Author: The Jody

We just had a fire drill/false alarm. 2000 people schlepping out into the driving wind and rain. That was *awesome*! Next time, maybe there can be thunder and lightning and hail the size of baseballs!

Look, I have a long drive to work. 50 minutes or so. Today it is raining, and that means other people are going to park in the garage. I usually park in the garage not for the cover, but because it is the ONLY parking for people who work at my end of the building. We don’t have a ton of lots down at the far end of the building the way they do for the middle and other end. The garage is it for me. And other people who never park there take all the spaces.

So when I get behind some schmo going 5 to 10 MPH BELOW the speed limit for most of my commute…I can understand how road rage can make a person do something stupid. I so wanted to rear-end this guy at one point. The speed limit was 50 and he was doing 40. 40! I don’t care if it’s raining, 10 MPH below the speed limit should be cause for immediate arrest. The road was wet, not covered with ice and snow and dead skunks and potholes. It’s a long, straight road. If you are too afraid to drive your widdle Chevy Impala (bah!) closer to the speed limit, keep your fat butt at home. Some of us have someplace to get in the morning, and you are blocking the frigging road.

Grr.

(I wish NaNoWriMo had already started, because that guy would now be having the worst things happen to him on paper…)

Hey, I am very excited! We went to the Boston Museum of Science Halloween Party/Star Wars Exhibit preview and our family won second prize in the costume contest. Well, 2nd prize in the group category. We were, as I may have mentioned, Harry Potter’d up. Junior was KILLER as Harry, I was Hermoine after a growth spurt, and Mr. Dump was a Dementor. He was freaky scary looking with the mask. I believe the pictures they took of us will end up on the Museum’s web site.

I am thrilled we decided to dress “the same” this year, because that’s the only way we won. Not that Junior wasn’t a kick-butt Harry – I think he probably could have won a solo prize.

Here’s Junior standing with a few of his close friends. Some of the museum employee [Star Wars] costumes were KILLER. I assume the museum paid for them for the gala they had last night with George Lucas. That was $750 per person. We did not attend that party. Then again, my BIL probably would have given Mr. Lucas $750 worth of opinion on how he screwed up the franchise. So that would have been a good investment.

I am just full of despair. One of the big things I live for is the fall. I love everything about it…bringing out the sweaters, the smells, the apples, the pumpkins, mentally getting cozy. But the foliage…the foliage is just what makes New England a place I could never leave.

My favorite trees are the sugar maples because they turn fluorescent orange and red. I mean on FIRE. It’s an amazing sight.

Except this year.

Basically, the trees are going straight to brown. They stayed green about 2 weeks longer than usual, and then…nothing. Junior, Mr. Dump and I had to go to a thing up in New Hampshire this morning/early afternoon, and I was psyched to be able to just enjoy the view (as opposed to when I’m commuting, and I tend to keep my eyes on the road). But there was no view. There were yellow leaves, but they weren’t even that lovely bright yellow; they were more a mustard color.

I have the guy from San Francisco sitting next to me at work, and I have to explain to him that like the 9 straight days of rain he experienced his first 9 days here (“No, it’s not like Seattle here”) that the trees are usually so bright and colorful you need protective eyewear. He’s really going to think everything he’s heard about New England over the years was BS. *sigh*

My car, a 1992 Maxima with 105k miles on it (just a baby!) is acting up. And the local Nissan garage had it for 2 days, and because it didn’t act up when they had it on a test drive, they said it drove perfectly, and there were no issues that showed up on their computer. For all of this, and me not having a car for 2 days, they charged me $85. Now I understand that for someone to take the time to drive the car around waiting for it to act up is time that person could be fixing another car. But if you charge me $85, you’d better find something, y’know?

I even gave them a service bulletin from 1993 that seems to be describing the problem exactly. But they didn’t want to do the suggested repairs because they couldn’t confirm that anything was wrong with the car. There is something wrong with the car, and I am giving you permission to try this repair, knowing that it might not fix the problem but they still wouldn’t do it. So I’m out 85 bucks, didn’t have a car for 2 days, and the car was acting worse than ever this morning (you little poop, you knew it wasn’t the mechanic driving you!) and now I have to find someone else to fix it for me.

Thanks, Nissan dealership!