How NOT to attend your buddy's fundraiser

My Team in Training teammate Renee (with whom I had the pleasure of sharing a two-miler back in December) was holding a fundraiser last night only 15 minutes from my house. How could I not go, right? I was all set to go support her and booze it up for a good cause. However, despite my best efforts, I never actually made it there. Read on--I'm going to show you how NOT to attend your teammate's fundraiser in 5 easy steps!

1. Put the wrong time for the fundraiser on your calendar. It started at 6:00. How I managed to put 6:30 on my wall calendar may always remain a mystery. (I suspect simple boneheadedness on the part of yours truly.)

2. Experience hair-raising technical problems with a large file you are desperately trying to send out over the Interwebs. Make sure this delays you so that it is already 6:30 as you hurry to your car and get in.

3. Perhaps because you're running late and in a hurry, back the car crooked down your driveway--so crooked that you slide right off the driveway and strand yourself on the slope between your yard and your neighbor's. (The driveway is completely to the right of the car in the picture above.) Spend half an hour cursing your idiocy at the top of your lungs with language that would fry an egg while frantically shoveling the car free.

4. Finally, get on the road that will take you most of the way to the fundraiser. Thirty seconds later, come to a complete halt and admire the brake lights stretching out ahead of you, punctuated by the flashing blue lights of multiple police cars. Spend fifteen minutes crawling toward and through an intersection dotted with wrecked cars.

5. As the time approaches 7:30, pull into the picturesque one-lane drive that extends back into the forest and to the parking lot of the hall where the fundraiser is being held. Wonder why the cars ahead of you are just stopped. C'mon, charitable boozing awaits! Watch glum-faced man approach your driver's side door and roll down window. Listen to man tell you that there is not a shred of parking left anywhere and the lot is full to overflowing. Apparently there is not even room enough to turn around. Which means--yup, you guessed it, you now get to BACK UP several hundred feet up a VERY NARROW SNOWY ROAD WITH HUGE DROP-OFFS ON BOTH SIDES!! Yay! Roll up window, shift into reverse, fry some more eggs with your tongue, and begin the torturous white-knuckle process of extricating yourself from this mess. Boy, if you didn't need a drink before, you certainly do now!!

Upon reaching home, swear you will never leave the house again. Attempt to salvage evening with beer, pretzels, and Johnny Depp.