I do my own stunts.

A few weeks ago, I picked up a new car. Not a brand new car, but a new-to-me car. The image at the right is the same year make and model, the color is hard to see, but it is sea-foam green. I call it the Booger-mobile.

I didn't pay a lot for it, but it runs well and looks nice. Considering what I paid for it, I expected that there are a to be a few issues: One, the windshield fluid doesn't come out. Yes it's full. Talk about annoying. Two, the blinkers work on an infrequent basis. My car likes to PMS. Three, there is a connectivity issue with the battery at times. Four, the gears don't line up to what is matched. For example, to put the car in neutral, I have to line it up with the R. So obviously there are a few things wrong with the car, but considering I was driving a car that I thought would literally fall apart at the slightest bump... I'm ahead of the game.

Yesterday was the first test to see how it would handle on ice. Schools were closed yesterday as well. When that happens, my son goes to my Aunt's house for the day.

The roads home weren't as bad as I thought. Save for the ass-wipe who thought the safest way to drive was right on my tail with their brights pointed directly in my rearview mirror. It only took me about 15 minutes longer than normal to get home. (I'll go off on a tangent another day about how CT plows it's roads...)

Instead of going directly home, I went to my Aunt's to pick up my son. We stayed for about an hour chatting and what-not. I had my aunt look at my head where I slammed it against the staircase on Sunday night. She said she felt the bump, but didn't see any discoloration. Before I heard one more "I'm bored" sigh from my son, I decided it was time for us to leave.

The drive a few blocks to my place wasn't that bad, but I realized that I had forgotten something at my aunts house. I sent my son inside, had him lock the doors and told him I'd be home in about 10 minutes.

Upon reaching my aunts house, her driveway was not shoveled or plowed and decided that parking on the FLAT street would be a better option. I put my car in park and waited inside the car for a half a minute to make sure that it wasn't going to go anywhere. I saw what I had dropped on the driveway. I got out of my car, closed the door, walked three feet, picked up what I forgot and turned around to go back to my car.

Instead of being able to walk back to my car to get in, I saw it slowly rolling backwards on the street. I did the only logical thing, I yelled, "Hey wait!" It didn't take me long to realize that it wasn't going to stop. I quickly thought what my options were: let it roll away and potentially cause an accident or to chase after it.

Before the thought even finished I started to chase after my run-away car as it was going backwords, on a flat surface, on sheer ice... I had no other options.

I started to carefully chase after it as fast as I could trying to both save the car and save myself from falling. About the time the car got to the neighbors drive way, I had tried, unsuccessfully, to open the passenger door 3 times. On the 4th try, it opened and stayed opened!

Now the trick was at it's most dangerous. I had to enter a car, while it's rolling backwords, on top of sheet ice WHILE finding the path of least resistance to get the car to stop in the fastest way possible...

I swung the door open, jumped in and reached out with my left hand and slammed the parking break as hard as I could. I couldn't tell if the car was still moving or not. I could tell it had slowed down, but just when I thought it stopped, I felt it start to roll back again slightly. I pushed the parking break harder and the car came to a final rest.

I needed a minute to comprehend what had just happened. The interior light of my car was on, and I lay face down on front seat, my feet still sticking out the open passenger door. I slowly lifted my head and saw I was parked in front of a drive way. The only drive that happened to have a person in it, shoveling.

Embarassed, I sat up, slammed the passenger door, hopped into the drivers seat. The guy shoveling the snow just stared at me. I took the parking break off and peeled out of there as safely as possible. I could only imagine him running inside to tell his family about the crazy blue haired girl he saw running down the icy roads chasing after her car that backed away from her as if she was a repelling magnet.

On the drive home, I couldn't help but giggle. No one or nothing was hurt or damaged. As I told the story to my son, he literally broke down laughing and decided to call everyone he could think of. The story was almost more funny when he told it, "But then *laugh* she turned around and *laugh laugh laugh* her car was rolling away with out her! *laughing so hard he almost can't breathe* And the guy *laugh* was looking at her *laugh laugh* like, what are you doing lady? *laugh*"

Next time, I'll add a banana peel to the perils that I have to face while chasing my car. I think my good friend Colleen is right: I do live in my own little sitcom.

-MetalRose

Infiltrated by Rock stars

"You can't park here," A woman in a brown parka and a bright yellow cap tapped on my car window. "You'll have to move over there." Her gloved hand pointed to some arbitrary point in the snow covered parking lot.

It was 12:30 am Saturday night/Sunday morning. My car was stopped just outside front doors of the "bathroom building" of a CT roadside pit stop. I was only about 10 miles from home, even living in Minnesota for as long as I did, the snow in CT was enough to scare me. It's not really the snow, it's the lack of good plowing techniques and the idiot drivers.

As I mumbled something about other cars being parked there, my son started to giggle in the back seat. I was surprised he was still awake. I put my car into drive and circled around the parking lot a couple of times, and then pulled up next to the side walk just a little further down.

I sent a text to the guys in Epicurean, "Roads aren't bad, but the blowing snow and lack of plowing makes it hard to see. Be careful! -MetalRose"

Earlier on Saturday morning, Epicurean's tour bus pulled onto my street and parked in front of my house. I went outside to meet them and saw someone get out of the drivers side of the bus. It was Laramy, the singer. When I moved closer I noticed his stance. I apologized and turned around to head back to the other side of the bus to greet the rest of the band.

Gensmer, the drummer, got off the bus first and gave me a huge hug and introduced me to the remainder of the band. Their line up had changed quite a bit since I left Minnesota, but it was great to see both Johns- Gensmer and Laramy. The new line up was very gracious and the fill in guitarist was on the same label as the last band that stayed at my place. Brian from Luna Mortis was filling in, Eli and Jeremy rounded out the band.. and of course the merch girl, Hanna- who was very much like me. I later found out she loved Asian horror and made a lot of her own clothes. I offered to make her a corset after I found out she'd been looking at $300 custom made ones.

After introductions, I invited the guys and girl inside and we cracked a couple of beers. Laramy offered to leave money for the booze, but I declined. We settled where everyone was going to sleep and set up air mattresses and folded out the futon. Just after 6 am we decided to turn in for the night, well morning. I told the boys that if they got up before I did, there were clean towels on the washing machine and the coffee pot was ready to go.

At 9 am, I woke up to use the bathroom, I had left the living room door unlocked for those who needed to come back into the house. A couple of the guys felt more secure sleeping in the van/bus, I offered a space heater and after they objected. I put it next to the door and told them to grab it if they needed it.

While I sauntered to the bathroom, I saw a figure standing in my living room. We smiled and groggily waved. By the time I came back out, he was gone. Sleep came so easily.

An hour later, I heard Brian talking on the phone. I got up and started the coffee. I had toyed with going to the bus to see if the boys were up yet. I know I had seen Jeremy up earlier, the dilemma was to accidently wake them with coffee or not.

I brought Brian over a cup of coffee, but he said he was good. I dumped it back into the coffee pot and started to put away the dishes while jumping over the air mattress laying the middle of my kitchen floor. I didn't mind them lying there as it was right next to the heater, but I had hoped that the coffee would wake them up.

The hot brew didn't wake them the commotion got them to arise; Laramy opened his eyes and thanked me. He said the club they played at last night was so cold that when they were at the merch booth, you could see the steam rolling off the lips of the people as they spoke. He was so grateful to be warm. Gensmer walked in and headed toward the bathroom. He opened the door and asked where the towels they could use were. I told him they were on the washing machine, he turned around and saw the stack and hit himself in the forehead.

While the griddle warmed up for some home cooked pancakes, Eli ran into the kitchen while rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, "Did I hear that right? Pancakes? I heard Brian talking to his girlfriend on the phone and he said, the girl we are staying with is making pancakes! That woke me up! I was like, pancakes SWEET!"

As fast as I could make them they were gone, pancakes, coffee and a couple of glasses of milk. It seemed like chaos in the house as all 5 guys and one girl tripped over each other for the bathroom and to make sure all their stuff was packed. Brian had asked if I would mind hosting Luna Mortis should they be in the area. I told him that as long as I knew at least one person in the band, then my place was open. We exchanged phone numbers for a later time.

I stepped outside to get out of the bands way as they packed. Jeremy, who had turned in early last night and missed the festivities was standing out side. It was nice to finally get to chat with him for at least a few minutes. He thanked me up and down, I told him it's my way of saying thanks for putting us on the guest list.

As fast as they came, they left. I gave them all a hug goodbye and told them I'd see them in a couple of hours. My heart sank as I went back downstairs to my apartment, I half expected to see it looking like a tornado hit it. When I opened the door, the place was just as it was before they came. That always makes me so happy. The worst of it was a pile of towels and a pile of dishes. I sighed and rested on the couch.

After my son's basketball came, we came home, showered and took off. It had lightly started to snow. Driving in CT was very slow and it took almost 20 minutes longer than I thought to get out of there. Once I hit MA, the roads were perfectly clear. It was like night and day. I drove like a bat out of hell to get to the Palladium as fast as possible. The venue was an hour away, and with the roads being crappy, we were behind.

At the Palladium, we walked to the box office, "Hi, we should be on Epicurean's guest list." The woman there shook her head. "Only one band gave me a guest list, and they only had one person on it... and they are in already..." My heart sank, I asked where the merch area is and left Joey Sky as a lien while I grabbed Hanna. She came out and vouched for us, just as we hit the middle of the last song. *sigh*

We stuck around for half of Rotting Christ's set. I peeked out and could tell the roads were getting bad. I told Gensmer that if they didn't think they'd make it to come back to my place. I'd rather see them safe and warm then cold and at the side of the road.

Joey Sky and I followed Gensmer backstage to say our goodbyes. It was really really good to see some home town faces. On our way to the car, we ran into Brian and Jeremy, the last two in the band. Their grinders from Woosta Pizza were exposed to the falling snow and becoming more and more soggy. They didn't seem to mind as we chatted for a few minutes about touring and hanging out. They gave me another hug, shook Joey Sky's hand and told us to drive safe. I turned on my car the clock read 10:30.

The drive from Mass wasn't bad. About half way in, we stopped and grabbed something to eat and a fresh tank of gas. We followed behind snow plows which made the driving go so smooth. Just before the CT border, the snow plows turned off and the roads turned ugly. Cars passed me doing 90 miles an hour on unplowed and untreated roads. The blowing snow made the visibility almost nothing. I couldn't tell where the hills were or where the turns were, after hitting the rumble strips a couple of times, I knew I had to get off the road for a little while. Besides, my bladder was screaming at me.

I pulled off at the first rest stop I could find. I saw three cars parked along the walk way just a head of me. I pulled up behind the last one, it was covered in snow and had been there a while. I figured we'd be ok for a quick pee break. I had just put the car in park when I got a knock at the window. "You can't park here."

-MetalRose