When I was fourteen I went to Montana for a week with my aunt. I think we had a good time, I can’t actually remember the time we spent there. What I do remember is that we brought home a kitten with us. And that I drove the entire way. En route from Montana to Western Washington there are three notable mountain passes that must be crossed. On one of them, in all my fourteen year old wisdom, I down shifted her old mini-van into second. You know, to maintain the speed that was so important. After successfully crossing to the other side, I promptly forgot about it and continued on my merry way, driving for several hundred miles more miles at approximately eighty miles per hour. This, well, it caused the little van to overheat.

At some point, near the small town of Cle Elum I realized my error, put it back into the appropriate gear and oh-so-casually mentioned that it appeared to be getting rather hot. Maybe we should stop.

Overheating rapidly leads to expensive consequential damage. It can easily crack head gaskets. If not repaired, a cracked head gasket can let non-compressible water into the cylinders, which can accumulate and break the starter and flywheel. Radical overheats can bend heads and other parts. A single serious overheat can require an engine rebuild AND repair of the initial cooling problem.

That folks, is exactly what happened.

My aunt called my parents and they were irate. They were pissed off that she was so irresponsible that she’d take an unreliable vehicle out of state. They were pissed that she hadn’t thought ahead and planned for the unforeseeable incident and brought enough money for a mechanic and a hotel room. And all this with their precious daughter!

And I? Said nothing. I didn’t fess up to being the one driving (to be fair, neither did she, because who lets a fucking fourteen year old drive seven hundred miles?). And I never said that perhaps, MAYBE, I had been responsible for the overheating and eventual ruining of her car.

Until now.

I was reminded while I was doing the same drive home last weekend… only, this time there was less cracked head gaskets and more intimidating Transformer cops in Idaho.

I got a tattoo in Missoula.

It says Sapere Aude, it’s latin and means dare to know, or have the courage to use your own reason.

I love it. Even though it looks a bit mangy, with bits of skin falling off at the moment. I am assured that this will not last.

The Kid and I are going to Montana tomorrow. Instead of doing anything productive, like laundry, or charging my camera battery…

I’m watching the Food Network. I do not like Giada De Laurentiis. I do like Paula Deen.

Today, one of my teeth got chipped. This, I do not like. I don’t like the new edge in my mouth, it feels wrong when my tongue touches it. I do not like it because the only thing I had eaten when I noticed it was a salad… and really, since when is a salad for lunch a dangerous thing?

So, I took a picture. Because I’m a blogger, and that’s what bloggers do. They take pictures of their mangled mouths and post them on the internet.

Right. So that WAS the point of this post. However, when I was looking through the pictures I’d taken of my mouth, I was HORRIFIED. Seriously. I thought then that dentists having the highest suicide rate wasn’t all that surprising. Who wants to look at that every day? When a tongue is looked at that close, it looks like an alien sea monster who had tentacles until they were horribly chopped off. It’s terrifying! And it’s my mouth. Can you imagine spending forty hours a week staring at those of a complete stranger? Blech.

Then I wondered about the validity of the statement that those in the dental field have the highest suicide rate… I’ve heard it a hundred times, and I was even quite certain that it was true when I drunkenly related that fact to some people in a little bar in France a couple of weeks ago. So I googled it, and I found a couple articles verifying it, but the statistics are really small, and include all of the health care profession in general. But, the article had this little happy tidbit which made me laugh:

Of 22 occupations examined in Washington state, dentists had a suicide rate second only to that of sheepherders and wool workers

What? Sheephearderes?

Lastly, I was thinking that teeth crumbling in a willy-nilly fashion is the sort of thing that nightmares are made of. Teeth should absolutely NOT break and/or fall out with no provocation. When one’s teeth just start falling apart, bit by bit, without and hoopla or fanfare… that cannot be a sign of anything good. I looked up the interpretation in a dream dictionary, and apparently, these are quite common nightmares. I’ve had them… and what does it mean? Oh that’s right, that I have a fear of sexual inadequacy.

Of course.

One of the great things about summer is all the outdoor fruit and vegetable stands. I really, really love them. They aren’t especially cheap, nor do they have the best quality produce… but there is definitely something to shopping outdoors. It’s lovely.

I was at one the other day picking through the peaches along side a tall, great looking guy. A guy without a ring, because I look for that sort of thing. I smiled, he smiled and started up a conversation. We talked of inconsequential things in a friendly sort of manner that made me think, so this is how you meet people. One wouldn’t necessarily think of asparagus as a seduction tool, but indeed… He didn’t know what to do with it, I said that it’s great on the grill. He said he’s got a grill and maybe I could come over and show him? I am envisioning wild outdoor sex (because I’m a 15 year old boy on the inside) and thinking how our story will begin at a fruit stand (because I’m also a 15 year old girl on the inside).

We made our way to pay, still maintaining the banter. Then he turned to the cashier and said, in a horrible derogatory voice, “Let me keep the box, the wife’ll need it for one of her projects.” He turned back to me, charming smile and all… as if what? I would jovially make fun of his WIFE and then come by while she’s out?

Are you fucking kidding me?

I just got a phone call from… myself. The caller ID had my name and my number on it.

When I answered, it was a prerecorded sales offer from the DISH network.

Weird.