When I went downstairs to the garage after work today, my car was gone. “Damn, I’m sure that I parked it in my normal spot.” I’ve risen to the level in life where I have reserved parking at work. Underground no less. I had my keys. I didn’t get a ride with anyone for lunch, I just cruised home for a bit. It was 5:30 and Beck needed the car at 6. “Gangestad, we have a problem.”

Someone had grabbed my keys off my desk and moved it out into the parking lot. I’d had a really exasperating day. I kind of popped a bolt over it, before I started buying into the humor of it. I know who did it. I will get my revenge.

Becky went to a play with some of the women from the neighborhood. I headed over to the smoke shop for a stogie. I started thinking about the full moon and October nights and my mind drifted over to high school football. It was a perfect night, not cold but clear and crisp. I decided it would be a perfect night to go see my niece’s boy play football for the number one team in the state, Eden Prairie. At six feet and two-twentyfive he’s an undersized offensive guard. I asked the boys at the shop if they knew where Eden Prairie High was, and they gave me a vague discription and mentioned that it was kind of a maze over in that part of town. I came home and googled the location, printed a couple of maps and headed out. About five minutes after I turned off of 169 I was completely disoriented. I drove around for awhile, thinking I could find it with dead reckoning and luck. Then it dawned on me. Look for the lights. I looked up and there they were. Had to be a stadium. So I drove toward the lights. I found a parking place about a half mile from the stadium, downhill. I got all the way down to the ticket counter when I saw that I was at the home of the Hawks. Eden Prairie is the Eagles. Eagles, Hawks, Falcons we have a regular raptor center around here. I was in Chaska, the next town over.

I made the long trudge back to my car and started to drive home. I had visions of myself as one of those poor people whe drive off and are found six states over, dead of exposure in a gulley, picked over by coyotes. But soon enough I got to a road I recognized, and now here I sit safe and sound, listening to my cat crunch his food while he thinks about his next piss attack.