Tire pressure and sinus pressure

I have discovered another way I am like my car: sometimes we don't do well when the weather changes. 

Last year when fall and winter fought, and the temperature dropped, a warning light burned bright in my car, and the same thing happened this time.  The pressure in my tires was off, so I went to a gas station and tried to fix it.  I learned several valuable lessons from this experience.

• There is a 75% chance that when I am unscrewing the air valve cap,  I will drop the air valve cap into the tire.
• It is easy to pop part of the hubcap cover off to retrieve the cap.
• It is easy to pop the hubcap cover back on if you know the trick (which does not involve kicking).  (I learned this one after cracking one hubcap cover with the help of a nice guy who was also at the gas station and noticed my cluelessness.  I hold him blameless.)
• You can't tell if any air is actually going into your tire; you just have to believe.
• Even if enough air goes in, you won't know until you drive your car for 15 minutes, according to the nice guy from the tire shop that was, in fact, still open.
• There are nice people who will let you into the tire shop (the nice guy at the gas station pointed you toward) even though it is 5 minutes until closing, and they will stop vacuuming and come outside to check your tire pressure and fill the tire that is still low even though the freezing cold wind is blowing.  And then they will not charge you because you are obviously too pathetic, and, for once, you won't mind.

How to (try to) avoid car accidents

Long day today.  I started out by getting up on time, leaving early, and still being late to work because I stopped by Panera to grab something to go for breakfast since I am out of food.  I don't know why I do this every six months or so: I should remember that in the mornings, Panera employees are not quite phased into reality yet, so they move at an eighth of the speed of our reality, resulting in five minutes or more per customer.  A guy ordering a bagel and a coffee took seven minutes, and his friend was still waiting.  I left with no breakfast and was still late.

I was working a double shift (someone needed today off, so I worked his shift and then my own), and it was already going to be a long day since I didn't get much sleep last night and had not breakfast.  Then someone called out sick, and no one else could fill in, so I picked up that shift, too.  Yes, I left at 7:30 am and returned around 11pm.  I'm glad I could get those extra hours because I like being able to pay my rent, but the ride home was somewhat fraught with danger.

When I am wiped like that, I often have to pull myself into focus by singing the first two lines of the chorus from Steven Curtis Chapman's "We Are Not Home Yet" to remind myself that I am on the road driving and cannot get distracted by shiny things, shadows, other vehicles, people in other vehicles, birds, flickering lights, or anything else because I must get home in one piece with my little car.  This became my theme song after the last accident . . .


What do you do to keep yourself awake, focused, and more safe on the roads when you're wiped out?