A Pitiful Mind

I've reached the age where I very much dislike having to learn things. Any new information trying to find a home in my brain mostly just ricochets around until it fizzles-out or flies out one of my ear. And if it does manage to lodge somewhere in my gray-matter, the impact causes blinding bolts of pain. I'm treating the condition with ibuprofen, bed-rest and a program of limited mental stimulation. I have to be very strict about getting plenty of Television and I carefully avoid things like insurance forms and VCR instructions.

I can't handle any kind of instructions. Microwave instructions, maybe--as long as I can do my microwaving at 100%, but if I'm instructed to defrost at 50% power, I'll just put that frosty entree right back in the freezer. I wasn't "that" hungry. In fact I think I'll just grab me a piece of bread, fold it in half and enjoy a nothing sandwich. Eating bread with your hands was how dinner went down in Biblical times and some of those dudes lived to be hundreds of years old. What I'm saying is the simpler I keep things the fewer problems I have with my brain.

All of which makes it quite ironic that I make my living working with computers. Computers are definitely responsible for the overcrowded conditions in my cortex. My RAM is now packed to the point that any new data that must go in, forces something else out. Chess, for example--when I was younger I played a lot of Chess, but last time I checked, Chess was gone. I couldn't tell you a Rookie from a Pond.

The missing Chess-file scared me a little bit and I even went so far as to try to refresh my memory by looking it up on the internet. Strangely when I typed Chess into my search engine, it brought up a list of porn sites. Which, y'know I'm not complaining, I vaguely remember Chess was kind of boring anyway.

I think the only reason I can manage my little computer career is because I have absolutely no interest in it beyond the bare minimum I've been forced to learn in order to function at my job. I figure the harder things are for me to understand, the more I wasn't meant to know about them. But as a result of this sloth-like disinclination for learning of most every kind, I've become something of a dysfunctional adult.

For example I'm nothing but a dunce when it comes to cars. I'm challenged here. I usually have to kneel down on the ground just to find the lever that pops open the hood. Once I've accomplished this I'm pretty much in the dark. Gazing under the hood for me, is every bit as worthwhile as a 2-year-old looking at the blueprints for the shuttle.

You see, I recently suffered the loss of a car. Not a car that was known for turning the lady's heads, but it was as loyal work-horse and it was the car that came along with my marriage. I was planning on holding out for a bride with a really cool car, but when I met my wife, I was sufficiently impressed to settle for the Mitsubishi Gallant. She would be quick to point out, I'm sure, that it was much nicer than the Nissan Sentra I was bringing to the party. But that's just how she is--she likes to pick the poor old Boneman apart. Throughout our marriage the Gallant performed like a champ. Tried and true, she was a cherished member of the family bla bla bla--it sucks not to have a car.

I don't want you to think that I gave up on her easy. I'm not such a wuss that I don't know a few tricks about how to get a car back on it's wheels. I gave it the old college try--gas from a can, a swift push-start down a good hill--but when I popped the clutch, the car reluctantly shuddered back to just enough life to let me know that it much preferred to be dead. There wasn't going to be any re-in-car-nation. It woke up just long enough to say goodbye.

I was lucky that it came to rest in a legal parking space on the street in front of my friend's house. And there she rests to this day, a rusting, metal monument to my inability to function as a real man.

It' not like I didn't know her days were numbered. She'd developed a number sickly symptoms. For example air conditioning became too much to ask. Even in 110 degree heat I had to settle for rolling down the windows, because every time I tried to turn on the A/C it was like I'd kicked the car in the nuts. It would practically screech to a halt.

And even more annoying was the fact that it all-the-sudden refused to idle. Every stop sign meant instant death. And the more I had to fire it back up, the more the battery complained. "Nya nya nya, nya nya nya." I had to develop an intricate footwork technique in order to keep it alive at a red light, and I'm obliged to admit that at times my little "brain problem" caused me to be something of a hazard on the road.

You'd certainly guess that having a car's idle adjusted up a notch would be a painless affair, yet mechanic after mechanic would shake their head in sad resignation. "That's a fuel injected car--son, it's all run by computers, y'might try the Dealership?" Are you kidding me--it's a car, do I need Bill Gates to figure this out? Isn't there a screw? On a side note I promised to give a shout out to Wayne Lamb of Jiffy Lube for showing me that there was indeed a little screw right on top of the carbeurator that adjusted the idle like magic. Vroom vroom, a simple turn of the wrist and I was driving away with a chest swelling tight with the warmth and glow of false hope. She died shortly thereafter

Like the death of any elderly loved-one - a certain amount of relief accompanies the sadness - "it was a blessing," as they say. Driving it had become a chore. The car's illness was oil-related and on it's way to the huge, sticky stain on the floor of my garage, the oil would burn in great plumes of black smoke. It was embarrassing. Going through the drive-thru at Taco Bell became practically impossible. The car would produce such a racket of clicks and hissing that you had to shout whether you wanted hot, mild or fire sauce. Which is to say nothing of the obnoxious cloud of visible pollution that would invariably cause the people in line behind me to squirm in their seats and fire murderous glares into my rear-view. "I'm sorry, Jeesh, I've got a brain problem up here, cut me some slack, y'lousy tree-hugger."

The last time I tried to make it through Taco Bell I was so mentally exhausted that by the time I made it to the window and paid for my order, I just drove away without my food. I was half loopy from the fumes and in no condition to eat. I can't possibly exaggerate how much deadly, black smoke this car was belching out. You could park it into the middle of an open field beneath the wild blue yonder, and if you could get it to idle long enough, you could commit suicide.
"Goodbye cruel world." God bless her - she was a garage-optional suicide car.