Gas Station Blues

The windows are open today and Fall is in the air. I came home before finishing errands, as I was just to embarrassed to even be seen on the street. I was afraid someone would recognize me from the gas station. Now, before you laugh or think, “how in the world could she be that (I prefer the word scatterbrained instead of stupid) well, scatterbrained, you need to know that my mind was already on going to eat Italian food tonight with friends and on hurrying home to cut a big chunk of the Tunnel of Fudge Cake that was just waiting for me to walk in the door. So I pull into the station, but there are about 12 cars there waiting to pull up to a pump. I decide that I am going to do what I see other people do; not concern myself with which side of the car the gas tank is on. I will just make it work. People stretch that gas arm all the time. After 15 minutes, it is finally my turn. Well, the gas tank was on the other side, but no problem, I can do this. I try to insert the credit card in the island pay machine, but there is something blocking it and the card won’t go in. Luckily an attendant was out emptying the trash so I tell him that the machine won’t take my credit card. He comes over, takes my card and puts it in the machine. I am already embarrassed. I select #8 pump and go back to select the grade of gas and swing the gas hose over the back of my car. It won’t go. The attendant comes over and tells me that it is not going to reach; to just pull out and back into this side. I put the gas hose back and proceed to try and back up, but another car has already pulled in behind me, making it impossible for me to back up. Well, as luck would have it, the car in front of me is pulling out, so I tell the young man, let’s cancel this pump (why did I tell him that, like he is responsible for cancelling my card) and I will just pull up to the front one. He stares at me and shakes his head, like, “I don’t care what you do and why are you telling me all this? Why does he keep looking at me? Driving the car to the front gas tank, I quickly get out of the car, look up to find the number of the pump, ‘ah, #6, insert the credit card (all by myself this time) into the slot and the machine rejects my card. There are two people waiting behind me to pay, watching all this, when I realize I never cancelled the first pump station. All of a sudden, it dawns on me that I am still on the wrong side of the pump, the hose is still not going to reach my car. I quickly jump in my car, pull around to the side of the station and park. I now have to go in to be sure Pump #8 (the first pump is cancelled and there is a man in front of me that is giving the attendant his money for pump #8. The attendant says, “no sir, it shows that there is already someone at that one.” The customer says, ‘no, I am at pump #8″ So that was why my card didn’t work, it was still on the first pump I tried. This is when I move ahead of the 4 people in line, all the time trying to explain what happened. Why did I just make my hair red, why didn’t I leave it blond so I would have an excuse for all this? I go back to my car and wait in a different line, the line with the pumps on the right side of my car this time. After another 15 minutes, I finally fill up with gas. It was all worth it, I saved 3 cents a gallon. I ate 2 pieces of the chocolate cake the minute I walked in the door. I deserved it today. It will be awhile before I return to that station. Or that part of town.