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I have done something to piss off the universe. I apologize to people for bringing bad luck to them. It's following me and affecting them. Let's take a look at Monday and Tuesday, shall we?

Monday was our day to rent a truck and pick up some furniture from West Elm that didn't fit into the Element last Friday, and also some IKEA stuff. So, off we go.

As we're at the truck rental place, the phone rings and it's the guy from Texas with whom I'm working on a book. As he'd said Sunday, he'd like to meet up Monday, but unlike what he said Sunday, he'd like to meet at 5 instead of 7. Since it's already almost noon, I'm thinking "uh oh."

We go into the rental place and there are 3 people in front of us...no biggie. But there's a guy with problems on his bill, so 3 people are helping him, leaving 1 for everyone else. Then, the computers are going slow...literally 10 minutes between one entry and the next. 45 minutes later, after the guy behind the counter flirts with me (and is visibly disappointed when Adrian walks in, after being accosted by a homeless man outside), we leave with a van.

Everything goes fine with the furniture pickup, though we have some trouble getting things off the shelves at IKEA. We get back to our building and have to learn how to use the frieght elevator (keys are required). We get everything unloaded, though I bruise Adrian in the process. I leave to drop off the van and head to the Metro, and I gas up the van only to get in and turn it on and realize it still isn't full. I put a couple more gallons in and get to the rental place, where a guy asks "do you want me to put that gas cap back on for you?" Um, yeah. Computers are now totally down, so I can't get a receipt. And it's starting to sprinkle.

I make it to the Metro with 10 minutes to make a meeting that is 40 minutes away by train. I decide to save time by switching from Blue to Yellow trains to avoid a bunch of stops and save around 20 minutes. I get off the Blue train and find that no Yellow trains appear to be running. At all. Anywhere. So I'm back on the next Blue having wasted a few minutes. My co-editor calls but I let it go to voicemail, figuring he'll assume I'm underground. Soon enough I am, but we pop up long enough for me to get another call from him. I answer, tell him trains are having trouble, and we arrange for an alternate meeting site. Then my train stops because someone on the train in front of us is having medical problems and they're trying to move us around it. I wonder how this will affect me, which means now I have bad karma points on top of everything else. Hope they're OK, whoever they are.

Finally make my 30-minute meeting which lasts an hour. It is POURING down rain when we leave and I have no umbrella. Make it to the train looking like a wet dog for a 40-minute ride home. Am supposed to meet Dancin' Mike for dinner, and I have a voicemail from him that is all static. I try to call him twice but get no response. No dinner that night, alas.

I get home and we do some work on the house. By the time we leave the restaurants are closing. We get Chinese food (bad, as it turns out) and head back to the hotel. Bear in mind we were supposed to be painting Monday as well, yet little painting has been done.

Tuesday morning we check out of the hotel and go to the condo. We unload some furniture that's been in the Element since Friday and Adrian leaves for his 1pm job interview. I put together our bed because the mattress is being delivered. When it is I can tell the guys want a tip but I have no cash so BANG, some more bad karma. Adrian's interview goes great and they appear to already be scheduling him, even though they want him to do audition by doing one of the owner's hair next week.

We paint and paint and paint, waiting for the cable guy who's coming from 4-8pm. He calls at 7, says he's overbooked, can they reschedule for Wednesday? A pain in the ass, because we have plans for Wednesday evening, but the alternative is a disgruntled cable guy showing up at 9 or 10 for what promises to be a couple hours worth of work. I resolve to write a nasty letter to the cable company (which I've already done). Of course, we'd checked out of the hotel because we expected phone and Internet by Tuesday night, but alas.

We get up early Wednesday morning for our 7:30am New Resident Orientation, which only happens once a month. We wait for a while, only to find it's at 7:30pm. When the cable guy's here. And when Adrian is doing someone's hair. I get pissy. And no one likes that.

Over bagels at Panera Bread, with it's free wireless, we discover that rain is expected along the east coast this weekend. We had already bagged our plans to head to the Caribbean because we'd only be there a couple days, not enough to justify the cost and it also wouldn't allow me any time to scuba dive, which Adrian wants me to be able to do. We decided to back off of that and try it later in the year, like Thanksgiving, and just head to a beach this weekend, maybe Rehoboth Beach. But the weather forecast calls for rain all the way down to Miami. So we thought, "let's just go to Charlottesville," as I want us to get out of here, otherwise we'll continue working on the condo. We cannot find a room in Charlottesville, either downtown or near the University. What the hell? We consider New York, but know we won't relax there, and then we realize it's Pride Weekend and we REALLY wouldn't relax, so I guess we'll stay here and hang out and maybe see some friends. But I expect Adrian's family will ask us to arrange a cookout at the condo. Because they asked for that last weekend.

I need a vacation. More importantly, I need whoever is screwing with my universe to back off for a day or two.

(BTW, when I first tried to post this, my connection to Blogger failed. The universe obviously doesn’t want me posting about how it’s trying to screw me. It's now 12 hours later and I'm sending this from home with our new connection, so at least that worked. The orientation got postponed until next month at the last moment.)