On Not Freaking Out

So on Sunday I decided to go to Taipei. More on that later. First, the story of my scooter.

So on Sunday I get up, get ready, grab some breakfast (which I planned to eat on the bus), and drive to the bus station. I'm sitting at an intersection staring at an advertisement of a son on his father's back--holding a baseball--and pondering the popularity of baseball in Taiwan, when my scooter suddenly dies. I start it up again. It runs for a couple seconds. Then it dies. So I try starting it again and again, and it isn't starting. I notice the light is about to turn green, so I pull over onto the sidewalk before everyone starts going.

So I try kick-starting it a few times but nothing is working. So I decide to sit down and just eat my breakfast and let the scooter chill out for a few minutes. After I finish, it still won't start.

There are two things in this world I never want to have to deal with alone: taxes and car problems. The fact that I was by myself and had to deal with this dead scooter came across my mind, and I thought to myself, "Look at me, not freaking out! All by myself with a dead scooter and no increased blood pressure whatsoever!" If Mike were there, I surely would have been cursing. But that's because someone else would have been there to help deal with it, so I could get away with it. But I was by myself, so what good would cursing do? So I thought, well, it's Sunday morning. I can spend the day dealing with this thing, or I could go to Taipei and deal with this when I come back. So I did the latter. I walked the rest of the way to the bus station (four blocks or so) and went to Taipei.

When I came back I went straight home, figuring that since I have the next two weeks off from my morning school, I could deal with it Monday morning.

So today, Monday, I took the bus back to the street where I left my scooter on the sidewalk. For once, I was not worried about it getting stolen. I figured if someone was capable of stealing a scooter that wouldn't start, then they deserve to have it. Although I guess it wouldn't be that hard...you could just drag it off somewhere...but I digress.

What I assumed would happen: the scooter wouldn't start (it was soooo very very dead yesterday), and I would go ask the people at the breakfast stand where the nearest scooter shop was. Then I'd drag it toward said scooter shop.

What happened: the scooter started, much to my surprise. So I turned it off and got all my stuff on and ready. I put on my raincoat (yes, it was raining, on top of all this), put on my helmet, and put my purse in the seat. Closed the seat. Went to start the scooter again...but where were the keys?

In my purse. Inside the scooter seat. The very very very locked scooter seat.

I just stared at the scooter for a few seconds. I couldn't believe what I had just done. I've locked my keys in a car twice in my life, and both times I happened to be with my flute teacher, Ms. Woods. I thought to myself, "This can't happen--Ms. Woods isn't here!" But sure enough, it was never her presence that caused me to lock my keys in a vehicle, it was my own stupidity.

I resolved to rip open the scooter seat with my bare hands. I was headed to the scooter shop anyway--who cares if I break the seat? I took off my helmet and my raincoat and pulled with all my might. For a while it really seemed like I could rip it off. With my fingers, I tried to find some sort of hook so that I could unlock the seat. But no, the seat was not going to come off. However, if I pulled really really hard, I could create enough room for my other hand to reach in, fumble for my purse, open the purse, and dig through it for my keys. And that's what I did. I have two sets of keys--one for the apartment and one for the scooter. I grabbed the first pair I felt, and--lucky me--it was the scooter set.

"Thank God!!!" I said to myself.

There was a dude sweeping the ground not too far from me, and, if I couldn't rip off the scooter seat, Plan B was to pantomime to him my situation and hope he had a crowbar nearby. Luckily that man was spared an encounter with me.

So I got the heck outta there.

Originally I planned to just pull into the first scooter shop I saw, but then I resolved to try to make it to the shop with the guys who know me and my scooter. The scooter felt funky, like it might die if I didn't keep the engine partly revved up, but miraculously I made it there!

The scooter guy checked it out and decided I needed a new air filter. Something about it being too dirty, so dust and stuff is getting into the carburator and making the scooter die. He didn't have any air filters on hand, so he fixed it up enough so that it would last the day and I'm going in tomorrow morning to get a new one. It's cheap, only like $6 US. I don't know if I buy that explanation for the scooter dying, but I don't really care. I just want it to last until the end of September! Then the next owner can worry about it!

So that's my scooter adventure. My friend Mark and I decided to name it Steg, short for Stegosaurus, my favorite dinosaur (is it weird to have a favorite dinosaur past the age of 9?). Oh, Steg, how you toy with my emotions.