Anything that can go wrong . . .

. . . will go wrong.  That’s Murphy’s Law.

Saturday started out rather pleasantly.  Woke up to the biological clock, made some coffee, did some scrapbooking, listened to some radiolab, listened to the drizzle of the rain outside, and stayed in my PJ’s until about 3:00pm.  Little bit of this, little bit of that.  Decided to go to the grocery store, then watched a movie and finally decided it was time to do some studying for Monday’s exam.

That’s when it started.

I packed my binder and my purse and headed down the road to a little sidestreet coffee shop recently recommended to me.  I discovered that parking is not so easy in that neck of the woods.  My first time past the coffee shop, I saw an open curbside spot  sandwiched in between two very nice cars, so I passed and just thought I’d park on the next section of curb on the other side of the driveway.  I pulled up, grabbed my stuff, and began strolling to my destination.  That’s when I noticed the faint writing on my curb: Passenger Loading Only.  It was right in front of the Pasadena Playhouse.  Strike one.

So I loaded myself back into the car and proceeded to circle the block to look for parking again.  Pasadena’s seemingly random one-way streets serve to taunt visitors – you know you want to go to the right, but we’re only going to let you go to the left.  Strike two.

After finally getting my bearings and circling the block a few more times, I eventually parallel parked into a spot right in front of the shop.  Okay, that’s a good sign.

Upon entering the indie-style cafe and ordering some sort of soy latte, I presented my debit card as payment for my treat, only to find out that they only take cash.  I was clear out of cash.  Strike three.

The barista told me I could walk over to the mini mart on the other side of Colorado Boulevard and get cash back, and he would save my drink for me.  I exited the establishment and decided to toss my school binder in the passenger side of my car so that I wouldn’t have to carry it with me.  However, the ear-shattering screech of the bottom of my car door on the pavement told me that I had apparently misjudged how high the sidewalk curb was.  As if the noise wasn’t enough, a mark was left on the cement as a sort of momento of the time that my car’s door and the sidewalk had spent together.  And if that wasn’t enough, it just had to be less than four feet away from the patrons who were trying to enjoy their coffee amidst the peaceful atmosphere of a clear summer evening in Pasadena.  Strike four.

I scurried across the street, grabbed a pack of $1.25 gum, and presented my debit card to the cashier, requesting cash back.  He told me I had to spend at least ten dollars to get cash back.  Ahhh!  Strike five.

I decided to make a trip out of it and grabbed for a jar of peanut butter and a container of honey, when I noticed the blue and red stainless steel mini water bottles.  I’ve been wanting to get one for some time, but they’re always too big for me, so these were just what I needed.  Peanut butter and honey and pack of gum (which I was now emotionally attached to and was determined to buy, even though I didn’t need it) in hand, I strode over to the water bottles to grab one and go.  They were lined up in two rows: red in front, blue in back, and just high enough that I had to stand on my tip toes and reach up to get them.  Red I would not purchase, so as I juggled my three grocery items and reached over the reds and into the blues . . . you guessed it . . . I knocked over the reds and they came crashing down onto the floor of the mini mart.  Stainless steel x 5 + a hard and echoing floor + people standing nearby = me embarrassed.  Strike six.

So I finally plopped my items onto the counter, checked out, and headed back across the street.  My quest to get five dollars had turned into thirty.  Sheesh.  This coffee better be good, I thought to myself.  I got my binder out of my car, got my coffee from the barista, and scanned the shop for a place to begin studying.  This little place is just that – it’s little.  So there is very limited seating outside, and even more limited seating inside.  I found my way to the only open spot, the bar counter next to the blender, which meant that, every time the blender whirred, the entire counter vibrated.  Great.  Finally settled in to my little area, I aggressively took a gulp of the foam on top of what I thought would be my now-lukewarm latte.  I was wrong.  Because I had tipped it back so fast, I failed to burn my tongue and just went straight for the throat.  Burnt throat.  Awesome.  Strike seven.

I pulled out a handful of writing and highlighting utensils so that I could get started with my studying, and as I clicked on the end of my mechanical pencil, I quickly discovered that it was out of lead.  Of ALL the pencils I could have chosen from my bucket of pencils, I had to choose the one that was out of lead.  Strike eight.

With only about 30 minutes remaining before I had to evacuate my one-hour-parking-only spot, I grabbed a pen and dove into my lecture notes but really didn’t even get through the first lecture out of four.  I was beginning to think that tonight just wasn’t my night.  So, after making much less progress than I had hoped, and spending much more time and money than I had anticipated, I drove the mile or so back to my apartment.  There, I pulled out my box of Safeway brand Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Very Vanilla soymilk, cleared my whiteboards, grabbed my bucket of dry erase markers, lit a study candle, and got to work.

Maybe my next attempt at studying out in the world will be more successful.  But if something goes wrong at the beginning of my trek over there, maybe I should just head back home.  Because Murphy is out to get me.