My first rental car and an earthquake…My own series of unfortunate events!

Posted October 17, 2012 by Julie Steenson

I don’t have to work or attend class on Tuesdays so it is normally my day to hunker down and get a lot of homework done. Well, I am writing this Tuesday night and have nothing to show for my day but a beloved smashed car, a shiny red rental car in my garage, and a Facebook posting about our earthquake.
To back up, I gave up my homework day this week to attend inter-library loan training by our New Hampshire State Library (as I live and work in NH). The ILL system for New Hampshire uses the NHU-PAC (The New Hampshire Union Public Access Catalog) and the system is a bit dated and not intuitive…but it works!  The holdings of over 375 libraries in the state are represented in the NHU-PAC.  Our small libraries thrive on our ability to share our resources and provide patrons with materials from partner libraries all over the state, delivered daily our state library van service.
Training is offered periodically and today, I attended a day of training being held at a large, beautiful NH library. Coming from a small library, I was excited to view the library as well as learn how to use the NHU-PAC more efficiently.  Unfortunately, my training was interrupted by one of our host librarians, asking me to move my car for their landscape company.  I was parked in a regular parking place but they apparently had a trailer that needed to get by…but the driver decided not to wait and I was greeted by him with, “You don’t have to move it now because I already hit it.”  What he described as a “small hole” was worthy of a tow truck.  Needless to say, I missed some of the training and the great plans I had for the day disappeared.
Knock on wood, I have never had an accident and this was the first such event of my middle-aged life…including my very first rental car.  After hearing that I had been driving the same car for the last nine years (my beloved Subaru Baja), the very nice rental agent kindly demonstrated all the features of this new shiny red car since, “Things have changed in the last nine years.”
I will admit to pouring a glass of wine soon after my arrival home from what had become a very long day.  As my husband and I were preparing dinner, the house rumbled and shook.  We looked at each other and said, “Was that an earthquake?”  (As you undoubtedly know, there was indeed an earthquake!)
Maybe I have fallen down a rabbit hole into a Lemony Snicket novel.