My work week ended in a torrential downpour, with the students hurrying to their buses with whatever rain gear they possessed clutched tightly about them. We always line up to say goodbye to them as they file past. Some of them hug us. Sometimes they cry as they leave. Some give us high-fives. I noticed that my selective mute student pretended that none of us existed as she walked past. Strange. It makes me wonder why she is the way she is.

Anyway, after work I went home for awhile before setting out again to get M and the equipment needed for the show up in the city. I wasn't really looking forward to driving all that way in the rain, but we got to the venue without any problems, traffic or otherwise. The fact that an auto dealership exploded (gas release caused by plumbers, or so the media reports) just a block from the freeway along the route didn't even add any travel time.
G met us at the venue, with R arriving later. We were second on a bill of three bands, playing upstairs above a bar that is apparently a weekend yuppie meat market sort of place. The start time was late, after 10 pm, and by that time lots of familiar faces were in evidence. Our set went pretty well, with nothing too unexpected happening. R introduced us in his William Burroughs voice, and things flowed along nicely through our half hour set. G and I wore lichen masks that M had put together over the previous week, and choir robes that G had borrowed. M wore a Lone Ranger type mask and horns that he'd super glued to his head. We played lots of non- instruments and mishandled some real ones. Afterwards, we got lots of compliments, which is always nice. The last band, and I Am Spoonbender side project simply known as Spoonbender 1.1.1, projected an early Cronenberg film, Crimes of the Future, while playing the voice track from Cronenberg's Stereo. They layered their own sounds over this, complementing the film(s) nicely.
At the end of it all, while I was driving the van from its parking place on Mission St. over to the club, I noticed that the power steering was out. I had a moment of hoping that it was just a flat tire, which would have been more easily remedied, but no such luck. We loaded everything into the van anyway, and G got a cab because I figured I wouldn't be able to get him back home. M came with me, such he had no other option. I found I could turn well enough if I wasn't attempting to do it from a standstill. This made intersections tricky though. Then, to add to our troubles, the battery light came on, the temperature gauge started rising, and the defroster stopped working. And of course it was still raining as well. Despite my better judgement, I made it onto the freeway, but soon gave up the hope of making it home and pulled over. Upon getting out and looking under the hood (during a particularly nasty downpour) we discovered that the timing belt was hanging limply down like a sneezed up tapeworm.

I called Jen, since I realized I had no idea what her insurance covered as far as towing went. My own roadside assistance insurance expired last August. Jen, despite being wakened by my call, made numerous calls, most of which ended up being routed to small offices in Kansas or Ohio or East Nowhere. She finally found a small towing company covered by her insurance. The guy who eventually came was this stand-up, consistently hilarious teamster type who genuinely liked helping people in need (for a fee, of course). He said the only reason he agreed to come out in the rain and drive the nearly 100 mile round trip was because Jen had been so nice on the phone (apparently most people in need of his services are not). Jen should be a diplomat. Of course, being a parent involves lots of diplomatic work.

Anyway, the driver regaled us with stories of his family, his work, and his encounters with petty criminals on the hour plus drive home. He'd even once been thrown out of the club that we'd just played at. Really nice guy though.

By the time I got to sleep, it was 6 am. Yay. I woke up several hours later to watch the kids while Jen and Uncle Jay wrestled with a newly purchased timing belt outside in the rain. Eventually they won the match and now the van works again. For once, watching the kids was the easier job. I felt guilty.