"I'm sending you a picture. Don't freak out."

A married couple of 37 years can call each other on the phone this way.

It could mean a cell phone shot of a winning lottery ticket. Or not.

Last week, it was Or Not.

I was standing in a dark office with my co-workers pondering the power outage that had just occurred when Brad called on my cell phone.

"I'm sending you a picture. Don't freak out." Click.

C'mon lottery ticket! Baby needs new shoes!

It was not to be. Instead I opened this -- a sad picture of  a somewhat mangled Go-Kart, our sporty little red Honda Civic. Aside from some pretty impressive Technicolor bruises on his left arm and a stiff  neck courtesy of air bag deployment, Brad was okay. And that's the important thing. Period.

It was the other driver's fault. And miraculously she had insurance -- something I can't say about the two fender benders I've been involved in. (BOTH were the other drivers' faults, OKAY!?) Even better, both insurance companies have been champs. And yesterday, the Insurance People declared the Civic totalled.

It's not an easy loss, the most obvious, and annoying, piece is that we're back into a car payment of some sort. But on another level. . . . it was my step-dad Frank's get-about car down in Portland for years until we bought it from him and The Mom Unit as they downsized a few years back. Frank's gone now -- he died five years ago this Labor Day weekend -- but The Go-Kart was one of his special gems -- we still have all the service records with notes in his handwriting. It's hard to watch a small pocket of happy memories towed away in the rain along with a little red car.

And one other completely different, superficial note: Despite it's humble origins as a Civic hatchback, the Go-Kart was fire engine red and kicked ass.

Truth be told, and shhhh, only now I can confess, the Go-Kart and I totally ripped up the road on a couple driving trips between Bermtopia and Portland -- country western and/or NPR (now THERE'S an oxymoron) cranking from the radio because the car didn't have *gasp* a CD player. It was a 5-speed but the GK could haul.

Poor Go-Kart, you'll be missed. You were special, even coated in bird poop.

And we'll always have Mister Car Wash.

The trip of a lifetime

I don't go looking for weird, trust me, but sometimes, despite my best efforts, it finds me. Which was the reason for my trip to the car wash yesterday.

Let me preface this cautionary tale by saying a trip to the car wash was NOT on my dance card yesterday. Buying a paella pan was, however.

See the connection? No? Good. Because there's none whatsoever.

Buying a paella pan involved a trek to World Market, which is located a ways up North Division -- probably the busiest thoroughfare in the fair city of Bermtopia. So I thought, hey, why not multi-task and stop by The Farm to curse my nonexistent beans and cukes to water the veggies on my way north.

And so it was, on a beautiful Memorial Day weekend Saturday, I found myself traversing the intersection of Madison and 21st when my reverie about paella pans was shattered by a deafening SPLAT! The car's windshield was instantaneously dotted with large, white, oozing ovals of, excuse my French, bird poop. 

The car shook from the impact. I swear to God. It shook.


Fortunately, The Farm was just two blocks away. I pulled along the curb, turned to open the car door to get out and inspect the poop-tacular and nearly passed out. More massive quantities of bird poop coated the driver's side window.  Which was actually about a quarter of the way open. 

I'm lucky I'm still alive.


The collateral damage was quite breathtaking. If you're into bird poop, that is. My little red Honda Civic, affectionately known as the Go-Kart (a term the Numbers 1 and 2 Sons came up with a few years back), was coated in poop. It had been transformed from sporty but trusty mode of transportation into a Dalmatian-like red and white Poop-mobile. 

I would not like to mess with the bird who dropped this particular payload. 


What to do? What to do?


Well, I watered of course. Took a few cell phone shots to document the occasion. And thought about my paella pan.  I wanted that paella pan. And then I remembered the car wash. Conveniently located on  Division not too far from my work. Huzzah!


What I didn't account for was the drive to the car wash. Do you know what it's like to drive through the downtown of Washington's second largest city. . . on one of it's busiest streets. . . in a bright red car. . . coated in bird poop?


Neither did I. Until yesterday.


Smurks. Honks. Averted eyes. Outright laughter. The ever-present panhandlers at Division and 3rd took a convenient break as I sat idling at the stoplight. You name the reaction, I got it in the 10-minute drive to the car wash.


But the car wash gals were the best. The sprayer gal -- a little goth-like but more effervescent than most (is that possible? -- picture funereal black dyed hair, a few strategically placed piercings, ironically uniformed-up in a perky polo shirt and khakis) could only say, "Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod" while attacking the offending pockets of poop. 

The money-taker gal, a cool drink of water with a stash of one-dollar bills in her hand, gazed at the Go Kart with much car wash gravitas and simply said, "I hear they like red cars the best."