My Terribly Horrible, Gloriously Wonderful Day

How many of you have ever thought you had a chance at winning the Publisher's Clearinghouse Sweepstakes? We see the Super Bowl commercials and how thrilled the family is that wins. We immediately begin to fantasize what it would be like to have Ed McMahon (or his ghost-I honestly have no idea who delivers the cartoonish 3' x 6' check anymore) ring our doorbell and surprise us with a million dollars (I'm also not sure what the current prize is valued at, but a million seems like chump change anymore).

Maybe I'm speaking in antiquated terms. How many of you have ever heard a radio contest and thought, "I could be the 9th caller"? We may hear them or even occasionally enter sweepstakes of some kind but we never really expect that the "You" in "you could win" applies to us. We always assume that it is a reference to some nebulous person in Culver city who wins every contest and his house is overflowing to bursting with swag from the local radio stations.

Well, it was with that same, "I don't stand a chance to win" attitude that I filled out a small postcard with my name, cell phone and a fake email address that I use for entering things like this (so that my main email doesn't get hit with copious amounts of spam from these sorts of things). But perhaps I am getting ahead of myself a little bit. The title does begin with with "Terribly, Horrible" so I guess I should address that first.

You see, this particular Monday started out like a typical Monday. I woke up at 3:30 that morning got dressed for work and headed out the door. That isn't a typo. I get up between 3:30 and 4:00 every Monday morning and go to one of 40 Jack in the Box restaurants. I serve as asset protection for a franchise. You should only ever eat at one of the 40 Jacks owned by Beshay Foods Inc. (for a complete listing send me an email). Anyway, I drove to work in Rancho Penasquitos (Ranch-o Pen-a-skeet-os, for all those non-southern Californians) and began my audit.

About 8:00 that morning my phone chimed to let me know I had missed a call (my phone has been temperamental (mostly mental) these last few days). I listened to my voice mail and it was someone representing the sports store that was holding the drawing and told me I should call them back by midnight tonight. I figured that there was no way I actually won the contest. I was certain that if I did in fact return the call that they would tell me I didn't win but they have some intriguing offers for me.

I finished with the bulk of my work and decided to head over to another restaurant to pay them a visit. As I was crossing over the 15 (that's Interstate 15 for all you non-southern Californians)I approached an intersection that will forever be ingrained in my mind. This is a somewhat unique intersection. If you stand in the very center you have to go up hill to get out of it. It doesn't matter which direction you choose, you must go up hill. I was waiting at the light to turn left and when it changed I entered the intersection and my vehicle stalled. Everything went dark. I still don't know what exactly is wrong with it, I just know that it didn't run and there was no electricity at all. I was in the middle of an intersection with cars about to start approaching me. I jumped out and with one hand on the open door and the other on the steering wheel I began pushing the Jeep Grand Cherokee up hill. I huffed and I puffed and I pulled a muscle in my calf and just as I was entering the cross walk I reached that point at which you know you have lost all forward momentum and are about to start rolling backwards. Just when I thought I couldn't go any farther a good Samaritan happened along and gave me the impetus I needed to get the car through and alongside the curb. I thanked him and he disappeared.

I'll spare you the boring details but suffice it to say that I spent the next two and half hours being passed by countless cars with no offer of assistance whatsoever. I found a loose cable, I repaired it and, since I could get no help, called a tow truck company to come give me a jump for a paltry $25. When all my efforts at repair proved inadequate, I was forced to have the tow truck guy load up the truck and take me back to the Jack in the Box less than a mile a way. The tow truck driver informed me that there was usually a $99 flat fee charged to tow less than ten miles but that since I only called for a jump and the drop wasn't even half a mile away he'd do it for the price of the jump. I was thrilled at that thought but was quickly smacked with reality as the tow truck drove away leaving me in a parking lot 46.3 miles from where the Jeep should be.

I called my father-in-law to ask for any sage mechanic advice he could give me that might make the Jeep miraculously spring to life. But after a few last ditch efforts, the vehicle just sat there like a half ton paper weight. With no other recourse, I quickly called another tow truck company with better-not good,but better-rates.

You may wonder why I knew that the Jeep was resting 46.3 miles exactly from the Church parking lot. When you receive a quote to have a vehicle towed for a $50 hook up and $5 per mile, you know exactly how far you have to take it. So for those of you who failed Consumer Math, that's a grand total of...wait for it...$285 (yes, that means the 3/10ths of a mile were rounded up!). A bill I would have to foot entirely even though it wasn't even my vehicle.

With the Jeep securely tied down to the tow truck and the driver finishing a few last minute notes for his paperwork, he remarked that I seemed different than anyone else he had towed. I asked him to explain and he responded by saying, "Most people are extremely upset and even get mad at me for having to tow/charge them. But you're joking around and seem completely okay with this." I must preface my response to him with this: if he had seen me a couple of hours earlier, he probably would have assumed I was no different from anyone else he's ever met. I was pretty upset at first, but you see, I had about four hours of down time and I guess I just got over it. While at one point I was ready to push the jeep off a cliff, I was resigned to my fate and determined not to let it control me any longer.

I conveniently left all of that information out when I responded by saying that I was the Assistant Pastor of a Church in Temecula ( a truth that would become abundantly clear when we pulled into the parking lot to drop off the Jeep) and that as a Christian, I was commanded to trust that God had a purpose in everything (though at the time I had no idea what that was). He perked up immediately at hearing that I was a Pastor and asked me if I ever did any counseling. I told him that from time to time I did (omitting that fact that it was usually with teens) but not very often. Well, apparently he heard, "Yes, I'm a tremendous counselor. Please, tell me all of your troubles." because he began telling me all of the issues he was going through.

I didn't really have any wisdom to impart to him, but I asked a few questions and mostly listened to him. I think he may have just needed someone to whom he could vent his frustrations. After he finished, I asked him if he went to church anywhere and if he knew what it meant to be born again. He said he started going to church with a buddy recently but had never really gone before. I began to speak with him and just as we were coming down the road to the church, it all sank in and he understood what he needed to do. As we crossed the last stop light before the church, he prayed and asked God to forgive him of his sins and make him a new man.

That was when my Terribly, Horrible day begin to transform into a Gloriously, Wonderful day.

As He finished unloading the Jeep into the church parking lot, I pulled out my empty wallet to reach for my bank card (which was also void of funds) not sure how I would pay for this whole thing. He walked up to me and handed me the paperwork and told me that he was so grateful to me for sharing the gospel with him, that he was just going to use this as a tax deduction and that I would be charged absolutely nothing! That's blessing number 2, for those of you keeping score at home!

I was so excited (and exhausted) that I forgot all about that drawing I had entered and didn't call the people back. I realized that the next morning as I was driving my son to school and wishing I had a new phone because my Blackberry was freezing up again. Once my phone came back up, I called the number of the store holding the contest again just on a whim. Someone picked up and I began to explain that I got their message to call by midnight last night and I related the ordeal I endured the day before. The person on the phone told me that it was alright that I still qualified as a winner of their drawing and that I had won their Grand Prize!

Now the biggest thing I had ever won before was a $50 gift certificate to ProFlowers from a sports talk radio station in San Diego. I just sat there unblinking as I realized what I had won.

A brand new 16gb iPhone 4!

I went over to the Apple store in Temecula (still disbelieving) and walked out with a $461 (tax included) phone. I was so flabbergasted that I could barely control myself as I called my wife extolling the virtues of Apple and the sports store that had held the contest. I was so ecstatic that one could have mistaken the smile etched into my face as a botox injection gone wrong.

My iPhone and I have lived very happily together for the last couple months. It does everything I could hope and so much more. I even got a nifty cover featuring the logo of the World Series Champion San Francisco Giants to protect it from harm. The only issue is that my wife complains of being an iPhone widow from time to time, but I try to keep my iPhone from hearing such talk.