Odds and Ends

From the week gone by and the upcoming weekend...

-  A bit of bad news this week…yesterday, my luxury sedan wouldn’t start; therefore, I had to drive the truck/SUV to work today.  This always makes me a bit nervous, because I’m not used to driving big vehicles with terrible sight lines.  Plus, I kind of feel like I’m personally killing a polar bear every time I drive it.  It also didn’t help that I had a dream last night that I was driving the truck…spun it out…and started to tumble backwards off the side of a castle wall (yeah…don’t ask).  Fortunately, the front wheels caught on the edge, and because the truck had four wheel drive, I was able to floor my way back onto level ground.  I actually have no idea what four wheel drive does…but I can only assume, based on my dream, that it allows you to climb castle walls…if the need should ever arise.

Luxury Sedan

As a postscript…my amazing wife was able to fix the luxury sedan by changing the battery!  She really is the bestest!  I probably would have fixed it myself…because, there’s nothing I like more than getting under the old hood with a monkey wrench (or whatever)…but I was busy chasing the paper today.  However, not to diminish my role in the repair…I did buy the WD-40 (a while back) that was instrumental in finally getting the old battery out, and I handed my wife the wrench (or whatever) when I got home and she was finishing up.  I try to do my part when I can…(Love you, honey!)

As an aside…who knew car batteries were so expensive?  I wonder if you can buy used ones?

-  My latest musical crush (or more appropriately…Crushcrushcrush) is Paramore.  I feel like this is appropriate since I’m getting ready to move to England.  I don’t claim to know too much about the Brits…but one thing I know for sure is that they love rocker chicks with dyed hair.  They really eat that stuff up over there…

-  Looking forward to kicking back and watching UCF and Jeff “the magician” Godfrey dominate Buffalo tomorrow night.  On our way to 13-1 baby!

-  Just got an email saying that Oprah’s latest book club pick was Freedom by Jonathan Franzen.  This is the guy that wrote The Corrections back in the day, which I really liked, so I have been planning to pick up his new one (I actually put in a hold request at the library, but I was like 37 in the hold queue).  But, now that Oprah has told me to read it…the situation has suddenly become a lot more urgent!

-  Just a quick update on the parking dilemma/shuttle bus situation.  While I’ve been hoofing it (for the most part) back and forth from my car to the lab…I have managed to hitch a ride on the bus when I’ve felt particularly lazy.  Everything has gone ok, I guess.  The first try was a bit dicey though.  Everything started out pretty good…I asked the bus driver if that particular line stopped at my stop.  Of course, I already knew that it did…I had the routes memorized after all…but I was trying to be talkative.  He replied in the affirmative…as far as I could tell.  Anyway, I was kicked back…rocking out to some Paramore on my ipod with the other 2 passengers on the bus…a couple of 18-year-old girls.  I started getting a bit nervous when I noticed that the driver was skipping most of the stops…likely assuming that everyone was headed for the apartment complex at the end of the line.  So, in order not to miss my stop…which obviously would’ve required me to get off at the end of the line and wait for another bus to avoid any embarrassment…I jumped up as we were approaching the drop off point.  The bus driver glared back at me in the rear view mirror and asked with a somewhat perplexed look…”you getting off here?”  I nodded, he slammed on the brakes, and I was out of there.  Success…I think.