I Kinda Sorta Bought a Car This Weekend
I didn't mean to! But boy is it a doozy!
I got a letter on Thursday night from Saturn of OC that they needed pre-owned cars, and if I wanted to bring my (2003) car in they could give me a trade-in value to try to put me in a 2006 car. I figured I didn't have anything to lose since I wasn't really looking to trade, had no $ to put down and didn't HAVE to get a new car. [That is, sadly, a situation that I'’ve been in twice and it causes you to make desperate and stupid decisions.]
So I went in on Saturday, armed with the Kelley Blue Book values on my car ($7900-$8500) for trade-in. Well, darned if they didn't offer me well above blue book trade-in right off the bat! Payments were still too high, though, and I reminded them that I didn'’t *need* this deal, so they went back and worked on it some more. And then some more again when I reminded them that I was not going to pay anything down on a car I didn't need. Eventually they offered me even more on my trade-in, making my (2003) car worth more money than it would ever be worth again!
You know how cars depreciate each day that they are off a sales lot? Well my car was probably down to less than $8000 in value and they offered me well over that! How could I say no?! Particularly when they finagled all kinds of other dealies for me as an incentive since they really needed to move the 2006 cars!?!
On top of all of this, my 2003 car is apparently extremely desirable. It is a red coupe with spoiler, power doors and windows, CD player, and had been extremely loved by me. It did have some nasty scratches (stupid students) on the polymer panels on the sides, but they were apparently not deal-breakers. I really loved Ruby (the car), but this deal was too good to be true. The Boy and I had been discussing me getting a new car in a few years that would be a family-ish car (NOT a minivan) for long-term ownership. And here was the opportunity on a silver platter.
Having said all that, meet Garrison:
NOTE: I would upload the pictures, except that the wire that connects the camera to the computer is not in the camera case. I think it may be on the table at home. I will have to update with images later. Until then, just imagine how handsome he is.
Garrison is a 2006 Storm Gray Saturn VUE
He has chrome trim, roof rails, side curtain air bags, one free year of OnStar, a nifty stereo system, auxiliary jack for my MP3 player, heated front seats, power driver's seat, lumbar support for the driver, a digital compass and temperature readout in the rearview mirror and much, much more. Wowza! And he’s handsome as all get out, eh?
[sigh] I’m in love with the fella, what can I say?
Wherein I Whine a Bit and then Let You Play Dream Interpreter
Commence the Whining:
Hello there, my dear readers--if any remain...
As to the lack of post-age, I apologize but I'm going to be slammed at work thru...well, best case scenario, things MAY lighten up a bit in September. Seriously. Ugh.
As to the terrible outdatedness (is that a word?!) of my blog, I'm sorry. I haven't had time to go in and mess with the code to get rid of my countdown, update my colors, etc. Please note that we have dial-up at home (the last people in the industrialized world, methinks) so it's not going to happen anytime soon. There was discussion last night of possibly having DSL by September. To dream, perchance, to blog. Or something like that.
My goal is ultimately to unveil an actual website linked to a single blog.* The blog would be more general: a place where I can post knitting as well as life stuff; where I would have server access for posting pictures; a page for finished crafty things so people can look at them (if they are so inclined); and revised links to favorite things. It's an endeavor, and I'm probably going to have to pay actual cashola for it, but I am somewhat at a loss as to where to start. My html knowledge is mightily limited to what you see on this here blog.
Commence the fortune-telling based on the weird-o dream:
So this morning I dreamt that The Boy and I went to a camp kind of thing for adults. On the last night we had dinner with some non-couply types, including a girl who looked a lot like a girl that The Boy had a crush on in high school (I've seen her picture). We left camp and went to the movies. At the theatre I told The Boy that I felt bad that XXX girl (I can't remember her dream-name), didn't have a boyfriend or husband because she was so nice.
The Boy looked at me seriously and said, "I need to tell you something." (You can see that this is not going to be good because nothing good ever starts with "I need to tell you something"). Then he tells me that when I was at one of the camp activities during our week there, he had asked XXX girl out. On a date. I remember being absolutely gobsmacked and just staring at him.
He proceeded to tell me that they had just clicked and 'when you know, you know', so he was leaving me to be with her. I remember just saying to myself and him over and over, "You're going to leave your wife, someone you've known for four years, for a girl you've known less than a week??!!!
I remember just turning in circles round and round in the theatre, repeating the same refrain to myself over and over and getting progressively upset until I was sobbing. Finally I SCREAMED at the top of my lungs, "My husband is leaving me, his wife, someone he's known for four years, to be with a women he's known less than a week!!!" At this point I was clearly hysterical.
Then I woke up. And was I ever mad at The Boy!
I woke him up to tell him the dream, and do you know what comforting words my dearest, my one true love, the center of my world, said to me?
"That would never happen, honey. [beat] We don't camp."*The plan is to collapse the current two blogs into one because, let's face it, as bad as I am at updating this one, consider how awful it is for people that read both or just the other of my blogs.
Yeah, So We're Back and I Haven't Blogged. You Wann Make Somethin' of it?
We tied the knot
We got hitched
We each got a brand shiny new ball & chainWe had an amazing and fabulous wedding that managed to beat out any dreams and expectations I had. In fact, I have been having trouble finding adjectives beyond 'amazing', 'perfect' and 'wonderful' to describe it. I will begin to gradually post pictures as we get them to give my loyal readers (all two of you) some idea of how everything went. It really was ideal. Everything from the flowers, to the homily by the rector, to the reception facility were absolutely perfect (see, there I go again?). I don't want to bore anyone too much, so if you have any questions, let me know and I'm happy to respond. But it really was amazing. ;)
Our honeymoon was also great. As a refresher: we spent some time in London, and then joined a tour going from London, to Wales via Southeast England, to (Southern) Ireland via ferry, around Ireland via motorcoach, around the 'hotspots' of Ireland (Kilarney, Galway, Dublin, etc.), back across on the ferry, to Scotland, over to Edinburgh, and back down through England, ending in London. Sigh. What a perfect dream. Unfortunately that's what it feels like now. A dream. Although there are 1300 or so pictures on our camera to show that it really happened. And someday I'll caption all 1300 and share them here. We all know how good I am at getting things done right away. (Hahahaha)
And then we came home. And I've been sick for 2-1/2 weeks. The illness led to another educational and interesting meeting with the less-than-stellar doctor at the on-campus clinic of Whatsamatta U here that I've now seen 3x, each without success.
Here was her
really great and thoughtful diagnosis: "Well, it could be strep throat, but your throat doesn't really look red (post-throat culture, it wasn't). It could be mono, but your throat is not all pusy (sp?). Besides, we don't treat for mono anymore. It could be bronchitis. But we don't treat for that anymore. I don't think it's pneumonia. Your lungs sound okay. It's probably a really bad viral infection that you're just going to have to suffer through." Gee, thanks.
At one point I even got all teary-eyed because it had been almost two weeks at that point and I could barely swallow for the pain. And the hacking cough was making sleep a distant memory. So I begged for some kind of resolution. "You'll just have to live with it for now." Ah, the compassion!
So since returning from my life of leisure and queenly stardom, life has been alarmingly prosaic. Our apartment is a bona fide disaster area featuring stacks of shower gifts that I don't yet have room for; cat hair like you wouldn't believe (we're wading in the stuff); couch slipcovers that are dragging on the ground and only marginally
on the couches; and piles of discarded clothes--it's so much work to hang things up when the apartment feels like a good day in Hades.
The heat! Ugh. Give me back Ireland's temperate climate. Cool breezes, warm sun. Crazy things like, you know, nature. We don't really have that in Southern California, as it turns out. It must have been 125 degrees F in my apartment yesterday.
Sitting took energy and turned me into a sweaty lump. Ick!
On the upside, I never knew vacuuming could be like this! We got the Dyson DC-14 Animal with special attachments and filters for pet hair (since truthfully I am allergic to cats and should probably live in some kind of hermetically sealed environment). So yesterday, while The Boy was enjoying his third 12-hour shift as a
REAL MURSE, I assembled the Dyson and vacuumed the living room and bedroom. It's so smooth! What a joy to vacuum my home. That lovely, lovely machine practically purred its way around the apartment sucking up everything in its path. It's STRONG. So strong, in fact, that it sucked up things I wasn't really trying to suck up. Like coins and paperclips. And my sleep mask. And cat toys. And possibly a cat.
Since this vacuum cost so much that we can no longer afford even the
idea of children, I think that this Animal is now my baby. I shall call her Betsy. Maybe I should knit my vacuum a bib?
Okay. Enough babbling. I hope this makes up for not blogging for forever. Come back? Read my blog? LOVE ME?
