Sunday, September 16, 2007

Nut and a Screw

That's all I needed. A nut and a screw. To fix my license plate, that is.

My license plate has been dangling from the front of my car all summer. I have barely noticed, save the light scraping sound from underneath my car when I go up hills. However, the countless observant pedestrians, homeless people and Good Samaritans of Seattle have noticed and boy, are they freaked out. A few days ago, as I was waiting to turn left onto Broadway, an older woman in a green Subaru rolled down her window as she was turning to YELL and emphatically pronounce the fact that my license plate is falling off. She almost rolled into a pedestrian who was also looking bemusedly at the front of my car. Today the panhandler on the median by UW stadium seemed exceptionally concerned. No amount of smiling, hand-waving, thumbs-up, or A-O-K symbols seemed to communicate to any of these people that I FRICKING GET IT!!! I AM AWARE OF MY CURRENT LICENSE PLATE SITUATION!!! When people see a parent smacking a kid around on a bus, they are quieter that mice. But when it's a license plate, well!!! That's just an entirely new level of concern.

The reason why I haven't fixed the thing yet was mainly because I didn't have a nut or a screw. And if I don't have hardware, that means a trip to Lowe's. I basically try to avoid Lowe's like the plague, because in my mind, it is the plague. I worked at Lowe's for an eight month spell in the paint department. My liver's still working on the detox.

But I was already out and about. After a really awesome yoga class (Note to self: new yoga mats off-gas: hang them outside for at least a week to avoid choking on fumes during child's pose) and a jaunt over to Ballard for some biodiesel, I decided to be pro-active in taking care of my stuff. The Lowe's parking lot is already filled to the brim and I park way at the end of the lot. No further that 50 feet away from the door, I begin to smell the nauseously familiar scent of dirty dirty chemicals. A glance over at the plants for sale tells me they are absolutely drenched in toxic sludge. Already disgusted, I outright choke on fumes of Miracle-Gro stacked in the foyer. Seriously, my eyes were watering. Damn. It's a miracle plants can grow in that shit.

Inside, first I walk to the back of the store to use the restrooms, which are housed in the next zip code. I keep peeking around all darty-like, because I totally expect my old ignorant, lameass boss, Gary (read: George W. Bush's retarded cousin) to bounce around the corner. After reconvincing myself that I'm not in Brockton anymore, I powerwalk over to the hardware section. After coming eye-to-eye with the rope selection and partially glazing over for a minute, I come across the bajillion little drawers that house all things small and metal. Now, I am partial to wingnuts: not the wingnuts that work at this gaia-forsaken dump, but actual wingnuts. They're functional, handy and cute as all hell. And in the eight or so drawers with pictures of wingnuts on them, guess how many I found....too easy, huh? That's right, zero.

The chemicals were starting to get to me, and the fractions and pictures, combined with the general disarray and mislocation of just about every item in said drawers, started swirling around and kicking the shit out of the space behind my right eye. If I weren't withering up and dying, I might have felt fiesty enough to ask the pimply adolescent Lowe's employee for a nut and a screw, but at this point, it wouldn't even be remotely amusing. I finally settled on a 1/2" Push-In Nylon Rivet. Up at the register, I received a receipt that was at least 8 inches long (WTF?), and nearly ran out of the store, sucking in breaths of wet air in gratitude.

I open up the package at the car, remove the duct tape from the plate (Note: duct tape does NOT cure everything: it worked on my plate for all of two minutes), and start swearing. The gauge on these Push-In Nylon Rivets is way too big, it won't even fit into the hole of the plate. Sighing, I head back into the store, this time holding my breath through the foyer, fish out a 1/4" Push-In Nylon Rivet from the drawer, and head back to the check-out line. In the past, I would've simply slipped it into my pocket, but then I went and witnessed a thing called Karma, and since I'm trying to start up a massage business, I thought I'd best stand in line and cough up another $1.04. This time my receipt was 14 inches long (Double WTF???). Not exactly the Karma I had in mind...

I get back out to the car, and this time the thing goes through. I push the little knob through, and sat back to examine my work. Exactly two seconds later, my moment of pride was popped with the sight of the plate swinging mockingly back down around its one good screw.

Fuck this.

I got back in the car and drove over to Seanix's house. In addition to actually having these items laying around, he would appreciate the "nut and screw" joke. After a cup of tea, a fistful of pecans, and a few rounds of Super Mario Brothers 3, my license platee is now horizontal. The people of Seattle may now collectively sigh in relief and get on with their latte-sipping.

Anyone need some handy Push-In Nylon Rivets?

1 comment:

herrsatan said...

Haha!

That same (well, similar) thing happened to me when I left one of my headlights out for a few weeks. Pretty much anytime I drove anywhere people would flash their lights at me. I kept thinking I was getting pulled over. But no, they were just being nice. Or something.