opabinia

Yesterday I skipped my workout, because my right knee was achey. Feels perfectly fine today -- maybe it was the weather, or maybe I slept on it funny.

There are chocolate chip Pop Tarts instead of low-fat animal crackers in the vending machine now. That's why everybody's fat, you guys. They're making us fat. Whom do we sue? At least when you find a chicken head in your nuggets, the answer is clear.

It looks like all the Buick Grand Nationals come out in the fall. Cold, dry air complements a turbocharger nicely, I guess. I've seen three in the past week.

Work is picking up, in a comfortable way. My mentor is pleased with my m4d ph47 c311 cu17ur3 s>|1llz. I haven't had trouble getting in on time, either. It's nice to feel motivated enough to respond to the alarm clock.

I'm calling the fuckers at the Sentry Lincoln Mercury of Medford body shop right now. They've had the Civic for what -- three weeks now?

I got voicemail. I think they're afraid of me. I left a mild yet slightly grumpy message.

The pathologists disagree with the doctor. They found Ductal Carcinoma In Situ (DCIS) at the margins of the explant. No biggie -- it's a very non-scary cancer, as those go, but shit... My poor mom. Anyway, all they have to do is go in and remove more tissue, to get the entire DCIS out. I doubt she'll need radio.

The Buick sold on Ebay. I have taken a crippling loss. Some guy from Brooklyn is coming to pick it up on Saturday. He speaks thick Brooklynese, but in a pleasant sort of way. I'll imagine that he desperately needed a car, and that he is even broker than me, and see if that makes me feel any better about throwing out $2400 and 11 months.

***

Job fair tomorrow. Visiting a friend/potential business associate in Texas sometime in the future, when I have time and cash. One of our competent medical fellows knows someone big at Invitrogen, and they're passing my resume to them along with all manner of outlandish compliments.

I loathe The Doors.

Somebody has promised to buy the Buick! Now I can actually buy a used 180-gallon tank when I see one, and not a moment too soon: Last night, I had a terrible dream that Fluffy had jumped out of her house and shriveled up on the floor. Oh, I felt awful when I woke up. She's doing fine -- I checked.

Shout-out to Shell Car Care in Arlington.

I take it back. The fuel filler pipe emerges behind the license plate on this (and many other GM) vehicles. The plate swings out on springs to allow access to the filler cap. Some pinhead installed the tank so that the filler tube sticks out too far, and the license plate cannot be re-seated -- it sticks out at an angle, resting against the edge of the filler cap, under tension from the springs. How anyone could do such a shitty job and not notice is beyond me, so I assume they noticed and didn't care. I brought the car back and left a note. Let's see if they get it right the second time around.

People suck.

Work's boring.

If I had seventeen million dollars right now, I'd go home and take a nap.

I., the Cake-Inhaling Romanian Doctor, broke her toe running for the phone.

I am frequently plagued by a deep-running desire to have my Buick NOW. That's the second thing I'd do if I had seventeem million dollars. No, the third. I'd call my parents second. First, the nap.

I'm reading a book entitled What Should I Do with My Life?

When you approach a new hobby, there's a nasty learning curve, and it's hard to learn anything because you don't know anything to begin with -- like the vocabulary. You also spend lots of time floundering about looking for simple bits of information that are practically intuitive to those in the know. You lack a tech support network, and you also lack a source of encouragement and kindred enthusiasm for whatever silly project you've become interested in.

I think the phone call I got five minutes ago represents the end of that stage in ( buick_project. )

Do I know anyone I can borrow a pickup truck, SUV, or big station wagon from? For a 5-hour drive (each way)? To pick up and transport a very big, heavy car part?

I'm going to put buick_project updates behind cuts in this journal. Logging in and out of separate journals is cumbersome.

The first few entries are here.

( There's more here. )

Making a car is hard. I'm all frustrated.

I had a whole month to move, and suddenly I only have a few days. Craaap! The Fluffy project will be delayed. Getting my belongings to Arlington is Priority One.

The Buick got plates today, so now it can legally move under its own power. The next hurdle is getting the piece of shit to start. I think it needs a battery. I'm glad people said "Join AAA" enough times that it finally penetrated my thick cranium.

Ender's Game, by the way, was phenomenal. That, The Forever War, and Armor cover something that really affects me, but I'm not telling what it is.

Okay okay fine. It's that feeling you get when you just want to lay down and let everything do whatever it's going to do to you, what it would do anyway if you resisted as much as possible, so you may as well give up. You know you're worth more than the air you breathe, but you haven't figured out a way to make it actually benefit you, and so you just sit there, and life coasts on past you, occasionally slapping you in the balls just because.

But really, I'm a cheery kinda guy, these days. Those books just dredge up some dark shit, that's all.