I finally figured out my life, I have all the answers, its so simple that it was easily overlooked and I could just shoot myself for not realizing it early. Unbeknownst to me, I am starring in my own sitcom. Of course I don't hear the laugh track or the theme music because I live this sitcom pre-edit (and with as much as I am cursing lately, it certainly needs to be edited unless I am airing on HBO or Comedy Central). This has to be the truth, because nothing else can possible explain the bizarre, asinine situations I find myself in.

Evidently, this sitcom revolves mostly around me, my van, and the paper route from hell. I don't know which is the antagonist though, my van or my route. I am thinking it is the route and the van is my trusty sidekick. So, I will need to name my van, something like Hunk or similar to describe the big hulking beast that carries the load and takes a pounding, occasionally being injured, but not to the point of death. I think if I start calling my van Hunk, he'll start talking back to me (like in knight rider) and he will be the supportive nurturing kind that says things like "Gee Katie, you sure look perdy today. (Hunk, or maybe Hoss, will be a southern gent with questionable intelligence).

So if I name my Van, Hunk or Hoss, I will also need to name my route. There is really only one appropriate name for my route and no other name could fit and that will be Satan. It has to be. Or Damien, because isn't that often what Satan names his son in the horror movies?

So Two nights ago, Katie, the intrepid transsexual papergirl and her trusted companion Hoss, engage in their nightly battle with Satan. Satan got in two mighty blows these last few days, leaving our heroine staggered and almost without hope.

The story actually starts three nights ago, when I ran over a dead carcass on the main highway. Nothing like hitting a dead boar (I think it was a boar, could've been a large dog, but it was sufficiently dead when I got to it) going 60 MPH (which is only 5 miles over the speed limit and heroines get that kind of leeway.) Needless to say I was worried, but it was a dark stretch of highway, east of Omaha (Insert song here) and I wasn't going to stop there and get plowed by a logging truck (actually it would be a dump truck that carries some sort of gravel, but I like the visuals of a logging truck hauling big ass logs.) I made it the mile to where I could stop, got out of the car, worried that I would lose another van to a dead animal (I hit a live dear once and it actually left a nice glossy sheen on the headlight as if it were just buffed). I, all 490 lbs of me, got on my hands and knees and crawled under my van with a flashlight. Good Ol' Hoss pulled through and he seemed to have no damage at all. I didn't see anything dripping or nothing. I did keep an eye on the gauges though, just in case. Victory team K.T.

Then two nights ago, me and Hoss drive through a small lake. Hoss doesn't like water very much. Satan struck a blow to Katie's sanity. The spedometer went out, and in its place, the warning chimes went on. Ding, ding, ding. It wouldn't stop, unless I turned the headlights off. You can't drive through dirt country roads at 3 in the morning without headlights. I put the radio up as loud as I could bear. In fact, it first took me a moment to notice the damn chime in the first place, because it actually went in time with whatever current song was playing. Leaving me to stupidly look at the camera and say to the audience, I never notice that repeating note in that song before, this must be a station in HD. Later that night, I discover that whatever caused the chime also made the fan not work and I wound up over heating. I pulled into a gas station to get water, they couldn't figure out how to turn on the lights. ARE YOU SHITTING ME. So I am sitting there, with no way to get water, but my van was cooling down. There was a tanker there and he needed to leave, so I shut my hood and drove off. The engine temp immediately went down, for about 10 minutes. Then my check engine light comes on. Oh shit. I forgot to put the cap on the radiator. I actually drove on the median, passed three cars, and ran a red light so I could pull into a parking lot. Luckily I found a spigot and I had two 32 oz gatorade bottles (that were not crushed in filming scenes for God Bless the Child the Movie.) It took me a dozen trips, and I don't think I ever did fill the radiator all the way up, but I got on the road, the temperature gauge went down and stayed down.

No big deal though. I went back to the original problem with the chime and I looked online. It said I had a bad ignition switch. (10 dollar part, awesome). I went to my normal mechanic... to busy to do it that day. I went to another mechanic, same story. I went to Firestone... still the same old story. No one could fix it. I had to go one more night with the damn chime. Luckily, Katie doesn't carry firearms, because I would've shot up a couple of customers houses (most of them on those damn unpaved roads that won't cancel or give me another delivery area that I could tolerate). I also filled my radiator all the way with water. By the way, if your car is overheating, don't unscrew the radiator cap... not only is it hot, but it sprays all the water out.

So, I'm driving with the chime, the fan don't work, and I have no odometer. Since the fan didn't work, I asked my roommate to deliver my apartment papers for me because I didn't want to overheat. It was a good thing I did that too. I was doing my route, actually making good time. Me and Hoss pull down this one dirt road that is it's own horror from the other dirt roads known as Hell's half acre (I didn't even come up with the name of that). The roads were wet and I didn't trust making a t-turn to go back the other way. I just put the car in reverse and went to back out. I've done it before. But, isn't there always a but. I ran over something. The something I ran over were two bags of cement that was solidified and hardened. Needless to say, something had to give and it wasn't the concrete. I went to go into drive... I had no drive. I went to reset the transmission, got it somehow into park and that was it. I was in a vehicle no more. I was no longer a car, I was an obstacle, in the middle of the road. I couldn't shift into gear, I couldn't go into neutral, I just sat there. Luckily I have Geico, but I didn't have the number. I called ATT 411, and proceeded to get the number for Geico in Alaska. GRRR. I called my roommate, who had just finished with my apartments and was heading home to rescue me. I finally got the right number to Geico and got a tow truck. I asked my roommate to stay with the van, but she wouldn't let me drive her car. So we abandoned Hoss in the middle of the road with the hazard lights on and went to do some of my route. My roommate doesn't know how to drive and her windows don't all roll down so I had to throw papers over the hood (something I didn't know I was able to do). She was stressing (which I didn't understand, I was the one that was fucked), but we did a small portion of the route before the tow truck driver called to tell me he was there and someone had called the Sheriff.

We race back to Hoss. The Tow truck driver showed my how he fixed my van. (Mother fucker, but I'm thankful) The transmission linkage fell off (Knocked off really). I was able to drive it and complete my route.

I took Hoss to get fixed up. They replaced the ignition switch and the thermostat. The chiming still didn't end. See the sitcom situation here. I then learned that the fan was bad. I took it to Firestone. I have a credit card with them that is now maxed out. While at Firestone, they discover I had a few bad fuses. FUSES I ALREADY CHECKED. They looked good, but they were bad. Even the mechanic said so. He said, they looked fine, but when we checked they weren't. So I got the chiming to end. I pull out of Firestone, my radio died.

I took the car back to firestone, they swapped out the fuse, radio came back on. I started the car and left. Radio went out again. I pulled the fuse when I was driving, van died. Put fuse back radio came back on. Started van. Radio died.

Evidently with the new Ignition switch, the key isn't resetting back to the on position after I crank it. So I just need to move the key and everything works. I didn't check the spedo though. I'm just glad everything works... Until tonight that is and we can see what else happens to Hoss.