The Brick Is Dead...

*"Leaking head gasket". Not what you want to hear your mechanic say. Even worse than that is when they say it will take some time for them to work up an estimate of what the repair will cost you. This whole thing makes me quite unhappy. And slightly queasy. I don't want to shop for a new car. I don't want to be making a car payment. But, I don't want to write out a massive check to the mechanic. Talk about a lose/lose/lose situation. I need to find ouit what the projected lifespan of the engine would be if I just have them put it all back together. Now that I know about the problem, it makes it real hard for me to not disclose it if I want to trade the car in. And even if it does have <70K miles on it, I don't think the gasket issue would add anything to my trade-in value. But, if I keep driving it and the whole thing just explodes, that would really do bad things to my trade-in value. The really pissy part is that there is a TSB out on the gasket problem (it was a manufacturing issue), but since it's not safety related, the manufacturer isn't covering the repair. That sucks. And shopping for a car sucks. Even if you've got it narrowed down to a model or two. Blech. Just not sure what to do yet.

*Got to run out to F+F and pick up a leaf blower to replace the one of the folks that busted while I was using it. But, before I hand it over, I fully intend to test it out on my yard first. Get all those leaves out of the back yard and be done with it for the year. What a way to spend my day off. Wheeeee. I am SUCH a rock star.

*Supposed to go to court to be a witness Monday for a DUI case from 3 or 4 years ago. This is supposed to take up the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I think this will be at least the 4th time that I have gone over to Sycamore to participate in this case. But it's been rescheduled and postponed more times than I care to remember, and it's really starting to piss me off. I'd kinda like to head out of town on Monday, but I really can't do that if I have to be in court all day and then back again the next morning. To top it all off, I don't even remember the guy. Wouldn't know him if he walked up to me and poked me in the eye. So, if this nonsense ends up mucking up my week, I do think I shall be quite put out.

*Good to know that if nothing else can, Monty Python quotes can always be relied on to derail a forum thread.

*Who would have thought it would have taken me so long to find my freakin NIU diploma? And who would have thought of all the strange stuff that I would have found in the process of looking for that diploma? The tiny blue armadillo was a pretty strange find. I have no idea of the context under which it came into my possession. It's actually kinda cute, though. So, it found it's way into the studio with my other armadillos. The rose from 24 years ago I left where it was. Still not sure what the lesson I was supposed to learn from that situation was. All I know is that it's way too late for me to learn it.

*The Space Car doesn't have a jack for my iPod. WTF??

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