Busy busy--and distracted

My moving-into-a-new-rental to-do list has been insane, and much of it has put me in the car, running errands on the unfashionable side of town, which conveniently begins one block from where I live. :)

I did manage to make it downtown yesterday for Urban Lunch, "a monthly informal gathering for urban-minded individuals who want to further the discussion surrounding Boise's urban issues." I ran into a departmental colleague there, and met two terrific folks with whom I hope to work in the future--one of the founders of Urban Lunch, who also works in my dean's office, and a visiting assistant prof who works on urban rhetoric. This town is packed with interesting people.

I was about 25 minutes late to Urban Lunch, however. I actually arrived 25 minutes early, but as I was parallel parking my compact car in a tiny space downtown, someone in a large SUV was trying to fit into the same-sized space in front of the car parked ahead of mine. The idiot kept bumping--ramming, really--the compact car in front of me in an attempt, I suppose, to make a larger space for his giant vehicle (even though there was an appropriately sized space across the street), and he set off the smaller car's alarm. I was also worried that he was going to push the small car into mine.

I left my car and pulled out my iPhone to find someplace to grab a lunch to go. Grabbing lunch took longer than I expected, so I rushed back toward the location for Urban Lunch, propelled by my smugness about my punctuality despite being a newcomer to town. Yay me.

But as I was passing by my car, I heard an engine running. And of course, it was mine. I was so distracted by the a-hole ramming the car in front of me that I had exited my car with the keys still in the ignition and the engine running. (In my defense, I've been driving for 18 years, and never had this happen.)

So I called Fang, who was out and about running errands with the boy. He got lost on his way to downtown--he has even less a sense of direction than I do--so by the time he arrived with a key I was late to lunch.

Eventually I'll learn that payback for being self-congratulatory is a real bitch.