Due to the planets being out of alignment, I didn’t make it into work this morning until 8:45.

I was all gung-ho and ready to go and I hopped into my car, hit the garage door opener, and looked up to see a black Dodge Neon parked right in front of the garage. I cursed out loud as one of the tenants tends to do this from time to time.

I honked my horn for about a minute - nothing. I knocked on the back door - nothing. I rang the door bell around front for the first floor - nothing. I rang the rest of the doorbells and got two answers (out of three apartments), neither of which knew anything. I called the landlord who gave me the number of the dude on the first floor. I called him - nothing. Then I saw through the window that the cell phone was sitting on the kitchen table next to a bowl full of cut limes…hmmm. Some more knocking, some more ringing, some more honking - nothing. I then noticed that the bedroom window on the first floor was open, so I hollered in there - nothing. I hollered in there for another five minutes - I heard the sheets move. Another two minutes and I got an answer - he didn’t know whose car it was.

I then proceeded to call the towing company. They couldn’t tow it until the police ticketed it. So I called the police. Just as I got on the line with the police, this guy saunters around the corner and reaches in his pocket for the keys. I hang up on the police and proceed to inform him that he nearly got towed and that I was very upset (I used some different language, of course). He didn’t even acknowledge my presence. Just got in his car and drove away.

45 minutes after getting in my car, I was on my way to work. Until I got onto the road.

I was heading down the sidestreets just about to hit Inner Lakeshore when I noticed several guys running around trying to corner another guy. It was almost like a game of chess, in more ways than one, where the opponent had one pawn left that just keeps skipping around the board. I don’t know what was going on, but all the chasers looked like they were on their way to work - backpacks, trenchcoats, and cell phones out, presumably calling the police. Finally the pawn went running down the street with this girl chasing after him holding her arm out as if she had mace. I don’t know what happened to the pawn, but one of the chasers got in his car (that was holding traffic up) and proceeded to leave. As I drove by the girl, she was crying and holding her face and talking about how it burned. Guess she maced herself by mistake…oops.

I finally made it to work without further incident, but I felt for sure fate was trying to tell me to stay home today.