You know that old Chinese saying/proverb/curse about living in interesting times? If I had to put Western words to it today, I'd say happiness usually exists in direct proportion to the dullness of blog posts.
So, yeah, I've got a story to tell.
I drove my boss's spare BMW home from work yesterday, worked out briefly, and then took my wife out to dinner while my friend D-- stayed home with AB. We went to Wendy's (romantic) because T-- wanted a Frosty and I was very slightly curious about their new boneless buffalo wings (and exactly how they would differ from their timeworn chicken nuggets). Unfortunately business was slow and the staff was either stoned or sleepy, because they managed to get every aspect of our order wrong.
The buffalo wings come in one of three flavors, and when I tried to tell him which one I wanted, he said I could have the "bold buffalo" sauce. I didn't ask for bold buffalo sauce, he just told me with a baffling confidence that that was what I was going to order, and then he typed it into the machine. Then he gave us our drinks and we found a table to wait for the food. My Dr Pepper tasted a little funny -- too much soda, not enough syrup -- but that happens sometimes, so I let it go.
Then the guy behind the register called me up to the counter to say, "Hey man, I know you wanted the bold buffalo sauce, but I accidentally put Asian zing sauce on. That okay?" I just stared at him for a moment, trying to formulate an answer, and he said, "These are the last ones we have ready, and it'd take a long time to make some new ones." I should have thought that all the way through, but instead I told him Asian zing was fine.
T-- got a chicken sandwich, so there were a total of about nine pieces of chicken among us at the table, and when our meal showed up, every one of them was scorched beyond reason. The fries were so undercooked as to be soggy, though. I could have just said, "We went to Wendy's, and it was disappointing," and nobody alive would've been surprised by that statement, but the sheer level to which they failed to fulfill their obligation as a provider of food was quite astonishing.
Halfway through our dinner (yes, we ate it), T-- said, "This is not a very promising start to our evening."
It wasn't meant to be a date night, so much as we left AB with D-- so we could go car shopping. I'd spent a significant portion of the day shopping online, and found a really great deal on a low-end 2007 Saturn Vue at Hudiburg Chevrolet in Midwest City. That's a big forty-minute drive for us, but that's also precisely the car T-- wants, and the price was right, so it was worth checking out. We thought we would give it a look over in person, maybe see how comfortable it was inside, then drive up to Edmond to check out the used cars on the lot where they're working on our Honda. There's a couple used lots near there, so we could get in some good browsing, but we wanted to check out that Vue as a baseline.
So after our disappointing dinner we got on the highway, and took it to another highway, and finally ended up at the dealership around seven. We rolled around the lot a bit, spotted a couple Vues (a 2008 and a 2007, just like I'd seen in the online inventory), so we parked and walked over to the '07 to check it out. It wasn't the one we'd seen online, though. 3,000 fewer miles on it, and $5,000 more on the list price.
Before we'd totally figured that out, though, the salesman snagged us. He showed us the car, pulled it out and cajoled us into taking a test drive, and he did a good job pointing out all the great things about the car, but nearly all of them were amenities and options that we didn't need (and which explained why the same year, same model, was so much more expensive than the one we'd come to see). We asked him a couple times if he could show us the cheaper one, because we couldn't find it, but he'd just say, "Well, we'll see what we can do for you."
So we got back from the test drive and he had us park next to the office building, then took us in and sat us down at his desk. At this point we've looked at exactly one vehicle, and it's out of our price range. We knew this, and we'd made sure he knew this. That was a pretty poor showing for the half hour we'd already spent at the lot, but once he had us in the chairs in his office, that was the end of our night.
He went through the whole song and dance, striking up friendly conversation, getting to know us, learning AB's name and asking about her, telling us all about his fiance, so that we felt like there was a real connection there (so we'd feel bad about walking out on him). He burned up time, spending forty minutes to fill out a one-page form while he chatted casually, so we'd feel like we had a real time investment in this purchase. He asked me what monthly payment we were looking for, discarding out of hand any discussion of total price (and total new debt that came with it). Unfortunately I didn't come prepared with a monthly rate, so I had to name something on the spot. I said $200 to $250, and he didn't even try to get close. He didn't even take anything off the sticker price. Just came back with a calculation on the $17,000 that it would cost us either $350 or $300 a month, depending whether we could put a thousand down.
We told him no, that was way, way more than the number I'd given him (which turned out to be too big a number anyway), and that this car really probably wasn't the right one for us. He said, "Nah, nah, give me a minute, I'll see what I can do." And went back in the room and pantomimed an argument with his manager for us and came back with a thousand bucks off the sticker price. We told him no again, and we had to get home because the babysitter was ready to leave, and he said, "Well, just give me a minute, I'll see what I can do." And came back with a lower monthly payment on the same total price (so he was just extending our term by a few more years), and when we told him no that time, he said, "All right, I've just got to get some paperwork taken care of."
Then he brought out his manager who was all set to put us through the same charade again. He started into a spiel about 80- and 90-month car loans, and I told him outright, "We are not walking out of here with more than $13,000 of new debt." We'd actually showed up hoping to talk the $11,200 car we'd seen online down to around $9,000, but this one was a nicer vehicle. By a lot. If he'd come down to thirteen, I probably would have caved.
He just shook his head and said, "That car will never be less than 13. I can get your monthly payments down to $225...."
And that's when T-- said, "Sorry, we've got to go. We have a babysitter waiting for us." And we left.
We got back to the house at nine o'clock. That was our entire evening -- one-sided haggling over a car we kept insisting we weren't interested in. T-- had to drop me off and then drive up to Edmond anyway, because she had an errand to run. We'd planned to take care of that while shopping the lots in Edmond, but we never got to do any of that.
It was an aggravating evening. Super-friendly salespeople aren't great for the social anxiety, either, I can tell you.
Anyway, I got home and spent half an hour putting AB to bed, then sort of just vegged out on the couch while T-- watched Flight of the Conchords.
Oh! I did put some finishing touches on my Memory Game (the one Toby helped me write), and it's now available for testing if any of your are interested. Feedback is required (and tips are welcome).
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Journal Entry: July 7, 2009
The Saturn is dead.
I got home yesterday evening and after complaining to T-- about the sorry state of my life for half an hour (car troubles), I went to the office to work out and she took AB to pick up some Taco Bueno for supper. Both of those things proved satisfactory.
Then AB took a bath and went to bed, and I started up a game of Civ while T-- and I finished off Important Things with Demetri Martin and started over again on Flight of the Conchords. It was a pleasant evening.
This morning I heard from our mechanic, and the Saturn would cost $5,263.18 to repair. Its Blue Book value, even after the repairs would be $750. So, yeah, that car's never coming home again.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
I got home yesterday evening and after complaining to T-- about the sorry state of my life for half an hour (car troubles), I went to the office to work out and she took AB to pick up some Taco Bueno for supper. Both of those things proved satisfactory.
Then AB took a bath and went to bed, and I started up a game of Civ while T-- and I finished off Important Things with Demetri Martin and started over again on Flight of the Conchords. It was a pleasant evening.
This morning I heard from our mechanic, and the Saturn would cost $5,263.18 to repair. Its Blue Book value, even after the repairs would be $750. So, yeah, that car's never coming home again.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
My Most Earnest, Oft-Uttered Prayer
Dear Lord, my Father and my King, bless my name and bless my household.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Journal Entry: July 6, 2009
Saturday
Quite in defiance of my blog post, last Saturday turned busy. T-- went to her brother Matt's to get some advice from a veteran painter, and Karla and John went out shopping for dinner supplies and then picked T-- up at Matt's and took her to her other brother Chris's place to give some advice as a veteran interior designer.
While they were doing that, I was watching AB back at the house. She woke up from her nap and wanted to play, so we did spinning, and we explored Dora's dollhouse and we played the Memory game on my laptop, and she watched my marauders invade the Mongolian island chain. All good fun.
When the others got home, we had homemade ribs for dinner, and they were fall-off-the-bone perfect. Then T-- and her parents went downstairs to watch a movie and I stayed upstairs to comfort AB whenever the (very loud, very nearby) fireworks startled her awake. That was meant to be a ten- to fifteen-minute assignment, but it ended up taking three hours. When I wasn't comforting her I was playing Civ in the comfy chair, though, so no complaints.
Sunday
Sunday morning I skipped church. They were going to a new Chinese place for lunch, so I grabbed some McDonalds and read a couple more chapters of Click (and, in the process, figured out the entire plot of a new Ghost Targets book), and then met up with them to head over to Matt and Amy's place for the birthday party.
Her family mostly lives close together, and it's not a small clan, so birthdays come with some frequency among them. As a pragmatic choice, they've taken to celebrating via one big birthday party every month, in which they fete everybody whose got a birthday that month and have done with it. T--'s is the 24th, so she was one of the guests of honor.
Everyone had a great time, but before too long it was time for us to get on the road. Our cats were at home hungry, and AB was ready for a nap. So we said our goodbyes and got on the road.
Umm...I didn't mention this concerning the trip up on Friday, because T--'s false labor got top billing, but on our way to Wichita, about halfway there, the car started making a noise. I described it as a baseball card in the spokes, but it was a sort of rapid, light ticking/clattering. Before we left Wichita T--'s dad noticed the sound while we were in the driveway and he suggested we get some more oil in it. The car has always had a pretty bad oil leak, so I wasn't too surprised at his suggestion. I think I missed the urgency in it, though.
We drove home with that same ticking sound there the whole way, and we discussed the need to get the Saturn in to our mechanic as soon as possible. That "possible" was limited by the fact that our actual, reliable car is still sitting in the shop at the Honda dealer, though, as you will recall. That's the only reason we were in the Saturn for the Wichita trip at all!
Anyway, we made it home safe (in case any of you were holding your breath). We stopped at Pizza Hut and grabbed some dinner to take home, and then while I was eating I got a message from D-- asking if I was available to go see a movie, and against my better judgment I said yes.
We saw The Hangover, which has been getting incredible reviews, and I'll call them well-deserved. It was hilarious. It's raunchy and highly inappropriate, but it captures a certain slice of what it's like to be a guy, and present that in with a bunch of slapstick that had me rolling.
But, yeah, that had me out late. I got home after 11, crawled into bed, and completely failed to fall asleep. Somehow I started thinking about the Sleeping Kings series, and started considering Golden Age from a different angle, and couldn't stop that train of thought. I was rearranging chapters and stamping out the outline for hours. I woke up at six this morning with the feeling that I'd never really fully fallen asleep.
Monday
Or, in other words, I woke up tired. I got up, though, and got around, and then headed to work. I had high hopes to get the Honda back today, but that was hope without much faith. I decided to go on in to work, and wait until the Honda guy said "come pick it up" before starting into my vacation time.
It's a thirty-minute drive from my house to work every morning. I made it about twenty-two minutes, to the last exit from the highway, and as I was rolling up the exit ramp the Check Oil light flickered on, fluttered, and then all the lights on my dash came on.
Because the car was dead.
That was halfway up the ramp, and my inertia carried me to the top of it, and then back down the other side to settle to a stop just shy of the traffic light, in the middle of three lanes of busy commuters on MacArthur. I spent a frantic twenty seconds trying to find the button for the hazard lights, while the traffic light turned green and people behind me started honking.
Then I set to the task of pushing the car through the intersection before the light changed, without getting run over. An oh-so-generous stranger saw my plight, parked at the curb, and came back to help me push the car through the intersection and then into a parking lot on the other side of it. So at least there was that.
Remember, though, that this is my backup car. And by all indication, I just ran the engine out of oil, which is pretty much a fatal error. The ignition couldn't start the car back up (and when the AAA guy tried it later, with jumper cables attached, the starter started smoking, so that's pretty definite). The car's got 240,000 miles on it, so none of this is a huge surprise, but it's no fun.
Luckily I have some amazing coworkers. I called up my supervisor to tell him what had happened, and he immediately offered to come pick me up (and do any necessary ferrying the follow-up process required). I came to the office, made some calls, and eventually arranged for a tow truck to meet me back at the parking lot later in the morning.
Then I had trouble finding my supervisor to let him know the new plans, so I stopped by Irene's office (she's my Documentation Team Lead, which is one of my types of boss), and when I was done catching her up to speed she offered to loan me a car. My cup overflows.
My supervisor was still nowhere in sight, so she drove me up to the parking lot (and the AAA guy burned up my starter), and then he took the Saturn to our mechanic up in Edmond, and Irene took me to her place to pick up the extra car. Then she went back to work, and I drove home to drop off some stuff for T-- and try to sort out the car situation.
So the Saturn's now at K&C (the same guys who tried to fix the Honda before sending me to the dealer), and the Honda's at the dealer, and I'm driving a loaner BMW. I did hear back from Honda while I was at it, and they say it was the most expensive of the three possible options we'd discussed, but I can have my car back tomorrow.
There's catastrophes and there's blessings, all intermingled. Of them all, I'm most excited about the new Ghost Targets book. And most concerned about the changes to Golden Age. And that, my dear friends, is how you can tell I'm a writer.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
Quite in defiance of my blog post, last Saturday turned busy. T-- went to her brother Matt's to get some advice from a veteran painter, and Karla and John went out shopping for dinner supplies and then picked T-- up at Matt's and took her to her other brother Chris's place to give some advice as a veteran interior designer.
While they were doing that, I was watching AB back at the house. She woke up from her nap and wanted to play, so we did spinning, and we explored Dora's dollhouse and we played the Memory game on my laptop, and she watched my marauders invade the Mongolian island chain. All good fun.
When the others got home, we had homemade ribs for dinner, and they were fall-off-the-bone perfect. Then T-- and her parents went downstairs to watch a movie and I stayed upstairs to comfort AB whenever the (very loud, very nearby) fireworks startled her awake. That was meant to be a ten- to fifteen-minute assignment, but it ended up taking three hours. When I wasn't comforting her I was playing Civ in the comfy chair, though, so no complaints.
Sunday
Sunday morning I skipped church. They were going to a new Chinese place for lunch, so I grabbed some McDonalds and read a couple more chapters of Click (and, in the process, figured out the entire plot of a new Ghost Targets book), and then met up with them to head over to Matt and Amy's place for the birthday party.
Her family mostly lives close together, and it's not a small clan, so birthdays come with some frequency among them. As a pragmatic choice, they've taken to celebrating via one big birthday party every month, in which they fete everybody whose got a birthday that month and have done with it. T--'s is the 24th, so she was one of the guests of honor.
Everyone had a great time, but before too long it was time for us to get on the road. Our cats were at home hungry, and AB was ready for a nap. So we said our goodbyes and got on the road.
Umm...I didn't mention this concerning the trip up on Friday, because T--'s false labor got top billing, but on our way to Wichita, about halfway there, the car started making a noise. I described it as a baseball card in the spokes, but it was a sort of rapid, light ticking/clattering. Before we left Wichita T--'s dad noticed the sound while we were in the driveway and he suggested we get some more oil in it. The car has always had a pretty bad oil leak, so I wasn't too surprised at his suggestion. I think I missed the urgency in it, though.
We drove home with that same ticking sound there the whole way, and we discussed the need to get the Saturn in to our mechanic as soon as possible. That "possible" was limited by the fact that our actual, reliable car is still sitting in the shop at the Honda dealer, though, as you will recall. That's the only reason we were in the Saturn for the Wichita trip at all!
Anyway, we made it home safe (in case any of you were holding your breath). We stopped at Pizza Hut and grabbed some dinner to take home, and then while I was eating I got a message from D-- asking if I was available to go see a movie, and against my better judgment I said yes.
We saw The Hangover, which has been getting incredible reviews, and I'll call them well-deserved. It was hilarious. It's raunchy and highly inappropriate, but it captures a certain slice of what it's like to be a guy, and present that in with a bunch of slapstick that had me rolling.
But, yeah, that had me out late. I got home after 11, crawled into bed, and completely failed to fall asleep. Somehow I started thinking about the Sleeping Kings series, and started considering Golden Age from a different angle, and couldn't stop that train of thought. I was rearranging chapters and stamping out the outline for hours. I woke up at six this morning with the feeling that I'd never really fully fallen asleep.
Monday
Or, in other words, I woke up tired. I got up, though, and got around, and then headed to work. I had high hopes to get the Honda back today, but that was hope without much faith. I decided to go on in to work, and wait until the Honda guy said "come pick it up" before starting into my vacation time.
It's a thirty-minute drive from my house to work every morning. I made it about twenty-two minutes, to the last exit from the highway, and as I was rolling up the exit ramp the Check Oil light flickered on, fluttered, and then all the lights on my dash came on.
Because the car was dead.
That was halfway up the ramp, and my inertia carried me to the top of it, and then back down the other side to settle to a stop just shy of the traffic light, in the middle of three lanes of busy commuters on MacArthur. I spent a frantic twenty seconds trying to find the button for the hazard lights, while the traffic light turned green and people behind me started honking.
Then I set to the task of pushing the car through the intersection before the light changed, without getting run over. An oh-so-generous stranger saw my plight, parked at the curb, and came back to help me push the car through the intersection and then into a parking lot on the other side of it. So at least there was that.
Remember, though, that this is my backup car. And by all indication, I just ran the engine out of oil, which is pretty much a fatal error. The ignition couldn't start the car back up (and when the AAA guy tried it later, with jumper cables attached, the starter started smoking, so that's pretty definite). The car's got 240,000 miles on it, so none of this is a huge surprise, but it's no fun.
Luckily I have some amazing coworkers. I called up my supervisor to tell him what had happened, and he immediately offered to come pick me up (and do any necessary ferrying the follow-up process required). I came to the office, made some calls, and eventually arranged for a tow truck to meet me back at the parking lot later in the morning.
Then I had trouble finding my supervisor to let him know the new plans, so I stopped by Irene's office (she's my Documentation Team Lead, which is one of my types of boss), and when I was done catching her up to speed she offered to loan me a car. My cup overflows.
My supervisor was still nowhere in sight, so she drove me up to the parking lot (and the AAA guy burned up my starter), and then he took the Saturn to our mechanic up in Edmond, and Irene took me to her place to pick up the extra car. Then she went back to work, and I drove home to drop off some stuff for T-- and try to sort out the car situation.
So the Saturn's now at K&C (the same guys who tried to fix the Honda before sending me to the dealer), and the Honda's at the dealer, and I'm driving a loaner BMW. I did hear back from Honda while I was at it, and they say it was the most expensive of the three possible options we'd discussed, but I can have my car back tomorrow.
There's catastrophes and there's blessings, all intermingled. Of them all, I'm most excited about the new Ghost Targets book. And most concerned about the changes to Golden Age. And that, my dear friends, is how you can tell I'm a writer.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Journal Entry: July 4, 2009
Thursday T-- had plans to meet her dad at the halfway point between OKC and Wichita and hand over AB. Her parents had agreed to watch AB Thursday night and Friday so T-- could have a little bit of a break.
The broken car put a little bit of a kink in that plan, but T-- wasn't willing to let that stop her. So we all woke up early early on Thursday, piled into the Saturn, and T-- drove thirty minutes south to my work, processed through our Pass and ID office to get a temporary Pick Up/Drop Off badge, and then dropped me off at my office door. Then she turned around and drove all the way back across town and another hour and a half north on I-35 to meet her dad at the Dairy Queen for the baby transfer.
Then she turned around and came home, which put her back in town right around time for my lunch, and since she already had the badge she just came to the office, picked me up, and had me drop her off at home after lunch, so that she wouldn't have to do any more driving for the rest of the day. It was a pretty busy morning for her.
After work I continued my experiment with Madden-based elliptical exercise, and it proved a continuing success. Then I got cleaned up and took T-- out for a date night. We had Mexican at the new place right around the corner (Victor's Mexican Cafe where the old Boomerang Grill was), and it was not great. The prices were medium-high, service was slow and clumsy, and the salsa tasted like Chef Boyardee for some reason. The entree was delicious (we shared Tacos al Carbon), but not enough to make up for bad salsa. That's my primary criterion for any Mexican place.
Anyway, it wasn't terrible. Just disappointing. Then we went up to Barnes and Noble for a little shopping, stopped at Wal-Mart for some ice cream, and then went back home and watched InkHeart and The Pink Panther 2. The unapologetically stupid one was the better of the two.
Friday I had off for the holiday, so I got up late, worked out (and won my third preseason game in Madden), then we went over to K-- and N--'s for a delicious lunch. We brought croissants and they had chicken salad ready for sandwiches, and there was an American Flag themed brownie birthday cake for N--, and a fruit basket showed up for N--'s mom with perfect timing for all of us to enjoy. We were there for a couple hours, and then headed home to finish packing.
Then a little after three we headed to Wichita. We grabbed snowcones on the way out of town, and T-- was driving so I was able to read Click for an hour or so (I'll give more details at a later date, but no, it's not the novelisation of the Adam Sandler movie). Then, a little shy of halfway there, T-- started experiencing some Braxton-Hicks, which she hadn't had at all with AB. It was uncomfortable, but I think mostly it scared her. Either way, it was enough reason for her to pull over and I took over driving for the second half of the trip. She called N-- and got a prognosis over the phone, and called her mom to talk about it, and after that she felt a lot better.
When we got in the party was already going. The Charboneaus did their Fourth party on the third, because her brother Matt has to work tonight. John grilled out, and did chicken breasts, chicken wings, hot dogs, hamburgers, and a whole mess of stuffed jalapenos that were hugely popular. There was also potato salad and lots of chips and dip and a counterful of desserts. It was pretty awesome.
I got a little overwhelmed by the crowd, so I slipped away before the fireworks started. Went downstairs to check my email, and next thing I knew it was eleven o'clock and everybody was leaving.
This morning T-- and her parents took AB to a parade, and she loved it. Then we had chicken fajitas for lunch, and ribs are on the menu for tonight. I'm certainly going to be well-fed! In spite of the holiday we're looking forward to a pretty quiet Saturday, but tomorrow's going to be busy with birthday parties, so that's probably a good thing.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff
The broken car put a little bit of a kink in that plan, but T-- wasn't willing to let that stop her. So we all woke up early early on Thursday, piled into the Saturn, and T-- drove thirty minutes south to my work, processed through our Pass and ID office to get a temporary Pick Up/Drop Off badge, and then dropped me off at my office door. Then she turned around and drove all the way back across town and another hour and a half north on I-35 to meet her dad at the Dairy Queen for the baby transfer.
Then she turned around and came home, which put her back in town right around time for my lunch, and since she already had the badge she just came to the office, picked me up, and had me drop her off at home after lunch, so that she wouldn't have to do any more driving for the rest of the day. It was a pretty busy morning for her.
After work I continued my experiment with Madden-based elliptical exercise, and it proved a continuing success. Then I got cleaned up and took T-- out for a date night. We had Mexican at the new place right around the corner (Victor's Mexican Cafe where the old Boomerang Grill was), and it was not great. The prices were medium-high, service was slow and clumsy, and the salsa tasted like Chef Boyardee for some reason. The entree was delicious (we shared Tacos al Carbon), but not enough to make up for bad salsa. That's my primary criterion for any Mexican place.
Anyway, it wasn't terrible. Just disappointing. Then we went up to Barnes and Noble for a little shopping, stopped at Wal-Mart for some ice cream, and then went back home and watched InkHeart and The Pink Panther 2. The unapologetically stupid one was the better of the two.
Friday I had off for the holiday, so I got up late, worked out (and won my third preseason game in Madden), then we went over to K-- and N--'s for a delicious lunch. We brought croissants and they had chicken salad ready for sandwiches, and there was an American Flag themed brownie birthday cake for N--, and a fruit basket showed up for N--'s mom with perfect timing for all of us to enjoy. We were there for a couple hours, and then headed home to finish packing.
Then a little after three we headed to Wichita. We grabbed snowcones on the way out of town, and T-- was driving so I was able to read Click for an hour or so (I'll give more details at a later date, but no, it's not the novelisation of the Adam Sandler movie). Then, a little shy of halfway there, T-- started experiencing some Braxton-Hicks, which she hadn't had at all with AB. It was uncomfortable, but I think mostly it scared her. Either way, it was enough reason for her to pull over and I took over driving for the second half of the trip. She called N-- and got a prognosis over the phone, and called her mom to talk about it, and after that she felt a lot better.
When we got in the party was already going. The Charboneaus did their Fourth party on the third, because her brother Matt has to work tonight. John grilled out, and did chicken breasts, chicken wings, hot dogs, hamburgers, and a whole mess of stuffed jalapenos that were hugely popular. There was also potato salad and lots of chips and dip and a counterful of desserts. It was pretty awesome.
I got a little overwhelmed by the crowd, so I slipped away before the fireworks started. Went downstairs to check my email, and next thing I knew it was eleven o'clock and everybody was leaving.
This morning T-- and her parents took AB to a parade, and she loved it. Then we had chicken fajitas for lunch, and ribs are on the menu for tonight. I'm certainly going to be well-fed! In spite of the holiday we're looking forward to a pretty quiet Saturday, but tomorrow's going to be busy with birthday parties, so that's probably a good thing.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Journal Entry: July 2, 2009
I have spent much of the last week reading Courtney's blog from the archives. I hope she'll forgive the intrusion, but I've found it equal parts charming and inspiring. I liked reading her comments as a fellow writer enough that I went back to the beginning, and I've enjoyed reading her experiences as a missionary even more.
Yesterday I heard more bad news from Honda after I'd spewed a bit of my ire here (and some of it even made its way to Facebook). The upshot is that I won't have my car back until Monday, and it's probably going to cost me a thousand dollars. Yay.
I drove T--'s car home from work and had dinner with her and my sister's family at Swadley's, which remains just enough below Steve's Rib in quality, price, and service to justify the extra five mile drive. Alas.
Then T-- and AB went to VBS and I went to Wal-Mart to get some oil for the Saturn in the hopes it would survive its suddenly-pending trip to Wichita. I picked the girls up after church, put AB to bed (more than once), and then hooked up the XBox in my office so I could play some Madden while I worked out. It was probably the most swiftly-passing exercise session I can remember, although I missed out on the upper-body motion because I was holding the controller instead of the machine's flailing arms. Worth it, though.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
Yesterday I heard more bad news from Honda after I'd spewed a bit of my ire here (and some of it even made its way to Facebook). The upshot is that I won't have my car back until Monday, and it's probably going to cost me a thousand dollars. Yay.
I drove T--'s car home from work and had dinner with her and my sister's family at Swadley's, which remains just enough below Steve's Rib in quality, price, and service to justify the extra five mile drive. Alas.
Then T-- and AB went to VBS and I went to Wal-Mart to get some oil for the Saturn in the hopes it would survive its suddenly-pending trip to Wichita. I picked the girls up after church, put AB to bed (more than once), and then hooked up the XBox in my office so I could play some Madden while I worked out. It was probably the most swiftly-passing exercise session I can remember, although I missed out on the upper-body motion because I was holding the controller instead of the machine's flailing arms. Worth it, though.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Journal Entry: July 1, 2009
Monday morning I stayed home from work because I had no car. My plan was to take the day off, go pick up the car once my mechanic was done with it, and then proceed through the rest of my week as normal.
When I didn't hear back from the mechanic by ten, I decided to call in and get an update. Turned out he'd already given up on it, but hadn't gotten around to calling me. He said the problem wasn't mechanical, but was something electrical in the car's computer. For that, I'd have to take it to the dealer.
So I called the dealer and learned they couldn't do anything on it that day, but I made an appointment to drop it off Tuesday morning. Then I made sure T-- didn't need her car for the rest of the day, and I went in to work to try to salvage a few hours.
Monday evening I worked late, and then worked out when I got home. (I'm still doing that, two or three times a week, even though it doesn't always get recorded in my weeklong summaries.) After that it was time for supper, and after that T-- took AB to church for VBS. I stayed home and spent my writing time scanning in old material for future use.
Tuesday morning I woke up early and we all three loaded into the Saturn for a trip to the mechanic's, and then from there to the Honda dealership. T-- and AB waited in the car while I went inside to speak with the repairman. He told me that they would put the car through a mechanical diagnostics test -- check out the Freon level and pressure, check that the compressor was in good shape, check all the electrical fuses and relays, and then call me and tell me what needed to be done. The diagnostics would cost $90.
I told him I'd already paid another mechanic to diagnose the problem, and he'd done all of that and found nothing, and the problem was in the computer. I asked if they could just skip their diagnostics, since he'd described in detail exactly what had already been done, and just check out the computer. He told me no. I wasn't allowed to tell them how to do their job. They'd go through their normal process -- and I would pay for it -- or I could just take the car home with no air conditioner and multiple warning lights on my dash.
I left the car with them, but I wasn't happy about it. It was about 9:30 by then, but I couldn't go in to work because T-- needed the car to call on some clients, so we dropped AB off at my sister's place, T-- dropped me off at home to get a little work done (by which I mean a lot more scanning), and then T-- made her business calls, which took a little longer than expected. Around 11:30 she picked me up and we went together to pick up AB. I'd already agreed to have lunch with them, so we went to Schlotzky's and didn't get out of there until nearly 1:00. Then AB and T-- loaded into my sister's car so I could go straight to work from lunch, but five minutes after I got on the highway T-- called to tell me I'd taken her keys, and they had no way to get into the house.
So at that point I was looking at more than an hour of drive-time to get in less than three hours of work, so I just called the boss on my way home and told him I wasn't going to make it in. I stayed home with AB during her nap and T-- went out shopping with my sister.
Five o'clock came and went without a word from the mechanics, which meant another day without my car. A little after six K-- and N-- came over, along with N--'s mom who brought us a new bed for AB! T-- has already commented on it on Facebook, and I'm sure she'll have some cute pictures up on her blog before long. Anyway, the bed is a perfect princess bed, and after a week of trying to prep AB for the change (and her screaming, "No, no, no, I love my bed!") she immediately fell in love with it. K-- and I had barely finished putting it together when she came in the room, saw it, and her eyes just lit up. She divided most of the rest of the evening between screaming and laughing, and she fell asleep in it no problem.
So that was pretty fun.
After that T-- and I curled up on the couch in the living room and watched Better Off Ted and Jimmy Fallon, and had a pretty quiet night. Went to bed early, got up, and left T-- carless so I could get in a full day of work.
Oh! I did finally hear back from the Honda service guy around 1:00 today. I'd been without my car for a full day and now owed them nearly a hundred bucks for their time, but their crack technicians had come up with an answer. He said the problem wasn't mechanical, but was something electrical in the car's computer. They would get back to me when they knew exactly what.
Now, if you're following along, that's all stuff I knew fifty-three hours and ninety dollars ago, but at least Honda is caught up to speed now. I still haven't heard anything new, which means they haven't even started doing the actual repair work, so I'm running out of hope that I'll have the car back today.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
When I didn't hear back from the mechanic by ten, I decided to call in and get an update. Turned out he'd already given up on it, but hadn't gotten around to calling me. He said the problem wasn't mechanical, but was something electrical in the car's computer. For that, I'd have to take it to the dealer.
So I called the dealer and learned they couldn't do anything on it that day, but I made an appointment to drop it off Tuesday morning. Then I made sure T-- didn't need her car for the rest of the day, and I went in to work to try to salvage a few hours.
Monday evening I worked late, and then worked out when I got home. (I'm still doing that, two or three times a week, even though it doesn't always get recorded in my weeklong summaries.) After that it was time for supper, and after that T-- took AB to church for VBS. I stayed home and spent my writing time scanning in old material for future use.
Tuesday morning I woke up early and we all three loaded into the Saturn for a trip to the mechanic's, and then from there to the Honda dealership. T-- and AB waited in the car while I went inside to speak with the repairman. He told me that they would put the car through a mechanical diagnostics test -- check out the Freon level and pressure, check that the compressor was in good shape, check all the electrical fuses and relays, and then call me and tell me what needed to be done. The diagnostics would cost $90.
I told him I'd already paid another mechanic to diagnose the problem, and he'd done all of that and found nothing, and the problem was in the computer. I asked if they could just skip their diagnostics, since he'd described in detail exactly what had already been done, and just check out the computer. He told me no. I wasn't allowed to tell them how to do their job. They'd go through their normal process -- and I would pay for it -- or I could just take the car home with no air conditioner and multiple warning lights on my dash.
I left the car with them, but I wasn't happy about it. It was about 9:30 by then, but I couldn't go in to work because T-- needed the car to call on some clients, so we dropped AB off at my sister's place, T-- dropped me off at home to get a little work done (by which I mean a lot more scanning), and then T-- made her business calls, which took a little longer than expected. Around 11:30 she picked me up and we went together to pick up AB. I'd already agreed to have lunch with them, so we went to Schlotzky's and didn't get out of there until nearly 1:00. Then AB and T-- loaded into my sister's car so I could go straight to work from lunch, but five minutes after I got on the highway T-- called to tell me I'd taken her keys, and they had no way to get into the house.
So at that point I was looking at more than an hour of drive-time to get in less than three hours of work, so I just called the boss on my way home and told him I wasn't going to make it in. I stayed home with AB during her nap and T-- went out shopping with my sister.
Five o'clock came and went without a word from the mechanics, which meant another day without my car. A little after six K-- and N-- came over, along with N--'s mom who brought us a new bed for AB! T-- has already commented on it on Facebook, and I'm sure she'll have some cute pictures up on her blog before long. Anyway, the bed is a perfect princess bed, and after a week of trying to prep AB for the change (and her screaming, "No, no, no, I love my bed!") she immediately fell in love with it. K-- and I had barely finished putting it together when she came in the room, saw it, and her eyes just lit up. She divided most of the rest of the evening between screaming and laughing, and she fell asleep in it no problem.
So that was pretty fun.
After that T-- and I curled up on the couch in the living room and watched Better Off Ted and Jimmy Fallon, and had a pretty quiet night. Went to bed early, got up, and left T-- carless so I could get in a full day of work.
Oh! I did finally hear back from the Honda service guy around 1:00 today. I'd been without my car for a full day and now owed them nearly a hundred bucks for their time, but their crack technicians had come up with an answer. He said the problem wasn't mechanical, but was something electrical in the car's computer. They would get back to me when they knew exactly what.
Now, if you're following along, that's all stuff I knew fifty-three hours and ninety dollars ago, but at least Honda is caught up to speed now. I still haven't heard anything new, which means they haven't even started doing the actual repair work, so I'm running out of hope that I'll have the car back today.
Other than that, it's just things and stuff.
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