More Car Drama in Southern Maryland and How I Managed to Get Over It With a Trip to North Beach, September 12, 2019

After my sudden spate of car drama in Southern Maryland that reached a crescendo on September 10, 2019, I ended up taking the following day off from Census Bureau work mainly because I had no car. I basically relaxed in an effort to get over that trauma (which included having a local threatening to shoot me and the tow truck driver who was rescuing me from the car breakdown).

My housemate told me that he suspected that it’s a problem with the alternator. (Like I wrote in that last post, my problems initially began with a dead battery and it got replaced by AAA but my housemate said that the alternator problem is commonly related to the battery problem.) During that day I got a phone call from the Meinke place telling me that, my housemate was correct, and it was a dead alternator. An aftermarket alternator in good condition would cost $700, including repairs. (I shudder to think how much a new alternator would cost.) The good news was that, thanks to my recent Census Bureau job, I could afford to pay for the repair. The bad news was that I had to pay for the repair but I had no other choice if I wanted to continue working that Census Bureau job.

So the morning after that one day of decompressing from the car drama I got a call from Meinke saying that the car was ready. I needed a ride to La Plata in order to pick it up. My housemate kindly volunteered to drive me there. (He works at a local library where his hours are from noon until 8 p.m.) I decided to take both my work and personal laptops with me. I arrived at the Meineke place where I noticed that they had this really cool looking metal sculpture that looked like it was made from car parts. (I only didn’t notice it earlier because I was pretty frazzled the other day from that drama.)

I picked up the car and I decided to drive to the nearby La Plata Plaza to decompress and eat breakfast (which I didn’t get a chance to eat because my housemate needed to leave early enough to make the nearly 90 minute trip to La Plata then drive to his job in Takoma Park in time for the start of his shift). It was the same La Plata Plaza where I walked to the other day where I waited for my housemate to pick me up once he got off of his shift.

I ended up going to the Safeway in that shopping center where I purchased a box of Lucky Charms cereal along with a small pint of cream and a Rubbermaid Serving Saver that was about the size of a cereal bowl. (I only purchased the cream because the smallest milk size they had at the Safeway was a quart, which was way too much for a bowl of cereal. I also didn’t want to buy a quart because I would’ve had to keep it in the car and with the hot weather at that time of the year, I was worried about it spoiling the extra milk pretty fast.) As for the spoon, I swiped a plastic one from the salad bar. I also purchased a 20 ounce bottle of Diet Pepsi so I would have a jolt of caffeine.

So I sat at one of the tables at Safeway, poured the cereal into the Serving Saver, poured the cream, and ate a pretty rich breakfast. I pulled out my work laptop, logged into it, and found that I had another assignment that was also in the La Plata area and it was located just a few miles from the shopping center. So I put the rest of the Lucky Charms cereal in the grocery bag then went to the nearby restroom to go to the bathroom and wash out the Serving Saver before putting that in the grocery bag as well. Then I got in my car and drove off to my next assignment.

As I was driving I saw a couple of houses that had two flagpoles that were flying two flags. One was the American flag, which isn’t that unusual in this country. The other was a navy blue flag of the same size that had the name TRUMP in white letters. Basically these houses were flying a Trump flag alongside the American flag, which was pretty unsettling. I learned that Donald Trump is receiving a level of adoration from his supporters on a level that I have never seen before. I don’t recall President Ronald Reagan, who has long been a darling of conservatives, ever receiving THAT level of adoration. It’s almost like the people who fly the Trump flag next to the American flag have equated Donald Trump with the United States of America, which signals that a cult of personality have been created around Trump. These people would probably think that even a mild critique of Trump equals an attack on America and I find that alarming.

Sure I currently like Bernie Sanders, Liz Warren, and Andrew Yang but I would NEVER fly any banners with their names alongside the American flag because it just feels like it would desecrate the American flag just as much as burning it, walking on it, or taking a shit on it.

Fortunately I didn’t have to stop by those homes with the Trump flag flying side-by-side with the American flag. I passed by them while I was looking for a certain address, which I punched into Google Maps on my smartphone. The GPS led me to a two-lane country road that was all farmland. Basically Google Maps led me to a barn as the address. I was taught during training that sometimes people do live in what is known as “unconventional housing” and that can include tents, boats, recreational vehicles, and barns. So I pulled my car to a grassy area near the barn and I investigated it. It looked like one of those tobacco barns because a few of the wall panels were lifted up so I was able to peek inside. I saw an empty barn with no evidence of any kind of habitation.

I saw another building just a few feet away that looked like a house. I suspected that it might be the actual place that I was looking for and Google Maps had simply confused it with that barn. I decided to get back in my car and drive to that other building.

So I got in my car and started it. The car started fine. Then I put it into drive and I couldn’t move the car. Then I tried putting it into reverse and I couldn’t move the car. I tried putting it into drive and all I was doing was spinning my wheels. I tried putting it into reverse with the same result. I discovered to my horror that I had parked the front of the car into a small dip that was deep enough to trap the car.

Yes, I retrieved the car from the repair shop due to a bad alternator only to get that same car trapped in a dip on a grassy area just a few hours later! I can laugh now at that predicament but, at the time, it was simply more stress and upset, especially since—once again—I was stuck on a country road in the middle of nowhere. I ended up calling AAA to help me again for the second day in less than a week. Once again I was broiling in the hot and humid mid-90s temperature while waiting for a tow truck to rescue me. I took a few pictures of the car because AAA wanted me to text them so they can get an idea of what they were dealing with and give the right information to the tow truck driver.

While I was waiting I had one local stop his car close by asking me if I needed help. (He was an older gentleman who had grey hair and a matching grey mustache.) When I showed him the car being stuck in that dip, the guy laughed and said, “You’re really stuck.” He looked at the car but he said that I would need a chain and he didn’t have it so he couldn’t help me. He asked me what I was doing in the area and I told him about working for the Census Bureau. He asked me if I intend to ask people the citizenship question that President Trump wants to put on the 2020 census forms. I told him that I would ask if I was required to do so. (As of this writing, Trump hasn’t succeeded in adding that question to the census and he seems to have moved on to other concerns, like the possibility that he could be impeached and removed from office.) He mentioned that one set of his grandparents came from Italy and they followed the law when they immigrated. I just politely nodded. I didn’t say anything because I really didn’t feel like getting into any political arguments because I was already preoccupied with both the latest car trouble and the hot and humid weather. He drove off after a few minutes.

Later a car with two teenagers (a girl and a boy) stopped by and asked me if I needed help. I told them that my car was stuck in that dip, I called AAA, and a tow truck was on its way. They wished me good luck then drove off.

The tow truck driver eventually came. He was a different person from the one that rescued me a couple of days ago. He had the equipment needed to get my car out of that dip. I started the car and it was driving again normally. I thanked him and he drove off.

Like I wrote a few paragraphs ago, before I had that “car stuck in a grassy dip” drama, I was originally going to investigate whether that building that was located a few feet away from the barn was really the house that I was looking for and not that barn that Google Maps said was the correct address. I drove to that building and found that it was a house and it was actually the address that I was looking for. Had I driven to that house without stopping and parking at that barn first, I could’ve avoided that whole stuck car drama entirely. Ugh!

So I continued with my work and it was quite a trip. I was frequently driving on unpaved dirt roads, which was not fun. I feared getting stuck in another grassy ditch or worse. I saw three deer emerge from a field and dart across the dirt road in front of the car before disappearing behind another field that was on the other side of the road. I was glad that I was driving slowly and they ran fast enough so I didn’t have to add “collision with deer” on top of all of my other car drama.

Doing the last house on my case was really harrowing. I was driving along a very narrow dirt road that was barely wide enough for one car. There was fields on the left hand side and the Potomac River on the right hand side. I kept on thinking “One wrong move and this car will end up in the river.” I arrived at the house and I was fortunate that it had a driveway where I could turn the car around so I could easily get out of the area. I kept the engine running while I made a few quick observations of the house and recorded them in my work laptop.

By that point I was ready to leave the area. I looked on Google Maps on my smartphone when I found that I was located just south of the twin beach towns of North Beach and Chesapeake Beach. I hadn’t been to any beaches in a few years due to tight finances and I had found myself wishing that I could go to any beach, even if it was only for just one day. So I punched the address of the North Beach Visitor’s Center into my Google Maps app and I drove north.

I arrived to North Beach about a half an hour later. I parked my car and started walking around despite the fact that the temperature was still around 95 degrees at 3 p.m.

I saw the beach but then I realized that I hadn’t packed a swimsuit so I couldn’t go swimming. But just seeing the beach with the Chesapeake Bay was enough for me at that point.

The one thing I learned is about the fees. Usually non-residents are charged a daily fee to use the beach and the fishing pier in the summer. When I arrived at North Beach after Labor Day, I found that the Welcome Center where you pay the admission fees in exchange for a paper wrist bracelet that gives you access was closed. It seems like North Beach only collects those fees during the summer before Labor Day. That’s good to know for future reference since the days can get hot in early September.

I went to Sweet Sue’s Bake Shop & Coffee Bar where I ate a bagel with cream cheese as a late lunch. Since I didn’t have a swimsuit I decided to bring my personal laptop with me and I did some web surfing while cooling off in the air conditioning.

Once I felt better I decided to resume my walk in the 95 degree heat. I had hoped to check out some of the stores only to find that most of the ones in downtown North Beach either close after 4 p.m. or they are only open on the weekends. (I arrived on a Thursday around 3 p.m. and I had taken a long break at Sweet Sue’s.) I ended up walking over to Wetlands Overlook Park, which is located just on the edge of town. I had never been there before on my previous trips so I thought it was worth checking out. I saw some spectacular nature scenes that just I couldn’t resist photographing.

There was also a wooded nature trail but the heat was getting to me at that point and I was starting to feel tired.

I decided to put off exploring that wooded nature trail for a future trip and head back to the downtown area, where I took some more shots.

I finally arrived at the other edge of North Beach where it borders Chesapeake Beach. (This explains why North Beach and Chesapeake Beach are frequently referred to as twin towns.)

During my previous trips to North Beach I would eat dinner at Ledo’s Pizza in Upper Marlboro on the way back home mainly because it was cheaper than eating at the main seafood restaurant in town. Thanks to my Census Bureau job I was able to do something I had never done before: Eat dinner at Neptune’s Seafood Pub.

I found the place to be very cozy and intimate, although I didn’t take any photographs of the interior because I was running low on battery power and I used one of the plugs to recharge my phone while I was there. I managed to take this picture of my meal: a crab cake sandwich with waffle fries. It was very delicious.

While I ate my meal this rain storm suddenly appeared and I saw the windows of the restaurant being pelted with raindrops. It was a brief storm because by the time I finished eating dinner and paying the $20 bill, the rain had largely subsided to a drizzle. The temperature was also much cooler than earlier. I also saw this incredibly awesome rainbow that was over the Chesapeake Bay.

I was pretty tired after all of the day’s excitement. I was glad I went to North Beach because I was able to relax for a bit plus I got to see a rainbow. I also saw this awesome sunset as I got back to the car so I could go home.

At least I was able to return home with no problem at all. The one thing I learned from that day is that Melody Beattie had the right advice in her book The Language of Letting Go when she said that if you have a dream, wish or desire, just whisper it out into the universe. A lot of times it will come true when you least expect it. For the past couple of summers I had a desire to go to a beach and I wasn’t able to do it because of tight finances. But then, one night before I went to sleep, I whispered, “I wish I could go to a beach.” In fact I said it a few times over various nights this past summer, although I don’t know how many times I actually did this. That desire came true because I was able to go to North Beach. Okay, so I missed out on swimming because I forgot to bring a swimsuit and most of the stores were closed because I arrived so late on a weeknight. But I was still able to walk around and enjoy the scenery. And I got to see a rainbow and a lovely sunset to boot.

And, yeah, North Beach is pretty small compared to the ocean resort towns like Ocean City. But I felt that it was better to go to North Beach than no beach at all.

The biggest takeaway from this is that sometimes your dreams will come true in ways that you don’t expect.

Throwback Thursday: The Unicorn With An Attitude 31: Five Years Later

Here is the thirty-first video in a series of computer animations called The Unicorn With An Attitude that I did back in the 1990’s in an ill-fated attempt to show off my abilities as an artist and a computer whiz in the hopes of either 1) get famous or 2) get a higher paying job than the office administrative work that I was frequently offered.

I created this animation way back in 1999 and I actually uploaded it on various BBS as well as CompuServe. I originally created it as a QuickTime movie using various software for an Apple Macintosh. I have totally remastered it in high definition video using Apple iMovie. As for the music, I used one of YouTube’s royalty-free songs.

By this point I had been working on and off The Unicorn With An Attitude series for five years so it was a special five-year anniversary animation that, like the earlier “A Wet Dream,” I dedicated to my then-husband. (I dedicated it to him because I wanted to show my appreciation for the support he gave me to pursue this idea I had. Even though we are divorced now and he acted horribly towards me while we were separated, I’m still not changing the dedication because I felt that way at the time and I don’t believe in rewriting history.)

I originally came up with what became The Unicorn With An Attitude as a result of some doodling I had done in order to relieve some boredom on the job in 1994, when I suddenly had a lot of free time on my hands. At that time the CEO of the company I worked for decided to sell it outright to one of its competitors. Subsequently everything at that company came to a grinding halt while the new owners figured out what to do with its new acquisition. At first it was great because I was finally able to catch up on a backlog of work that I was never able to finish mainly because I was doing the work of at least two people, new work was always coming in, and I would be pulled from one project to another by various managers (that company was literally totally top-heavy with managers that were hired from outside the company based on having MBA’s from name brand schools like Harvard, Stanford, and Wharton). Once I completely finished the work backlog, I started working on things that I had always wanted to implement in my job but I had to put way on the back burner because of the backlog of work. Once I finished everything job-related I basically had little else to do. So my workday increasingly consisted of this: I would do an hour’s worth of whatever data entry came in. Once I finished, I would mail out whatever flyers or brochures people asked for. Then I would tidy up my desk. After that I would eat lunch then work on rough drafts for my new animation idea while alternating with reading a magazine or a newspaper or a book I brought with me. This continued until I was laid off from my job a few months later. (I was among the first round of layoffs. Eventually the company did a few more layoffs then transferred the remaining workers from the office in Landover, Maryland to its corporate headquarters in Chantilly, Virginia while ultimately closing down the Landover office.)

While I didn’t release the first Unicorn With An Attitude animations online until 1995, I came up with the idea a year earlier so I decided to declare 1994 as the official start time instead of 1995.

“Five Years Later” is a dream sequence where a unicorn meets a fairy and it’s a lovely scene until real life barges in.  Since it was an anniversary special, I added elements that recalled earlier animations in the series. As the original write-up for this animation puts it:

The Unicorn meets a fairy in a dream. Like the earlier “A Wet Dream,” the Unicorn gets a rude awakening. It’s also a sequel of sorts to “Channel Surfing,” “The Art Class,” “Withdrawal,” and “Santa’s Surprise.”

So, without further ado, here’s “Five Years Later.”

Throwback Thursday: The Unicorn With An Attitude 22: A Wet Dream (NSFW)

Here is the twenty-second video in a series of computer animations called The Unicorn With An Attitude that I did back in the 1990’s in an ill-fated attempt to show off my abilities as an artist and a computer whiz in the hopes of either 1) get famous or 2) get a higher paying job than the office administrative work that I was frequently offered.

I created this animation way back in 1998 and I actually uploaded it on various BBS as well as CompuServe. I originally created it as a QuickTime movie using various software for an Apple Macintosh. I have totally remastered it in high definition video using Apple iMovie. As for the music, I used one of YouTube’s royalty-free songs.

I wanted to do something a little bit different for this series so I decided to do a dream sequence where The Unicorn With An Attitude meets a mermaid and swims with her. The scenes are pretty lovely until the Unicorn wakes up and the animation draws to its ultimate punchline conclusion.

I dedicated this animation to my then-husband because, at the time, he was very encouraging of my efforts to pursue an artistic career even if neither one of us were certain that my efforts at animation were going to pay off. (He also used to joke about how he preferred seeing mermaids if they were bare-breasted instead of being covered with a clamshell bra like Ariel in The Little Mermaid. So I drew bare-breasted mermaids in his honor.) I had hopes at the time because it was the time of the Dot-Com Bubble when all kinds of ideas from previously unknown individuals were being discovered by pioneering sites like TheSync.com, Pseudo.com, and DEN.net (all of which are now defunct) who were getting funding by angel investors and the whole thing took off. But then the Dot-Com Bubble burst big-time and, well, that’s another story.

Of course I dedicated this animation to the same man who, it turned out, basically pretended that he loved me until the night he came home and announced that he was moving out without ever telling me that he was unhappy. When I was remastering this animation in HD, I debated whether to keep the dedication or not because of all the hell he put me through during all those months prior to our day in divorce court. (That’s not to mention that he walked out on me just three months after I went through hip surgery so I had to simultaneously deal with physical and emotional wounds.)

I ultimately left in the dedication because I really felt that way at the time and trying to remove it would be totally dishonest on my part. Doing the Orwellian re-writing of past history is something my ex-husband would do (after all he not only left our wedding album behind but he didn’t take anything that was given to us jointly by other people—during a rare brief e-mail conversation with him, I had to remind him that the two of us had purchased our Droid smartphones together at the Verizon store just six months before he left because he didn’t seem to know how I got a Gmail account and didn’t even remember that we both had to get one as part of the process of purchasing a Droid). I don’t want to stoop to his level. I’m much better than that.

As my original write-up for this animation described it:

The Unicorn With An Attitude meets a mermaid and swims around in her undersea homeland. Unfortunately this idyllic scene is just a dream and the Unicorn gets a very rude awakening.

By the way, there’s a NSFW warning on this animation mainly because I chose to draw a bare-breasted mermaid. (I didn’t just do it to please my husband who preferred bare-breasted mermaids. It was also my way of symbolizing that this animation should NOT be confused with more wholesome family fare like The Little Mermaid and this animation—as well as my other Unicorn With An Attitude animations—was meant for more mature audiences.)

So, without further ado, here is “A Wet Dream.”