Too close to home?

Last night on The Simpsons, Homer had a line about being “38 years old and driving a crappy car.” Wow…I’m 38 years old… I’ve been watching The Simpsons religiously since it first came on; I doubt I’ve even missed an episode. I’ve always looked at Homer, like I’m sure most people do, as a bumbling “older” guy. It would never have occurred to me in all of this time that I’ve been watching that someday I’d be the same age as Homer Simpson. Granted, we’re talking about a cartoon here – the characters have never really aged. So in two years I’ll be hitting the big 4-0, but Homer will still be 38. I’m not sure why, but this all strikes me as incredibly amusing.

Another reason I found this so funny was the "crappy car" part, as we’ve recently become convinced that my car is possessed. Last Tuesday evening I needed to run an errand. For whatever reason, the lights inside wouldn’t turn off on their own and a warning buzzer kept ringing while I was driving. It was like I was driving around with one of the doors open, only I wasn’t – I even stopped and checked! Then, all of sudden it stopped. On the way home from my errand, it happened again. The next day it did the same thing on the trip home from work, but only for about 2 minutes. It hasn’t done it since then, but I keep expecting it to. Maybe I need to have an exorcism done on my car – I wonder if that’s a service that I’d find listed in the yellow pages? I’d like to see my car vomit up some pea soup…or those 6 CD’s that have been stuck in the trunk loader for so long…