Profiteering, Betty as a Tank, and The Red Ring of Death

It all began with a hunger.

Not for knowledge or power, but for something more simple, more primal; a burrito.

It was more than a year ago, after a long night of studying some minute intricacy of the human body when the hunger began. With a pang, the burning started inside my gut.... Time to leave.

As I gathered up my things, and told my classmates I was done for the night, I took inventory of what I had in my cupboards and fridge... the report was grim. Unless I wanted to eat some plain noodles, sans sauce, butter or parmesan, well, I was up the creek.

I looked at my watch, 9:00.

"Oooooooooooo," I thought as I had flashbacks of 'word problems' from 6th grade, 'If a hungry student leaves his school at 9:00 PM, traveling at an average of 35 miles per hour, and needs to close a distance of 6 miles... how much time will he have left to grocery shop before Trader Joes closes at 10:00?'

The math nearly makes me gag.... though there was always something quite nerdly satisfying about working it out, and getting the answer right. But this time, I didn't take a moment to carry the one, or even round to the nearest decimal point. I just ball-parked it.

"Let's do it, Betty." While she wasn't in earshot, I knew she knew. And I think she also might have known that she was in for a fight.

I hurried down the five flights of stairs to the ground floor, as I never took the elevator. Taking the elevator seemed a waste, and horribly American, in the bad sense of the word. Like the 'American Way,' diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol.... which often equals overweight, and lazy. I suppose I can understand taking the elevator up to the 5th floor, but... still couldn't bring myself to do it. I can remember seeing people hop on the elevator and take it down one floor. As they boarded the elevator, they had working legs to carry them in, as well as out on the floor below, for I saw it with my own eyes, as I passed down the stairwell, faster than they had descended in the elevator. I guess it just doesn't make sense to me. If we can't do something as simple as climbing a few flights of stairs, then, we can't complain about being fat.

Anyway, I’ll get off my soapbox, for I was speedwalking to my car, and I couldn’t fit a soap-box in there, at least, I don’t think so. I’m not really sure how big a soap-box is….

So, I see Betty there, just ready and waiting to take me to Trader Joes. I hop in… and fire her up.

We’re off.

No, I didn’t speed, or throw caution to the wind. The wind has enough floating around in it. It certainly didn’t need my caution…. Plus, I don’t litter.

I was driving the way I normally do, like you’d expect an ’89 Cadillac to drive; as if a 89 year old female is driving it – steady and lawfully, but sort of half expecting it to take a wrong turn down a one way street, or jump a curb, causing sparks to fly in the dark, reminiscent of a Beastie Boys video (Sabotage.)

I was on it tonight, and so was Betty… man we were hitting the lights on Cornell, which can be entirely evil. It’s this unending string of stoplights that always seem to turn red at the sight of your car. You’ll just get up to speed, only to have to step on your brakes again… then, ever so annoyingly, you’ll JUST get to a complete stop, when they’ll turn green again. And to top it all off, not a single car will pass through that intersection while you’re stopped at the now COMPLETELY unnecessary red light. I think it’s just a bored employee at the DOT, controlling the lights, watching you get more and more frustrated, as he laughs his now slightly less boring 8 hour shift away.

I hate that guy.

Anyway, that guy must have been off tonight, because I hit every green light, didn’t have to stop once on my way to Joe’s… That’s somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 lights…. I nailed ‘em ALL…. with only a couple yellows… it was so satisfying.

As I neared the intersection of 185th and Cornell, where I’d be taking a left, I saw that the light was red; the one exception to my string of greens. It shined sadly off the empty streets, as if it felt useless since not a car was in sight to be halted by its glowing red radiation, save for me (well, Betty) and some little Hyundai traveling my direction. It seemed to perk up immediately at my sight, as it must have known that it ruined my perfect green streak. As we headed towards the light, I flicked on my blinker and established myself in the furthest left of the two left hand turn lanes, as I’d need to take an immediate left after this first one in order to reach Trader Joes. As I decelerated, our of the corner of my eye, I noticed the Hyundai make a darting, erratic move towards Betty; I pleaded with her to stop as quickly as she could… but she’s a heavy gal (it’s all muscle) and Newton had it right when he was talking about inertia. It’s tough to stop this giant piece of steel that I call Betty, she’s like an Abrams Tank, minus all the guns and cannons. So, Betty the tank, or now 2000 pound projectile, was on a collision course with this little, tin-foil type car as it has cut across 3 lanes to find itself nearly perpendicular to Betty, and the lanes of traffic.

I know that f = ma, but I’m not exactly sure what f = when multiplied by mass and the deceleration of Betty as she taught this little Hyundai and its occupants, a lesson it wouldn’t soon forget. But I do know that it equaled a severely messed up left back door and quarter panel, and more than likely a new alignment, that’s not so aligned.

The impact itself was exactly how Betty lived, smooth and powerful. Everyone always says, “Wow, what a smooooooth ride!” when taken by Betty…. I suppose it makes sense that if she rides this way, she’d destroy this way too. It was such a smooth impact, strong impact, and while it broke my perfect accident free record of nearly 10 years, it felt strangely AWESOME. Now, before you think I’m sadistic, please know, nobody was hurt… I was traveling at maybe 30 miles per hour when I hit her, or more realistically, when she darted out in front of me, like a terrified and momentarily stupefied deer when seeing headlights. They will actually run into the SIDE of your car… it’s tough to say you hit a deer when they run into the side of your car, it’s more like, you got hit by a deer. Well, in this case, though the front of Betty hit the side of her car, (I didn’t get her name) it’s more like she hit me.

Whatever the case, it still felt strangely good; powerful.

She pulled over, and I quickly followed…. Turing 180 degrees to face the opposite direction I had been traveling, as I had spun her around to face the direction from which we had both been coming.

We both got out of our cars on to the street, now newly littered with car shrapnel. I saw that the car held two young girls, maybe 16 or 17… can’s say that it surprised me.

“Are you girls ok?” I asked.

“Yeah, yeah, we’re fine.” One said.

“I told you not to turn!” I hear the passenger say to her friend, kind of laughing at the same time.

Yea, girl, she should’ve listened to you.

We assessed the damage.

Her back left door was crumpled, like a soda can that had been crushed, reshaped, and crushed again… over and over until the aluminum appeared wrinkly. This door would never open again. Her back left quarter panel took somewhat less damage, but would still need to be replaced. I’m surprised her tire had not blown, but it was certainly not quite facing the right direction. Her left driver’s side door, luckily was unharmed, as Betty had only bit the back door…. But had the timing been a bit different, this gal may have had some damage not only to her driver’s side door, but to the left side of her body. It seems that Betty took pity on this poor, new driver.

As I walked towards Betty’s front right side, which had delivered the crumpling blow, I was somewhat amazed by how little damage that she had incurred. For what punishment she doled out, it was amazing that only the front right blinker light cover was broken, and was now part of the shrapnel on the street. Her right front headlight was completely intact, though the hood was slightly dented, along with the front right bumper, and there appeared to be a new break in the right front quarter panel, which looks like a saw-tooth pattern, it actually looks quite tough. Some might say bad-ass, or radical. I say tough.

“Betty’s got a war wound,” I thought. But it’s nothing serious. This old gal’s a tank.

After the initial survey of our battered combatants, the stupefied girl and her friend asked me what we needed to do… as they didn’t know (shocker… sarcasm) because they’d never been in an accident yet (shocker – this one’s not coated with sarcasm.) So I asked for her insurance information, and copied down mine for her. As the two girls stood there, sort of half talking, then silent, then giggling, I kept on jotting down information.

“What’s a number that I can get a hold of you at?” I’d ask…. Then write mine down on her respective information sheet.

At some point during the middle of this, I am interrupted by the passenger, with what seemed like quite an odd question at the time… though once I understood why she asked it, it merely seemed fittingly stupid for his tweedle-dee, tweedle-dumb duo.

“Are you, like, a boxer?” Tweedle-Dumb asked sort of excitedly.

“What?” I quickly answer back, with confusion latent in my voice and written all over my face.

It was no more than a split-second later that I realize that I’m still wearing my school ID badge, that says “Boxer Card” on it, and has my photo and “Physician Assistant Student” written on it. The Boxer is our mascot. I believe it’s some sort of mythical dragon type creature, though I’m not entirely sure. I am, at heart, a Badger, and always will be. So the lore of the Boxer is of no concern to me.

“What? Oh… oh… no. No, I’m not a boxer.” I reply, as my brain has caught up.

She seemed disappointed, as if she may have given me her number if I were a REAL boxer.

I finished with the information exchange and told her that she needed to call her insurance company to file a claim, and that I would do the same. Then they’d pretty much take it from there.

We each disappeared into the remainder of the night, she and her passenger to God knows where, and me to Trader Joes to get FOOD.

I made it in time. I’m a quick shopper.

B-U-R-R-I-T-O! oh, oh …OOOOOOOOOO. It really wasn’t a bad night.

In the end, her insurance company claimed full responsibility, and would be paying for my repairs in whole. And, despite the miniscule amount of damage to Betty, the car had been totaled. It turns out that Betty, being old of age, but young in miles, was valued at around $3,200, and the amount to repair her would be about $3,400… I found out that parts for ’89 Cadillacs are mighty expensive. All of that said, I decided to accept their check for my ‘totaled’ car, continue to drive it, and not put a single cent into her repair, as I felt that she’s even more stellar than she was before.

Bottom line, I got a 3,200 dollar pay-day. Not too shabby.

What to spend this on?

Well, the responsible part of me said, “Save this money! You have a butt-load of loans!” (My responsible side also likes to use words like “butt-load” apparently.)

But the young man, or boy, in me said… “Hey, you just got a free 3,200 bucks, and you haven’t gotten anything cool for yourself in a long time…. you should get an xBox!”

So, I compromised… being that I totally gave in, and got the xBox….. BUT I saved the rest of it.

In Best Buy, I felt somewhat of nerdy, buying an xBox…. I guess I feel like it’s one of those sort of ‘girl repellant’ type buys. I got over it, though.

At the register, the pretty attractive young gal said the obligatory, “Do you want to buy the 2 year product replacement plan? If anything happens to it…. we’ll take care of it.”

My skeptical side, and frugal side, said “Yep, this is how they get ya! 39.99… for two years, nothing’s going to happen. Don’t get duped!”

So I ask, “Ok, shoot me straight… do I really need this? I mean, I know you have to offer it, but job aside, is this a good thing to get?”

And then, the guy behind her, boxing up some items, busts in and says “YES. We have at least 9 or 10 people bringing them back each week. If you try to send them back to Microsoft, it will take months to get your xBox back, and it’s going to cost you. I have one, and I got the replacement plan. It really is worth it.”

“Alright, let’s do it.” I say with confidence. Whether or not I got suckered, well, it’s only $39.99…. and the kid had a good speech. So, even if it was a crock, he did it well. He deserved the sale.

So, I bring my new purchase home, and enjoy a good escape from time to time for the past year or so… I can take a break from studying, and flip on the console, and rewind to WWII, and blast some Nazis (they had it coming) or go even further back to medieval times, and assassinate corrupt leaders and save innocent citizens. Ok, I don’t care, nerd or no, I’m loving it.

It was on one such escape I wished to embark a couple days ago, to Vegas, to stop some sort of terrorist group, when I turned on the console, and awaited the excitement to begin… nothing.

Nothing happened.

“What the poop!” I thought. OK, maybe I said it aloud too.

The TV is just black. And, I know I’ve hit the ‘TV/Video” button… let’s get the show on the road. Wait… maybe it just didn’t turn on… duh! So, I look down at the xBox… and to my surprise I see something unusual. It’s doing something I’ve never seen before, but, unfortunately (for my ego’s sake) have heard of before. It’s flashing red around the power button. Where, it should have this green ‘ring of light,’ it was flashing red. And as we all know, red light = bad. Well, this is no exception…. this is what is known as, “The Red Ring of Death.”

This is the dreaded, and universally known sign, that your xBox is beyond repair. Totally cooked. There is absolutely nothing that you can do to remedy this situation. It’s unlike when your laptop gives you grief, and you can control alt delete, ‘hard reset,’ system restore, or just monkey with it enough to fix it… even though you’re sure that this time was the last time….

Nope. This is it. No resuscitation. It’s over. You’d better pray tha…

“YEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I bought the damn insurance! Free xBox! Thank you God for that fellow xBox nerd at the Best Buy the day I almost didn’t spend that extra $39.99.”

So, I packed up my xBox yesterday and headed to Portland, as I needed to leave the coast anyhow… I have a ‘security briefing’ on Monday in Spokane for my next rotation. So today I made a trip to Best Buy, and brought my dead xBox, rigor mortis set in, to the customer service desk, next to the ‘Geek Squad’ desk. I’m now feeling more and more like I fit in there… with the Geek Squad… but this doesn’t bother me too much, I’m comfortable in my own skin… I’m kind of nerdy… AND I do enjoy the show “Chuck,” where the main character is a “Nerd Herd” employee in a “Buy More” store. He’s always saving the day, in a nerdy, but brave way. Not to mention, his love interest in the show, is beautiful. Check it out… you’ll get hooked.

In any case, I told the girl at the counter that my xBox was flashing red lights at me, and it wouldn’t turn on. I didn’t just come out and say that “I got The Red Ring of Death.” I may be comfortable in my nerd-ness… but not that comfortable. Though, after she got on the phone to Microsoft, going through the motions to report the xBox failure… she must have said “The Red Ring of Death" about 7 times. I guess this happens quite a bit. Or, that’s what she said anyway when I asked her.

After she got off the horn, she said “OK, so you can go over to the entertainment section and pick up a new one, then bring it back here, and we’ll get you all set up.”

“What? I get a new one today?” I thought. This is too good to be true… I mean, what’s the catch… I only paid 39.99 for this plan… This has to be too good to be true. I figured I'd at least have to wait a few weeks while I waded through some BS.

Despite my doubts, I go to the entertainment section, and pick up a sparkling new xBox, and return to the customer service counter. She rings it up.

“OK, that’s comes to $339.00…”

“That’s more like it,” I think... “time to get screwed by Best Buy, the $39.99 plan was worthless… I KNEW it.”

“DAMN that nerd kid who made me throw away my $39.99! I’m going to find that dork and give him the biggest dead leg!” I thought. "A FLYING dead leg, the likes of which haven't been seen since the Schiller incident of '99, in Brainerd, MN."

She continues to type in things to the computer, swipe badges and what not… then she hands me this yellow Best Buy card and says, “OK, so there’s $10.00 left on this card… and you’re set to go!”

“Wait, what? How does that work?” I say, almost biting my lip right after the words escape…. (just shut up you fool… shut up and run! you tricked them somehow… GET OUT before they realized that they messed up. FREE xBox PLUS 10 dollars!)

“Well, here’s your old receipt, see, it was $349.00 for the xBox a year ago. It was a bit more expensive back then, and then we put the protection plan back on there for you. I thought you might want that?”

“Heck yes!” I assert.

“ …and there’s still 10 dollars left over… and that’s on the yellow card I gave you. Just use it like a gift card.”

I nearly hugged her.

I guess I’m so used to getting screwed by the corporate world… and especially dealing with insurance companies now in medicine, NEVER wanting to pay for patient’s medications and procedures. They fight tooth and nail against providing the coverage to their clients that they had promised when taking their money every month. They dictate care, and deny claims left and right; it’s disgusting. There’s so much wrong with medicine, I guess I had been embittered to anything reminiscent of insurance. In my mind, there’s no way it could be as simple as, “hey, you pay us $39.99, and if anything goes wrong, we’ll fix it, for FREE.”

Well, this time it was… and more than that… they gave me 10 bucks, as if to say… “Hey, thanks for the biz… and come on back… we’ll take care of you… nerd.”

Well, Best Buy, thank you. I shall recommend you to my fellow nerds, but I’m sure they’re already privy to your awesomeness.

In any case, thanks for reading the story of the ten dollars, and how Betty made me see The Red Ring of Death.

I’m gunna go eat a burrito now.