving, this day, a 1994 Pontiac Grand Am with a distinctive pink ball on the rear antenna upon which glitters the word “Princess.” This is not my car. If this were my car, I suspect I would be writing about an entirely different set of problems this morning.

No, I am driving this car, my teenage daughter’s car, because her mother’s car is in the garage. If her mother’s car were not in the garage, then I would be driving it, because my car is also in the garage.

We are, as you may suspect, currently trapped in one of those everything-goes-at-once warps. Some people dismiss these kinds of streaks as little more than coincidence. Personally, I think such sustained runs of bad luck are the work of an extraterrestrial dork, who amuses himself this way.

Granted, this sounds like I’m a roll of aluminum foil away from a homemade suit that wards off death rays, but is there a more logical explanation? Consider the evidence. Besides the two cars, here is what else happened in the span of six days:

The first whiff of trouble was, literally, a whiff. Something wasn’t right with the septic system. In most cases, when something isn’t functioning properly, I try to fix it myself before calling for help. There are two exceptions to this approach: One is electricity, because I have come close on more than one occasion to walking “The Green Mile.” The other is the septic system.

Here is what I know about the septic system: The word “putrefaction” is included in the definition of the word septic. This is all I want to know.

In the interest of breakfast, let me just say that when the septic guy looked down into my tank, he whistled. A whistle is never the reaction you are looking for from any repair guy.

Next up was the computer, which had been sending increasingly hysterical messages. To be honest, I haven’t been comfortable interacting with computers since seeing “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Eventually the computer refused to do anything but click, which, you know, was better than its cutting off our air supply or something.

It cost twice as much money to fix the computer as it did to fix the septic system. You’d think it would be just the opposite.

Anyway, after one septic, one hard drive and two cars, what else could possibly go wrong? I probably shouldn’t have said that.

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Jim Shea is a columnist for the Hartford Courant, a Tribune company.