Fudge Covered Graham Crackers

...are the BEST things in the world when you crave sweets! 

I read Mondo's blog today, and was almost delighted that someone else has a problem which certain objects like I do.  She can't seem to walk into a room without light bulbs popping or wear watches for more than a few days without them going out. 

I have a problem with cars.  :-/  I've owned two vehicles in my life, and I'm lucky I got away unscathed by both of them.  I'm also lucky none of my friends have ever tried suing me for causing bad luck while I was with them.  My realization of this problem was with an old boyfriend in high school.  He had three vehicles while we were together.  A Chevy S-10, a Blazer, and a Cadillac he borrowed from his dad.

The S-10 was only two years old when he bought it.  He hadn't had one single problem with it until he met me.  Then, the problems started, and always when I was with him.  His transmission went out one night while we were heading back from a bonfire.  It wouldn't shift, so he was stuck in first gear the entire ride back to my house.  After that was fixed, we were going to go to a race track, and because we had accidentally fallen asleep at his house, we had to be quiet trying to leave the next morning.  He attempted to put the truck in neutral and back it down the driveway, while I waited by the road.  All I heard was crashing and crunching as he backed the truck right into a tree.  For some reason, the steering wheel locked on him so he couldn't steer it.  It broke down completely not long after that, and he used his sister's old Blazer.  He was in a band and had picked me up before one of his gigs, and as we were flying down my old dirt road in Michigan, the front axel snapped in half.  The passenger side front tire was almost completely flat to the ground when we got out.  After that he told me I was a bad luck charm and he wasn't sure it was going to work out.

I didn't own a car until I was 18 and graduated, so I was always stuck riding with friends and boyfriends.  My next boyfriend had a '98 Dodge Neon, and although I hate Dodge, I decided I'd give it a try.  First, the entire muffler system fell off while we were pulling out of his driveway.  Next, a brake pad snapped completely in half somehow, and a back tire couldn't turn.  Because it was winter, at first we didn't notice because it slid on the ice as we were going.  As soon as we turned onto the pavement, though, we felt it.  He pulled over, and behind us there was a huge black smear about a hundred feet long, trailing down the highway.  We rear-ended someone in a storm on the way to a Blink 182 concert.  The electronic fuel injector went out unexpectedly, and we had to walk to my parents house about five miles away.  The front bumper completely fell off after work one day.  It was one thing after another.

My friend Alison used to drive me home from work.  Her muffler completely fell off after I got in the car.  We got locked out several times.  My friend Alisha's old beater car finally took it's last breath on the freeway- with me in the passenger seat.

When I finally bought my own first car, I was scared to death.  I was lucky for the first couple of months.  Nothing bad happened, and I was surprised.  Then, one day I realized that I had used way more gas than I had intended to for the week.  While filling the tank up, I thought that it smelled way stronger than usual for a gas station, so I looked underneath my car: gas was leaking straight back out of the tank.  I blew a head gasket after that.  Once I paid way too much to fix that and get it on the road again, my old best friend's boyfriend backed right over the front end of it, crunching my headlights and hood.  After I fixed that so I could drive it at night, the alternator went out.  I got rear-ended TWICE in that car.  It finally took it's last breath in 2005.  I bought my next car not long after.  It was in GREAT condition.  I was so proud of it.  I drove it off of the lot with a quarter tank of gas, and it stalled in the middle of the road two miles later.  Turns out the gas guage was broken.  I had it for almost six months before I had my first real problem- I got into a car accident on the way home from Ohio, and smashed up the front end.  I was devastated, because it wasn't directly my fault.  It still ran perfectly, though.  After that, I got backed into, someone punched my windshield out, I got stuck in several inches of snow a few times during winter, and finally, I slid into a fire hydrant, taking out the driver side wheel well and rendering it useless.

As you can see, I have a history.  I haven't had a problem since being in Phoenix, mainly because I don't have a vehicle, and I don't have friends with vehicles, except Sheri.  And two weeks ago when we went to lunch, there was a strange white smoke coming from her vents when the air conditioning was running.  I don't know what that means but I'm sure I don't want to be around when she finds out.  Chris and I are planning to purchase our first vehicle together this fall, and I'm nervous.  I'm planning on getting something newer, definitely, and getting it checked by CarFax first, because I will not be paying out the ass for another car that has had too many problems in the past.

Does anyone else have bad luck with certain objects?  I'm wondering if this happens to more people than I originally thought.