Christine lives ... in my wheelchair

I have never seen the movie "Christine" about the car that kills off people it sees as competing for its owner's attention, but I think my power wheelchair has.

Unlike Christine, though, instead of killing off the people who hurt or disrespect it, my power chair is trying to kill me.

Really.

I don't know whether it has heard the talk that I want a new chair or what, but yesterday was a good example.

I was on my way back from the nearest pet store – about 40 minutes for me. I went obstensibly to get a Halloween costume for Claren – I didn't – but mostly because it was as really nice day after all the rain.

We were on our return trip, and I noticed a crappy curb cut that I had bounced over on the way. It was angled OK, but the edge of the sidewalk, the part that forms the gutter, was about half an inch higher than the regular sidewalk.

My bones and kidneys did not want another jangling, so I went down the curb cut slowly, or I tried to.

My front wheels would not go over the raised gutter lip as the slow speed, so I started giving it more and more power. Finally, the front wheels bounced over the lip, but they were turned and we jerked out into the street. There were several cars coming, but unfortunately for the power chair, I stopped before going into their path. It's tough to say if I could have touched one of the cars if I held out my hand.

Fortunately, the closest car was a little white sedan, not a Christine-like red Plymouth Fury.