The Eye-Five. And Other Drive-By Shootings.

Driving to Los Angeles from Sacramento is like being hung by your fingernails for six hours, minus the joy.  

If you're from Sacramento, the infinite swath of asphalt is called I-5. If you're from Los Angeles, it's called "The" 5. If you live in both cities, like me, you spend many years being overly self-conscious while debating the use of a definite article. Eventually you pronounce ALL freeways using your L.A. words because L.A. is so hip, they must be right.

Regardless, that long-ass southbound trip becomes all about driving as fast as you can and avoiding this:

somewhere along I-5

The speed limit is 70mph on most of I-5 The 5, which means you can go at least 75 before turning on your police radar. You don't want to go so fast that this happens:

[This is where I would have inserted the picture of a terrible accident where I saw a car on its side, but I couldn't grab my camera fast enough. Sorry. I did capture another accident later though, if that helps.]

Did I mention how long and boring this drive can be? Four hundred miles of more or less this:

btw, you can click on any pic to enlarge

You sing to yourself. You do glutes exercises. You think you can't drive any further before going crazy and wonder how much longer and you pass a sign that tells you:

 

And you drive and you drive and you drive some more. You search for radio stations, most of them are of the Spanish Mariachi flavor. You contemplate life. You drive with your knees while eating your Drive-Thru cheeseburger. You think you are never going to get to the Grapevine. You stop for gas. Again. You eat candy bars to kill time. You pass fourteen thousand rows of asparagus growing in the endless flat dusty bowl that is the Central Valley of California. Hours later, you pass another sign:

 

You are bored bored bored bored bored.

Then a fire truck whizzes by you and you see smoke up ahead. Yay! Some excitement. It takes at least five miles to reach it, plenty of time to grab your camera and take a couple of shots as you drive by.

 

woo hoo! A fire in the median!

 

You try to get one last shot in the rear-view mirror, but being the idiot photographer that you are, you don't realize that the camera focuses on the mirror, not the object reflected:

Oh well, nice camera though, right? Why thank you! It was gift from my husband for Valentine's Day last year. That's why it's red, see, because it was for Valentine's Day, isn't that cute?

Anyway....

Everyone has that one landmark on the map that designates the start of the "home stretch". The point at which, you think, OK, it's not long now. I'm practically home. For me it's this:

Not the grey car, silly. Magic Mountain. Geez, do I have to spell everything out for you? By now it's just a hop through Valencia, a skip across the Valley, and a jump past the Getty Museum into the Westside.

Home at last, home at last, thank God almighty I'm home at last. Yeah, there's nothing like a cold drink to greet your road-weary soul. I walked in the door, approached the refrigerator and noticed a small black stain on the floor formed by some blackish fluid dribbling from the bottom of the door. Hmmm, that's strange. Then I opened the freezer, when what to my wondering eyes should appear?

wtf?

I can only guess that some elf got locked in there while I was gone and created an ice sculpture while waiting for my return to let him out. Either that, or the fridge is on the fritz. {SIGH} I noticed the door shelf (the one right underneath the ice dispenser) was filled with water.

Did you hear that?  My freezer has WATER in it! You know, water? As in, not ice?

And yes, the refrigerator side isn't working either.

{SIGHHHHHHHH} 

So, the fix-it dude is coming on Wednesday between 11a and 3p. Or on Thursday between 8am and 11am. I'm not sure which one it is because for some reason two customer service people called me to make appointments after I made a service request via the home warranty website. I tried to talk to a human being but she just kept repeating the same thing over and over without actually answering any of my questions:

"Yes, I can make an appointment for you on Thursday."

"But I already have an appointment for Wed."

"Yes, I can make an appointment for you on Thursday"

So if I had to initially complain to a website, then make two appointments with machine-like humans, will a robot show up to fix my refrigerator? This should be interesting. I've never seen robot butt-crack before. I'll be sure and get a shot of THAT for you.

Thank You Letter(s)

Thanks goes out to Hammy of The Blah Blahs and the Yada Yadas for the Honest Scrap Award. Have you noticed that if you say it fast enough it sounds like Honest Crap? Hey, what a great name for a blog!