with the gasoline prices being what they are right now, i've basically reduced spike to a huge white elephant in my garage. don't take me wrong, i still do take spike out for the occasional trip to the mall, alabang (lingkod and tuloy) and quezon city (for weekend visits to tita mayu) but more often than not, i leave spike at home to save up on gas money.

therefore, when the people over at pilhino told me that it'll take a couple of days to re-attach spike's new bumper, i didn't think being apart from him was going to be that difficult. after all, we didn't have an ag (action group - it's lingkod's small pastoral groups) meeting scheduled, and by the time thursday rolls around (which is my day at tuloy sa don bosco), spike will be back. no worries, i basically told myself.

i was wrong. so, so terribly wrong. because who knew that the simple fact that spike was in the garage, all gassed up, and ready to be used any time of the day or night that i wanted to use him gave me so much comfort?

saturday evening, hours after i left spike at pilhino, and five minutes away from the house, i realized that, stupid me, i had left my house keys in my car. paz (who had graciously offered to bring me home) and i were both tired (we were stuck in the mall for hours because of the rain), cranky (at least i was - my new shoes pinched my feet horribly), and sleepy (it was ten in the evening and both of us had little sleep the night before) so imagine how close i was to crying when i realized i couldn't get inside my house simply because i had been stupid enough to leave my house keys in the car. no spike = no way of going to pilhino in the middle of the night without begging a friend to take me there. (incidentally, if you think about it, if spike were there, then i wouldn't need to go to pilhino cause the keys would be there too. but then you know what i mean).

(as an aside you might be asking, what about her brother, doesn't he have house keys too? well, he does, but he wasn't around, and he couldn't be contacted, and he wouldn't pick up the phone or answer text messages. horrible, horrible, horrible. thank god for good friends like paz, who offered to take me in for the night and to bring me to pilhino the following day if i wanted to and ex boyfriends like mars, who will show up after one almost-crying phone call, actually take you to pilhino to get your car keys, and actually manage to smile at you even if doing so meant him being late for a party you didn't know he had to go to)

sunday means church and while it used to be easy to just hop in the car, go to church no matter what the weather, and stay for as long as you wanted to in the blessed sacrament without fear of the rain falling real hard cause, after all, you have a car, a sunday without a car apparently means going to church and praying, and praying, and praying that the rain won't fall until you get home. incidentally, it didn't.

and monday, horrible, horrible monday. our boss decided to invite us to lunch at cyma in trinoma and since i knew that there's an MRT station right at trinoma, i was actually excited to commute going to qc. four rides (trike going outside bf, jeep to domestic, bus to ayala, and mrt to trinoma) and an hour and a half later, i was walking gaily at the shiny floors of trinoma, all set to spend the afternoon gorging on good food and feasting my eyes on lovely window displays. but, having been spoiled by the court of appeals shuttle, i had no idea that going home would be the most horrible thing in the universe: it was easy getting to pasay via the mrt but since i had no idea that rush hour is the way it is, not only did it take eons for me to get on a mia-baclaran bus, i was also harassed by a man who kept pressing his crotch on my side. i initially had to give him the benefit of the doubt cause the bus was, in fairness, really filled to the brim. but when he'd sway when the bus was actually steady and he steadily press against me even though i squirmed and moved, and clearly showed discomfort, well, it wasn't long before i figured out that someone was trying to tide over his lust right then and there. evil man - may you rot in hell. i wish i could've sued you.

and so while today's commute didn't really bring me anything blogworthy (except that i stood in the bus for half an hour and i made the mistake of not riding the first fx that i saw), the pain of not having spike around has not abated.

and so please, pilhino. bring spike back soon. after all, this is cardriver.blogspot.com and while i've learned to love riding the bus all over again, i'm not planning on giving up my license anytime soon. especially not with perverts like that man around.