Tag: Cars

Yet Another Question About Risks

Daily writing prompt
When is the last time you took a risk? How did it work out?
View all responses

Okay folks… let’s change the subject. I’m tired of sharing stories about past risks. Enough.

You take a chance getting up in the morning, crossing the street, or sticking your face in a fan.

Frank Drebin: The Naked Gun

Last night I took a risk. I was in Foxborough and I needed to drive home to Methuen. It was 9:00pm. There should not have been any traffic. I had three choices for the drive home. 95 South to 495 North to 93 North, 95 North to 128 North to 93 North, or 95 North to 93 North. The last option includes driving through Boston. At normal times of day that would be the last option I would ever take. Boston is a traffic nightmare. At rush hour I would take the route 495 option. It’s by far the longest, but by far the less likely to have an ugly traffic jam so the time on the road isn’t so bad. More often than not I would take the route 128 option. It can have some nasty traffic in places but it’s way better than going through the city.

Last night it was hours after rush hour. It was pretty late at night. Boston should not have been a problem. Even though I almost never choose to go through Boston, that was the option I picked…

and I got stuck in construction traffic that added half an hour onto my drive. Instead of getting home at 10:00pm, I got home at 10:30.

MuthaPussBucket!

It was a risk… and it bit me on the ass. Stupid risk.

Now, can we stop having daily writing prompts asking about taking risks for a while? It’s repetitive and it’s getting BORING.

Thank you, good night.

Less Than Nine Hours to Go

It’s just after 8:30am on the Friday before Labor Day weekend and I haven’t punched in to work yet. I had a few things to do first. I went with Harry to the garage to drop off his rental car and pick up his car. It’s all set and it looks as good as new. He just left to go back to Burlington. He’s going to miss his first class this morning, but that’s about the only downside to this visit. All is well again.

I’m less than nine hours away from a three day weekend. I just finished season 11 of the new Doctor Who. I have 20 episodes over two seasons left to go and then I’ll be all caught up. I’m on episode 17 of season seven of the original show. Eight episodes left in this season and something like 2346123472572 episodes left in the full series. I don’t expect to finish either series this weekend, but I can pretty much guarantee I’ll be done with the new show in a week or so which means I will be 100% caught up before the next episode airs in November.

What about the music project? I have 27 songs finished and 39 total in progress. I have four more songs ready to mix and I hope to crank them all out tonight. I have 30 days left, including today, and a ton of work still to go, but I think I am more or less on pace to finish on time. I’ll have a few days at Disney World where it will be tough to make progress, but I think I will be okay. I should note that even though I took over two weeks off in August, I still managed to finish an RPM Challenge Rules album in a month as I started and finished 12 songs within the calendar month. I started and finished 10 in July too. In order to hit 50 songs over all I will need to start and finish 11 songs in September. Three album in a months in a row isn’t a bad place to be. I think once this project is finished I will try to get back into the last re-recording project which has been left hanging for a little more than a year now.

I mentioned in the last post that my stomach has been a little less than 100% this morning. I had some trouble with water early on and had to deal with a minor bout of The Foamies after taking my vitamins. I only got eight ounces of water in during my exercise, but afterwards I was okay for breakfast and I am feeling much better now. I’ve managed another eight ounces since I came home from Harry’s auto shop. I think we’re back on track today. I might have a hamburger on the grill for lunch today. We’ll see how it goes.

Okay, it’s 8:50am now and I have to be punched into work by 9:00. I think I’ll hit publish on this masterpiece of an update and get my work day started. Lots to do today, lots to do. Eight hours and 40 minutes to go until the long weekend.

You can do it, Robbie! You can do it!

Crazy Thursday

What a nutty kinda day it’s been. Sheesh.

My step son Harry is home from Vermont right now because his car is in the shop and he needed to go to a mechanic near us because he couldn’t get one near his home without having to wait for a month or two. He needs to head back to Vermont tonight, but his car isn’t going to be ready until next week.

He went through his insurance claim (long story that you will not get details on) to get a rental for the next week. At lunch today I drove him to the rental car place to pick up his temp-ride. They told him they needed to call the insurance company to verify our plan will cover the rental because he is under age. The rental agent called them and found their entire system was down. They couldn’t look up our (or anyone’s) policy.

Harry offered to stay at the rental place until it was worked out so that I could go home and get back to work. Fortunately by around 2:40 or so the insurance system issues were cleared up and he was able to drive off in his rental car. All worked out for the best eventually, but talk about annoying!

On an unrelated, less serious, but still annoying note, at around 9:30-10:00 or so this morning both cats snuck their way into the cellar. Both of them! After an hour or so I was able to coax Lily back upstairs but Robin wanted nothing to do with it. A short while later I was trying to bribe Robin upstairs with some treats and Lily ran past me and went back down stairs again! FFFFUUUU!!!! That was just before we had to go to the rental agency!

When I got home I expected them both to be sitting on the stairs waiting for the door to open. Nope. Neither of them were. I got Robin upstairs soon enough, and by 2:00 I had them both upstairs. They both tried to eat a plant, one of them knocked over a box full of guitar gear, they got into just about everything down here. There are so many places for a cat to hide, I was unable to find them on my own. I also had to trip a few mouse traps, just in case they stumbled across them. What a couple of feline jerks, right? Bad kitties!

They are upstairs now though so they are good kitties once again. Still… sheesh!

Okay. Back to work. I have a meeting in nine minutes. Here’s hoping the zaniness is done for the day. I need a nap!

They’ve Left for the Week

Well, the kids have gone back to their dad’s for the week. They’ll come back for our family christmas eve thing and stay over for christmas morning. I am sad that they’re gone, and even more sad that I was in a meeting when they left and couldn’t run upstairs to say goodbye. Blah to my bad timing.

The kids leaving is also the official start of Jen and I being a one car household. The Mazda has been transferred to Bellana. It’s her car now. That leaves us with our Kia hybrid and… that’s it. Tomorrow will be the first day that the single car thing gets weird. I have to go into the office for at least half of the work day. That means Jen will be at home and the only car will be 40 miles away. There will also be a day next month when we both have to go into the office. We’ve carpooled before, but never with us working in the buildings we currently work in. I expect I will drop her off at her office on the way to mine, mostly because mine is further away.

I expect we’ll replace the car sometime after the weather improves. Maybe in the early spring. I’d like to get another hybrid. Really, I’d like to get an electric car, but that’s out of our budget. We might be able to handle a second hybrid, but it will be okay if we go with something else. I’m down for another Nissan Altima. I really loved that car. Or maybe a Buick Le Sabre. I had one of those and really loved it too. Then again, the closest I’ve ever come to having a truly bad ass set of wheels was a 1982 Thunderbird. I could go for another T-Bird. Heh, yeah right.

I miss the kids. We’re going to order some Japanese take out for dinner to try and cheer ourselves up. Sign me up for some Sashimi.

Oil Light Blues

Remember the posts over the last couple of days where I wrote about transferring one of our cars to Bellana and how I was getting all of the routine maintenance done first so that it would be in good shape for her?

Last night we took that car our for a drive around town to look at xmas lights. The oil pressure light came on.

What the ever loving fuck?

I’m going to bring it back to Valvoline this morning and ask them exactly that question. If they don’t see anything wrong I’m going to bring it to the dealer, though Lowell is a long drive with an oil light on.

Shit.

Busy Morning

The snow came early. It was supposed to switch from rain to snow by 9:00am or so. At least that’s what weather.com told me last night. When I got out of bed at 5:30 it was already snowing. Not a lot, but enough to cover everything.

I did my fake running and tried to have a shake for breakfast (and failed, see the previous post). Then I cleaned off the cars and took the Mazda for an oil change. It went a lot faster than I expected so I drove to Lowell for my 9:30 appointment at the Mazda dealer (a recall that involves a software update) and stopped to snap a few film shots along the way.

Now it’s 9:17 and I’m in the dealer’s waiting room. They are telling me it’s 45-60 minutes for the update. What is this, an Apple Watch? Sheesh!

Next on the agenda is going back to the mall to get the effing security tag taken off my new winter jacket. I might try to snag a couple of near-last minute xmas things while I’m there, and maybe a black and white film pic or two? After that it’s back to the grocery store for the stuff we forgot to get last night (how typical of me), and then I t’s home to ride out the rest of the storm and wait for kids to start showing up.

Busy morning, but it should be a good day. Here’s hoping.

Oh, Ya Big Baby

I was going to go out shooting some film this morning, but after I finished my morning faux joggin’ I completely wussed out. Why? I just don’t wanna go out in the cold. You big baby.

I did something to my shoulder today and I have no idea what. It hurts. Why? I didn’t do anything to deserve it, other than being 51 years old when stuff just randomly starts breaking down.

We’re supposed to get a huge storm sometime tomorrow, I think. I don’t know if it’s rain or snow or both. It might mess up some plans for the weekend, but I can’t tell one way or another yet. I hate snow. I really, really hate snow.

The kids are coming home this weekend. Bellana’s car is dead so we will be selling her (“selling”) one of ours. I want to get it tuned up for her. There’s a software recall and I have an appointment to get that done on Saturday. I want to get an oil change too, and have the tires checked. They should be fine but let’s make sure. The other car needs an oil change too and the wiper blades are falling off. So this weekend’s theme is kids and cars, to start with at least.

Did I mention that I’ve lost 200 pounds since January? I was on cloud nine all day long yesterday. I still am. I even went to the facebook to gloat a little. People are asking for before/after pics. I might give the people what they want. I gloated on post.news too. I was the first person on that network to use the hash tag #GastricBypass, but a few fellow surgical survivors said hello. That made me happy.

We are 20 days away from leaving for Florida. I can’t wait. I can’t wait to travel for the first time in almost three years. I can’t wait to spend two whole weeks with the kids. I can’t wait to experience Disney World with the love of my life once again. Did I ever mention that my original plan for proposing to Jen involved the World Showcase at Epcot? In the end I did it at home because I just couldn’t wait anymore, but we did reenact the proposal I had in mind when we took a trip there with Larry and Nawal a few weeks later. Also, and this is very important, I can’t wait to be warm. I know it is not going to be scorching, but it is going to be a whole hell of a lot warmer there than it is here.

I feel like I should have 100 other things to write about this morning, but I’m drawing blanks left and right. My shoulder is really bugging me. I think I pulled a muscle or something. It’s annoying the crap out of me. I’ll get over it, someday. Mostly I’m just really happy that I don’t have to drive into the office today. I am working from home for the rest of this week and the first three days next week. I have to go in next Thursday but hopefully that will only be for half of the day. Starting next month though (after I get back from Florida) we will be going into the office on Wednesdays. Every Wednesday for the foreseeable future. That’s seriously depressing, but I’ll rise above it, somehow.

Okay. I am going to finish my breakfast and then spend half an hour or so gazing longingly at my weight tracking spreadsheet. Specifically the Total Since the First Check In cell where the number is over 200. Ah, what a thing that is.

Rough Night Tonight – Half Day Tomorrow

It was a pretty quiet day around here. Harry stayed at his dad’s house last night. Bellana stayed here but left for dad’s at around noon. We missed them both but made the best of it. Jen was busy so I mostly just goofed off with the new film blog and Instagram. The Instagram already has more engagement in two days than my main account has had in however many years it’s been up. It’s nuts. I put a couple of film related tags on each post and people are coming from all around. I’m getting more notice than I usually get from Flickr, and I do all right (by my own personal, meager, non- viral, non-influencer standards) on Flickr.

The rough patch came at dinner. I took one bite that was way too big. I knew it was bad as I was chewing it, but I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. Nope. I got nice and sick. I felt queasy for a while and thought it was going to pass. Nope. My food tracking spread sheet has a column for nausea. On a scale of 1-10, that particular instance was a 10. The worst experience yet, by a long way.

I wanted to play guitar today but did not. I probably won’t tomorrow either. I took a half day in the morning because I thought I was bringing Bellana to the Registry of Motor Vehicles (or whatever New Hampshire calls it). Nope. Dad is bringing her. I am now on car inspection detail instead. I want to be out early enough to warm up the car and get to the garage before they open. If I can get in and out quick I might work on some song ideas before I punch in. Or maybe I’ll put that weight bench together. We’ll see.

Until then, g’night.

Snows-a-Comin’

The forecast is calling for about six inches of snow tonight and tomorrow. I hate snow. I may have mentioned that before. I really hate snow.

There are shovels on the steps under the overhang. The trash has been taken out. The cars have been arranged in the driveway. Bellana has an appointment in the morning and she’s going to borrow a car and we have the car with the best snow safety record on the outside.

Did I mention I hate snow?

The Last Day

Here we are. May 7,2021. The last day. The final day of my 40’s. Tomorrow is my 50th birthday. How’s my last day of early middle age going?

Harry lost his car keys. He took my car to school today. No big deal. He’ll come home today and dig through his room and find them and all will be well. We don’t have a spare to that car. We did, a valet key, but we’re not sure where it is. Purely out of a desire to always have a back up plan that has back up plans, we looked into getting a replacement key. The dealer told us we need to bring the car to them, buy a new key from the parts department, and then have the service department cut it. Expensive, but not the end of the world. Doing the math you’ll find that the difficulty is bringing the car to the dealer when we don’t have a key with which to start the car. They said AAA can tow it to them.

That brings up the next set of questions. We have a AAA account. We also have spent the last 14 months barely using our cars. Did we let the AAA membership lapse due to lack of automotive need? I called them up and told them I just wanted to see if we were active. I gave my name and address, they looked me up. Nope, our account was cancelled. Then I had a thought…

At some point in the past, a couple of years ago maybe, I needed AAA for something and found two different membership cards in my wallet. Same name, different account numbers, different dates, everything. If I remember correctly I called them to see which one was active and found they were somehow both active. I cancelled one of them. Is it possible that on the call today they were looking up the wrong account? I asked what membership number they were looking at and sure enough it was different than the one I was looking at. I gave them my membership and wouldn’t you know it? It’s paid up through September. What do you think of that?

So the moral of the story is, the last day of my forties is kinda being a dick, but at the same time if we need to do this crazy Rube Goldberg-esque key replacement, then we’ve got all of our ducks in a row.

Not too shabby.