oh...my...God.

I'm never traveling again.

Well, no, this is a lie. But I have reasons for the hyperbole. For those of you who did not know, this was my trip to and from Columbus:

On the way there, I (stupidly) paid attention to my Mapquest directions, instead of the voice in my head that said "Remember that those are wrong, self? Do not make that turn." I drove halfway to Warm Springs before I could find a place to turn around (the scariest seafood restaurant turn-off ever...dirt road, cult-like building...it reminded me breifly of Kool-Aid Alley from spring break)

So I get turned around, and just when I really get going, feeling pretty good about making it in when I said I would (I'm paranoid about making good time)...lo and behold, I AM HIT BY A DEER. A deer hits me. Notice again...I am the party acted upon, not the one committing the action. So I pull over, and there is miraculously no damage at all to the car (though I still can't say for sure about the deer. I looked on the way home).

So I get there, and Emily and Sam are wonderful, as usual, and I crash on my comfy friend the couch...and then I have to go home.

So I leave at about 5. It is cloudy and dark-ish, but I'm ok. I get to the turn-off for 190 AGAIN, and do not recognize that I should not take it (it's still on the damned Mapquest directions). So I turn. And I drive. And I get to the turn-off (about 7 miles down the road) where I turned on Friday. Oh yes, my friends. On Friday. For about half a minute, I sat there thinking "I could just go back. Forget school."

Then my sense of responsibility asserted itself. I drove straight, thinking "Well, maybe the turn-off here is closer than the other way." Oh-ho, no. I drive round some pretty serious curves, with someone behind me, practically in my trunk, because whenever I am lost, I always get in front of someone who knows exactly where they are going.

So, all told, I went about 20 miles out of my way. I got turned around again, and drove, thinking that I would not be home until long after the projected 9-9:30. I was fine, except for about 5 people turning in front of me when they should not. Until...

So I'm about 5 miles from home. There are 2 very big curves. I clear one just fine, but in the second one, the person going in the opposite direction had his/her brights on. So I edge a little further away from the center line, since they are rather close. And I hit a pothole. Hard.

There is a clunk.

I think to myself, "Self, there goes your alignment." Self replies, "Wow, the car is pulling like a son-of-a-gun. You sure that was all that went?" So I pull over. It is 9. I am still 30 minutes ahead of schedule. I am 3 miles from home. And I have a completely flat tire.

So I call home and ask for help. Mom and Dad come help me fix it. While we are doing this, we discover that the odd smell that has been emanating from my trunk recently is coming from 2 inches of water in my spare tire compartment. So that's fun.

By the time I make it home, it is 10 pm. We were out there for an hour. I stepped in fire ants in the dark. I was so tired I started crying. I try to relax. I go to sleep at 12:30.

I wake up 6 hours later and go to work. Everything is fine, until 5th period. In the middle of one of my most disruptive classes...my bra strap breaks.

There's nothing for it. I keep teaching.

They don't pay me enough.