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Last month I was graced with the task of taking Chewy for his last car ride to the vet. It was not fun at all. In fact, I’m pretty sure his last moments were filled with discontent for someone who had loved him so much.

Chewy had an interesting beginning. His momma, a black lab,  was one of three dogs that my father took in from one of his acquaintances. I’m not sure if if was a known fact that Puppy-doo was in-tact, but it became apparent a few weeks after the neighbors German Shepard had paid her a visit. When Chewy was about six weeks old he was kicked out of the doghouse. Maybe he was a biter. Maybe he was the runt. I can not recall. But us kids somehow convinced our mom to let us keep him because someone had to love him.

Chewy, or Chewbacca, was the most well-behaved, well trained  dog we ever had. He wanted nothing more than to play - all the damn time. He’d chase balls, rocks, sticks, a frisbee or anything else he could fit into his mouth. Even when he was having trouble seeing and walking, he’d get excited whenever I rolled a tennis ball his way - immediately trying to get up and run for the door. And pats on the head. He loved being pet and hugged and just being talked to. The slightest bit of attention made him so happy, and there was never a shortage of attention for the Chewbug.

He loved car rides, and never took issue with the four-hour rides to Iowa or the cabin up north. Even though he was too fat to climb into the truck himself in later years, whenever any vehicle door was opened, he’d run over and put those two big paws on the running board and look back as if to say “lets go!” I was baffled at his love for car rides since he has such bad luck with cars as a little guy. He was in a terrible accident with myself and my brothers, and also got hit by a car not long after recovering.

He loved unconditionally and never failed to make me feel better if I was having a bad day. I’m really glad that I was able to spend nearly every day with him for the last two years. I think he was too.  No dog will ever take his place or be as special. Losing him was extremely tough because of the special bond we all had with him.  He was our special little guy.

Rest well my friend. I hope you know I was just doing what was best for you.

I am pleased to say that today, I tried something new. Brussels sprouts without cheese taste completely disgusting, and I will never do that again. Ever. I also attended church. But not just any church. A church with a rock band, cartoons and really comfortable chairs. It was more like a pep rally than church, if you discount all the scriptural musings by that young guy on stage…in jeans and a polo shirt. Wait, what? You don’t say…

My little nephew was being dedicated today, which is like a baptism without the holy water and repeats of promises and duties and all that. In fact, I’ve had it explained to me about five times now and still can’t correctly explain the difference between a dedication, a baptism and a christening. The dedication was short really.

“Do you promise to bring up this child all christian-like?”
“Yep”
“Sweet”

I noticed when I arrived at the church that I was over dressed. I had slacks and a nice sleeveless top on instead of my normal church attire of jeans and a clean t-shirt. Little did I know, I could have worn shorts and a t-shirt and still looked the part of your average church-goer this morning. This was the first sign that this place was a little different from any normal church. Instantly I liked this place. Back in my day, when I still went to church on a semi-regular basis, you had to dress in nice clothing to visit the house of the Lord. It was a sign of respect. But I personally feel that God doesn’t care what you wear as long as you pass on his good word and don’t kill anyone(however, I’m agnostic and don’t really belive in “God” anyway).

Then there was the music. It was catchy pop rock style God music. You could hear it from the parking lot, and it only got louder as you walked into the auditorium. Drummer, bass and lead guitar, several vocalists and projection screens with the lyrics. Good grief, it was almost a straight-up concert. The tunes were downright catchy too. I tried to have a bit of fun by clapping along in time and throwing in some jazz hands for good measure. My companions were none too appreciative of my having a good time. Perhaps they thought I was mocking the Christ concert. Who knows. I just wanted to enjoy myself as long as I was in church.

As far as sermons go, this one wasn’t too boring. The minister would read a passage then talk about how it relates to real life situations, often citing from his own family experiences. It wasn’t that the bible stories were hard to understand, but it was refreshing to hear only parts of a verse with some explanations fitted in, instead of straight bible reading, which can be dry and boring, followed by an hour of sermon.

I mentioned cartoons. There were a few pauses in the sermon for breaks(?) where they showed “commercials” on the projection screens. Todays theme of commercials was Real American Dad, since it is Fathers Day. They also played clips from Family Guy and the Simpson’s in there somewhere during a break. If they ever showed cartoon clips at my old church, whomever was responsible would surely be kicked out of the congregation for being so bold and creative. I had no complaints, other than I wish they would have shown a whole episode of one or the other. Showing Family Guy at church might almost be enough to make me start going again.

All in all it seems a pretty hip place, if you like attending church and believing in Jesus and miracles. They even put podcasts of the sermons online. It was a fairly relaxed atmosphere though, as they don’t pressure you into anything. Skip the communion and offering if you want. Or show up at the very end for muffins and juice. As someone had mentioned, it was like a hippy church. No pressure man, just do what you want, man. Don’t like getting up before 9am to make the service? Come in for the 10:30, or come by Saturday afternoon at 5PM so you can just sleep in on Sunday.

When I write entries for online communities, blogs or mainstream sites, I try to avoid digging too deeply into my personal life. This has done wonders for my anonymity. It has also prevented me from getting too close to some online personalities whom I would consider friends. For what it’s worth, I don’t mind being distant, but sometimes I feel the need to pour the contents of my brain onto the internet in the hopes that someone, somewhere, will have an idea what I’m going through. Not that I care to have millions of readers beating a path to my inbox with heartfelt wishes and sympathies. I just need to know that somebody is listening to me, just in case I need a body to stand with in hard times. This is one.

Lately I’ve been feeling a lot of guilt. Not for me, for my parents.

They have both lived hard lives and sacrificed everything for their children. We kids were all well taken care of and loved very much. We are still loved very much. The three of us kids have had to endure some hardships growing up in a poor-ish household, but food was always on the table, and Christmas and birthdays were never without gifts and trips to see relatives. A 40acre spread of land, horses, trips to go hunting, a cabin for summer holidays and a yard full of vehicles to drive. These are only a few examples of what we had available to us. Mom and Dad worked hard, full time jobs plus farming. If anyone deserves a medal for parents of the century, I’d vote them for reasons too numerous to mention. They. Are. Awesome.

So why the feeling of guilt? My mom and dad are getting up there in years, mid 50s now. When they should be worrying about saving up for retirement and long relaxing holidays, they are instead stressed with helping their children still, all of whom are in their 20s. This includes me. You see, all three of us are currently unemployed.

It’s hard waking up in the morning and dressing in five layers of clothing(it’s winter now) only to shuttle myself over to my dads junkyard for a days worth of hard work. I don’t get paid much, only what he can afford. He already had 2 guys on staff, and now my brother. Soon my sister. She just lost her job, my brother is jobless after his year in Iraq, and I lost my job in May. How did three children of such dedicated and hard working parents end up going nowhere?

I can only imagine my mother crying to herself at night and blaming herself for doing something wrong while we were kids. She is such a giving person, and she gave her all to help us succeed. We all had a run at college, none of us took to it well despite decent marks in highschool.

I imagine my father doing bills at night and wondering how he can afford to keep paying my brother and I out of his own earnings. He won’t say it, but I know it hurts his accounts. I’ve seen the bills, I know the score. He had nothing of his own, and now he is still giving us everything he has just so we can afford food and bills and rent. I love working with him and helping him out. I get to spend every day with my dad, it’s a child’s dream. But how much of that dream is his as well?

This all weighs heavy on my mind. As the oldest child I have to set the example. The only example I seemed to have set is how to lose a job and run up credit card bills like a pro. I am also the one who everyone will have to turn to when mom and dad need someone to depend on in their golden years. Me. I can’t even find a job or afford to pay for cat food most weeks. I already make sacrifices for myself like not eating meat for three weeks so I can buy a new video game for the DS.

I often wonder how many other people lie awake at night with thoughts similar to mine running through their heads. Thoughts like this often keep me awake for hours or lend themselves to restless nights.

It feels good to empty my mind for once. I don’t even care if no one is here “listening”.

You can’t take me anywhere.

Last night I had to attend my godfather’s funeral after work. Funerals generally make me uncomfortable, not because of dead bodies and sad people, but because I’m forced into a situation where I need to be polite and sympathetic to those I have seen sporadically for my whole life but can not remember names or why I know them. Occasionally I will walk into the funeral parlor and notice some faces and think Hey! I know that person AND remember their name, and then stick to his or her side until there is another face I recognize. This time I had my parents and sister with me so I had someone to talk to. That only meant I had to make a fool out of myself in a more creative fashion.

In less than thirty minutes of hanging around the mourning community I:

Every year I freak out on the third Tuesday of November. I have months to plan ahead and yet, the night before I am supposed to leave for five days in the north woods to be crammed into a one-room cabin with ten other people, I freak out. Like, badly. Where are my mittens, my long woolen socks? What did I do with my back tag? Does mom have it? Did I even remember to get one? Holy crap Lois, where are my boots? I scramble around my apartment like a fox in a hen house, searching for everything I should have packed up weeks in advance. Doing laundry and cursing the appliances because my favorite pajamas are not drying fast enough. Yes, hunting season came once again and as usual I was in no way ready to go harvest some deer.

My mother is always prepared, and I don’t know how she does it. I like to think that it’s because she has a nice house with plenty of closets for keeping things orderly and easy to find. The truth is, I just suck. I inherited my father’s ability to save like nobody’s business. We’re packrats, and damn fine ones at that. My mom is not. Well not really. Mom has some knick-knacks and such, but I’ll be she doesn’t have over 100 empty M&M wrappers in a Looney Toon tin. She keeps only what is necessary and will organize the hell out of it. The hunting jackets are always folded neatly into boxes and stacked in a corner of the basement. The boots are lined up according to size. Each year we go as a family to purchase back tags where she, promptly after paying, will tuck them in her purse and put them in a safe spot near the hunting clothes.

At the cabin my mom is like a drill sergeant. She wakes up early opening morning and cooks breakfast, puts on the coffee, heats up water for washing and sometimes will sort all the hunting gear before waking us from sweet dreamy dreamland. We’d take our turns scampering off to the outhouse while she and dad loaded up the guns and put aside extra ammunition. Hopping over one another to get dressed and warmed up, mom would shoo us out the door, wishing luck and happy hunting, sneaking a bit of candy into our pockets for mid-morning snacks. She’d get lunches ready and set them in the refrigerator so that the first one in for the afternoon only had to heat it up. Mom is cool like that.

This year was different for all of us. We all stayed at the spacious new three-bedroom, two bathroom cabin which the folks just purchased in February. But, mom did not go hunting. Instead she was home caring for my elderly grandmother and had left dad in charge. The clothes, jackets and boots were all stacked and ready, as were the back tags and bonus permits. She pre-cooked meals and froze them. Snacks and various other groceries had been purchased and ready to go. Everything one might need to survive for a week had been procured by her and shoved into a box. Even in her absence we were kept in order.

When it comes to hunting I never view it as the slaughter-fest that many people imagine. I don’t throw on the blaze orange camo gear and go rushing through the woods looking for Bambi. To me deer hunting has always been a combination of three things:

1. Vacation time! away from school/work
2. Time spent bonding with the family
3. A chance to visit one of my most favorite places on this earth

Hunting in and of itself is not cruel in my eyes. I do not sit in the woods and wait for a buck with a giant rack that would look gorgeously redneck hanging on my living room wall. No, no. Deer are delicious. A decent sized buck would keep me in venison for months, leaving plenty of money for M&Ms since I wouldn’t have to buy as much meat! Fortunately for the deer I don’t enjoy sitting in the snow and cold waiting for something to shoot at. I’m a wuss. I’ll get decked out and go to my stand only to fall asleep or give up after two hours and come in for some cocoa and another nap.

The season came and went as it does each November, and I came home empty-handed like I do each year. After thirteen years I still question myself… Why do I bother anymore? Then I remember reason number one.

When I was seven, I was thankful for Mark because he had fishlips. That was 1985. Twenty years later I am still searching for something unique, positive and genuine to be thankful for. When I’m sitting at the grown-up table all smug and confident(take THAT, children’s table!), I want to be prepared for the round table discussion of what I am thankful for this year. I could choose the usual items like health, family or friends. All novel choices mind you, but like with New Year resolutions, I prefer to make a choice personal to me, and not have the same answer as 95% of the population.

I recently took a vacation. Truth! I went up north again for five days of laziness and deprogramming. Work has been rough lately and I needed to get away. The timing of deer hunting season was perfect. For five days I was hundreds of miles away from stress. Hundreds of miles away from the whale. Away from the cats! I spent more time sleeping and napping than I did awake and alert. Every chance I got to sneak off to a quiet room of the cabin for some sleep, I seized it. I didn’t last too long as far as hunting was concerned. It was cold, I liked my naps. I didn’t miss much, no one saw any deer all weekend.

The chilling air was no match for the beautiful scenery that was all around me. The air was pure, the trees stood like match sticks, barren now that the snow has fallen and knocked the last of the leaves from their grasp. Pine trees were heavily laden with wet snow, boughs bent in arcs toward the ground. Everywhere around me the ground glistened as sunlight bounced off the snowy cover.

I had the opportunity to travel over to the old cabin on the river and spend some time taking a jog down memory lane. So many summers spent in the Tomahawk River, tubing and splashing around. Hours wasted running through the established deer paths in the woods between our cabin and the Beckley’s - before the other properties had become built up. The towering pines across the river were empty, lonely. No majestic eagles had perched in their branches for years. Life had changed. Not necessarily for the worse, but the memories are now tainted with a touch of sadness and longing for everything to be as it once was.

I know what I am thankful for this year. As I sit at the adults table waiting for my turn, a smile will form across my lips and a warm feeling will fill my heart. I will probably fidget with my fork, pushing the kernels of sweet corn into my mashed-potato volcano, complete with lava made from gravy. When all eyes fall on me I will put the fork down and calmly recite the lines I will have gone over in my head several times.

What are you thankful for this year?

I am thankful for having serene places to retreat to when my life appears to be stumbling down a dark hallway filled with obstacles. I am easily overwhelmed with many aspects of my life right now, and nothing is more appreciated than peace and quiet in familiar and beautiful surroundings.

So tired. So very tired. I’m mentally and physically drained. I have nothing left to give and yet, we’re rounding that corner into the time of year when it’s all about giving and being charitable. Thank god I have a week off later this month. I need it!

Last week I was guilted into taking a day of vacation from work by my father. Maybe guilted isn’t the right word…more like convinced that it would be a good idea. I’m not one to turn down taking a vacation day. I hate my job! SO instead of getting to work late, sluffing off for 9 hours, and getting home late as per usual, I went on an adventure to Hick Town Iowa. Like a super hero swooping in to save a damsel in distress, I went to Iowa to pick up my grandmother from the nursing home and get her back to Wisconsin all in the matter of a day…

But wait, before I left on the four hour journey through valleys and over rivers, I had to make an emergency run to the vet! Captain Murphy was neutered on Monday and had pulled a stitch or something, so I had to run him in at 7:30AM(thanks a lot Murph!). Turns out he was fine, and I got up extra early for nothing.

Now, it was windy, and gloomish, and there was a bit of traffic all the way to Iowa. The trip seemed to take forever because the scenery was all the same - corn fields and silo’s. We stopped only once for a bite to eat at Hardee’s and made it to the nursing home by 1:30PM. Dad and I chatted with the administrator and rehab therapist concerning grandma before whisking her away, three blocks down the road to her house. I was dumped off with grandma to pack up belongings while dad went to run some errands.

My grandmother has a LOT of clothes in her closets. Seriously. There were some dresses hanging up that probably haven’t seen daylight since 1972. It’s a vintage goldmine. It was also very dusty. Now don’t get me wrong, I didn’t rummage through all her belongings. I had to dig through a lot of drawers and hanging clothing to find enough wearables to pack and take back home. With four sets of closets among all the bedrooms, and three chests of clothing, it shouldn’t have been too hard to locate enough tops and bottoms. At one point my grandmother called out asking if I had stopped to take a nap! No, I assured her, I’m just trying to find you some clubbing gear for the weekend.

It was kind of weird to be in her room. For 27 years I had visited my grandparents and never stepped foot in that bedroom. I had no need, but yet I had always wanted to see what treasures were hidden inside. Often times grandma would sit us down in the living room, walk back to her bedroom, and emerge a few minutes later with some cool family heirloom for us to see and hear a story about. I didn’t look for these mystical objects of awesomeness. I went back to work gathering her things and cleaning out the fridge and watering her dying plants.

Eventually dad came back and we loaded up the truck with all essential belongings. Somehow he got us all home in three hours, which is amazing considering he never once got everyone to or from Iowa in less than four hours. All those wasted hours on family trips crammed uncomfortably in the back seat with siblings and luggage. I know now that it was all a part of a master plan to make us miserable. Thanks dad. Since her arrival I’ve been helping my folks out when possible. Last weekend I spent a few hours of my Saturday afternoon watching grandma and keeping her company. I brought along the little ones and she really seemed to enjoy them. Mushkin sat so nicely while grandma pet her. Pixel was a little more rambunctious. They ran around moms house and chased after Chewy. He didn’t appreciate it much but was such a good sport about everything. Buddy and Dipper were skittish to say the least.

The rest of my daily routine is the same.
Wake up
Feed cats
Shower
Go to work
Feed cats
Clean and do laundry
Eat
Feed cats
Sleep
Sometimes I make time for errands and watching tv or playing WoW.

Speaking of the kittens, they are doing remarkably well and growing like weeds. They have at least doubled in size and are causing twice as much damage. I’m trying to wean them off the bottle but like a true alcoholic, they like the sauce. My hands and legs are marked with scratches of love. The whole “leg is a climbing post” and “hands are toys” habits are proving hard to break but it had better stop soon or I’ll have no skin left to pock up. Bless them though, freaking adorable. Just adorable. I will spoil them until my sister can take them, rest assured.

Hmm…what else. My sister had a birthday on the 2nd. She’s 22 now(I think). My brother is now a decorated serviceman. He received a medal for his work in NOLA after hurricane Katrina. I got into a fight with everyone’s favorite whale. It’s cold outside. Chocolate covered cranberries are better than chocolate covered raisins. It’s a fact.

My father and I went up north for the weekend again. I went to relax after a hard week at work and he went for the turkey hunting. It was absolutely gorgeous up there. The weather hit 80 degrees by ten AM and not a single cloud was to be found in the bright blue expanse of sky. We got up early Saturday and went for breakfast. While dad putzed around unloading frames for the garage, I decided to prune one of the many pines along the driveway. I got all full of sap and wood shavings. Nothing like getting a little dirty to bring a smile to my face. hindsight and all, I should really have worn gloves. Sap is a pain to remove from the skin.

After changing into some clean clothes and scrubbing a multitude of layers from my hands, I was rid of enough sticky sap to take a little walk with the camera into the woodsy property across the street to watch the leaves fall. It was gorgeous scenery, and I only wish my camera could have done the autumn colors some justice. They were so vivid and amazing. I’ve never seen so many color combinations before. Bright pinks, deep reds, maroon and even blaze orange. Traipsing over fallen trees and rocks, I tried not to fall flat on my face while taking in all the scenery. Some photos turned out alright, others were less than impressive, imho. On my way out of the trees, I stopped to tie my shoes and saw a flock of turkeys crossing out of our yard into the woods! Boy, dad missed the boat on that one.

After lunch I took a nap, which I was rudely awakened from by my father. The turkeys I had seen earlier were now sitting beneath the pines maybe 100 feet off the deck. He was so excited. He carefully moved outside onto the deck so as not to scare the birds. Raised the rifle and sighted them in, sure to get a perfect shot. Just as he was ready to fire, the cell phone in his pocket went off. Naturally startled he shot, the birds took off, he fired two more shots, and only got a tree branch. What a disappointment. He was sooo gonna get a turkey.

Sunday morning I was shook out of bed early so that we could go to breakfast with a family friend. I was sitting there in my pajamas watching infomercials on the one tv station, and dad was going to head out and check on some things in the yard. Jokingly he said I may as well go out today and fire off three shots and have just as much luck as yesterday. He walked out the door, and no sooner had it shut and he came running back in.

Dad: I don’t believe it!
Windy: huh?
Dad: Those turkeys came back!
Windy: pfft, sure dad.
Dad: No, look. They are right outside your bedroom window.

We both went in my room and peered out at the foul from behind the mini-blinds. Sure enough they were all there, just chilling in the yard eating bugs or something. I asked if he was going to try and get one again and he said no. Instead we watched them work their way all around the front and side yards for about 20 minutes.

You’ve been spared for now, turkeys, but hunting season is open until November so watch out. Next trip dad is leaving his cell phone in the house.

It seems that some readers were shocked to learn that, in my last entry, I mentioned that I had a little fun whilst shopping for clothes and even *gasp* pay mild attention to fashion trends. You, the faint of heart, take a deep breath before reading this post.

My trips to Chicago are becoming a regular event once again, and that pleases me. As much as I fear and loathe big cities, I love to visit them. I used to make the long trek to Schaumberg once a month and make a day of it, wandering around, trying new restaurants, looking in all the little store fronts for new and exciting gizmo’s like ecospheres that I couldn’t find back home. Those were the days of carefree spending and low cost tolls. These days my spending limits are smidge(ok, a lot) more conservative and the tollways have doubled in price.

You may recall my past trips to Lush on the bustling trendy strip of Armitage Avenue just outside Chicago proper. Each time I venture out I seem to collect more passengers which makes it that much more of an adventure. My sister is no stranger to the greater Chicago and Schaumberg areas, not unlike myself. My mother and newcomer to the trip, Aunt J., have not had the time, or perhaps the desire to go wandering around in a strange city filled with many strange people. It seems as though both had a good time and again, that pleases me. I’m not a girly girl and I don’t really like doing girly things, but a girls day out with the family females appears to be a great way to spend time together and relax. Unlike the Thanksgiving Day sales where we’re out shopping with a vengeance, snatching up garlands and Christmas decorations like they’re going out of style(Not me of course, I go along to watch the others scurry and fidget).

The trip itinerary went as follows:

Parallel Park closer than 2 miles away from Lush

Spend lots of rainy day money at Lush

Keep my sister under budget at the Container Store

Eat lunch at the California Pizza Kitchen

The four of us piled into my car after making sure there was adequate space in the trunk for bringing back lots of goodies. Armed with change for the toll booths and credit cards, we set off for Chicago. Not 20 minutes into the drive we hit a torrential downpour on the freeway. I’m talking major buckets of water being thrown every which way at the car. It was almost impossible to see for at least 10 minutes of it, going at speeds no higher than 40 and squinting to find tail lights ahead of me and the yellow barrier line to my left. Luckily we made it out safely and continued on our way. Other than a bit of traffic and slow motion toll booths, the ride was pretty smooth all the way to Lush. My sister documented everything with my camera like the last trip.

I turned onto the familiar block, passing large brick homes while searching for parking spots. Once again it was like Goldilocks and the three bears. Too small, too close to a dumpster, too many people watching. On the next block I spotted an open space on the left(it’s a one way street) and went for it. I nailed it perfectly. Pulled in, backed up, pulled out, back in with equal spacing between the cars ahead and behind. Why couldn’t I do that on my driving test when I was 16!

Ahhh, fun money. After several months of saving, I generally have enough to splurge like hell. Which I do. At Lush. I have a friend to thank for my obsession. He got me hooked on a particular soap, and now when I go back for more, I come home with so many new products. It’s not unlikely that I will spend $40-70 dollars on one trip to the store. Bath bombs of every scent, soaps in every color and organic preference, shampoo that comes in a brick of crumblies. I kept my spending low on this trip because i have a feeling I’ll be back picking up some Christmas gifts. I spent a great deal of time enjoying the scents and smells of all the new products, and playing with the new bath jellies. They smelled so good and had the look and feel of Jell-O gelatin.

One new product that I picked up was a Candy Fluff dusting powder. I put a little on my wrist for mom and Aunt J to smell and both got some powder on their noses. Oh man, I wanted to keep that to myself but I couldn’t. It looked like they were doing lines in the back room so I motioned for them to wipe it off. Plus, I remember how upset mom got over glitter the last time - which my sister and I immediately tried to recreate by playing with the massage bars the moment we walked in.

We took the long way back to the car passing up several shops and beautiful buildings. I stopped at my car to admire the parking job once again, but the drizzle was coming so I decided we best move on.

I’m not a huge fan of the Container Store, but my sister would love to live there. I’d be all over a shelf store if there were one. The best part of the container store is looking at all the crazy things people will purchase in an attempt to better organize their homes and offices. A lot of what this store sells will actually create more clutter, just in an organized fashion. While bopping around the photo-box aisle, I heard what sounded like a subway train. Knowing there were no over passes I looked out the window and saw sheets of rain coming down. I told everyone If you don’t have rain gear you’re buying a plastic bucket or something because we’re walking to the Pizza place. We conveniently stretched out the shopping until the rain had cleared up and then checked out. I bought some Christmas wrapping organizer thing(similar to this) and kept my sister under her allowed spending budget. Yay!

The California Pizza Kitchen was fabulous. All four of us got a different flavored pizza. And while my aunt seemed to miss the concept of spiffy new kinds of pizza toppings, she did like what she ordered. She’s just particular is all. I’ve been talking about going to CPK since our last trip, once I discovered it was just down the block from the Container store. It turned out to be a hit too! Lunch took about an hour, and after refueling everyone was ready for more shopping, but where? We only had two stores on the itinerary. My sister, the attentive shopper that she is, remembered that there was a World Market shop next to the Container store. We practically parked in its parking lot.

The funny thing about World Market is that both my mother and Aunt seemed to really enjoy it and didn’t even know that we had a store back home. Silly ladies. It is a great store to poke around and find cool things like asian inspired dinnerware, candies from all over the world, paper lanterns and a wine for any and every occasion. I spotted a few things that will be great for Christmas gifts, but I didn’t want to haul them home. I’ll just go next week or something and buy it all up.

The shopping completely wore me out but not as much as the drive home. It rained like hell for a good portion of the time. Luckily I had the tail lights and yellow line to follow again. If there is anything I learned this trip, its that I definitely hate driving in pouring rain during daylight. Just not something I’d recommend.

“Aug 16 2005, 12:43 PM
my car, the 300m, is broke….AGAIN. it never ends.”

I wrote that three weeks ago in a venting thread on one of the forums. Three weeks have gone by and my car still refused to start as of Sunday. It’s a stubborn piece of crap.

Last Thursday night some yahoo hit my garage on the corner, bending the frame of the door inward about 20 degrees and rendering the door inoperable. Nothing too major, but with some hammering, maintenance was able to open the door enough for me to push the car out, as they were in need of the empty garage in case major repairs were necessary.

We see an interesting trend continuing here. Car and garage, doomed to fail. The car, since I purchased it in 1999 has been crap. The garage door, since I moved in back in December 1999 has been crap. This is the first time, however, that both have decided to cause trouble at the same time. For once, I must admit, the garage issue was obviously caused by someone who shouldn’t be allowed to drive a two ton pick-up truck if he can’t see a building 15 feet behind him.

My car on the other hand is just a piece of work. Bless my father, he probably regrets becoming a mechanic after the previous three months. We all but pulled our hair out over the drama-fest with the Aurora(bad fuel pump), but who knows the deal with the 300m. It ran fine on the 15th last month, but when I went to start it the morning of the 16th, I got nothing. It tried to turn over and failed. Several times over the next three weeks it did something different on almost every start attempt. Sometimes I could start it, and it would idle rough, shaking the whole car body. Another time it started, then was about to idle out and caught itself in time to churn the engine over a few more times before sputtering out. Quite a few times I got the “rurrr rurrrr rurrrr rurrrr” of a turn-over attempt. I gave up after a week and a half of trying. Last Friday I gave it another go before having to push it out of the garage(driving is easier, its a heavy car!). Nothing. Sunday I double checked fluid levels just to be on the safe side, everything was in order. I tried starting it one last time, and I swear it sounded like metal was being tossed around inside. The engine started but was knocking something fierce. I turned it off quickly for fear of it exploding.

My father had a spare moment to swing by with the tow truck this morning and drag the heap over to his place to work on later.

“Hey daughter” “Hi dad”

“Did you put oil in your car recently?”

“Umm no. I told you Sunday it had plenty in when I checked it. Why, something wrong?”

“No. Well, I got your car off the truck and started her up and she ran just fine. Drove it around for a few minutes and everything”

“….”, speechless I was.”You did what??”

“I don’t know what to tell you, it was running fine”

“Don’t tell me it’s running fine Dad.” I whined in a frustrated tone. “Oh that stupid car, I SWEAR it wouldn’t start, honest! Three weeks!”

He proceeded to ask me what sounds it made when I tried starting it before, and I obliged him with my clunk’s and rurrr’s while office mates giggled at me.

“I’ll hook the meter up to it later this afternoon and see what is says.” he assured me.

“Ok Dad.”

“I’ll give it an oil change too and we’ll see if that helps”

“Ok Dad. Thanks.”

I honestly don’t know what to say about my car. It’s posessed or something. Just like every other time, it runs great when Dad looks at it. It gets quite frustrating. I think I’m going to do some research this week on lemon laws and their statute of limitations. My complaints have been logged in the past and my service history is quite extensive. I’m hoping my father can get things figured out for now, but I’m to the point now where I’d like to send it along to the recyclery with his next load of scrap.