Update on the car: the shop called back today and gave us an estimate of $160. HUGE sigh of relief over here. The transmission fan needs to be replaced (I didn't even know such a thing existed) and one other thing, but not nearly so major as we thought it would be.
In other news, I'm now kind of freaking out about the end of the quarter stuff. Deadlines crept up on me, and I procrastinated, and now there's sort of a lot to do. I'll manage; I always do.
Sooo...I don't know what exactly was up with that last post. I must have been on crack or something. Not literal crack, of course, but literary crack, which makes me think what I'm about to write is incredibly clever. Hey, it sounded like a brilliant idea in my head, and also like a good way to get a lot of info out in few words. But in the end it just took five times as long to try to keep a subject and verb from getting together. Plus I'm fairly certain it made no sense at all. So here's what you missed if you don't speak incompletesentencese:
Thanksgiving was totally awesome. I baked like a zillion cookies with my mother in law (and made truffles! no, I'm not sharing.) I spent time with Cassie, my sister in law who I only get to see about three times a year. I played fetch with my favorite dog-cat, Merlin. I took shots of rum with Chris's mom the pirate. And I consumed about twelve times the legal limit for sugar. All in all, a way fun weekend. Also, the traffic that was predicted to be disastrous due to construction at the pass, causing delays up to 16 hours? Nonexistent, at least at the times and directions we were going. Oh yeah, and we also got South Park DVDs which Chris got for his birthday (thanks, Cassie!) and an artificial tree that my Grandma found while cleaning her basement.
Yesterday we decorated for Christmas. The tree is up and decorated, and we've been breaking out the Christmas music. It's a fake tree, so it doesn't smell like Christmas yet, but we don't have a choice in getting a real tree or a fake one, since we'll be gone for two and a half weeks.
...and for ten days of that, we'll be in Kentucky! The first week we'll be spending with Chris's friendsin Morehead , and the last three days with my Rachel. I am SO excited. And it's coming up really quickly. Two weeks to go!
And in new news, I may have broken the car. Yesterday, I was driving up the windy canyon road to the camp where I work, and I hit a sizable rock with the undercarriage of the car. It sounded bad, but I couldn't see whether anything was wrong. Well, today the car wouldn't shift into drive, and there was a dark puddle underneath where the car was parked. I called TripleA, and they towed it to the shop, who won't look at it until tomorrow. But the tow truck driver said the leaked fluid was transmission fluid, which sounds like an expensive fix. Keep your fingers crossed for us.
1. For Halloween, Chris and I went as Mario and Princess Toadstool from the Super Mario Bros video games. I wore this huge pink poofy dress (surely a bridesmaid's dress from the 1980s) and dollar store plastic jewelery and tiara. Way fun, especially because that's the first time (other than my wedding) in probably twelve years that I've worn that much tulle. Also, it gave everyone an excuse to quote Napoleon: "I like your sleeves. They're real big." Chris and I went to a Halloween swing dance, where I spun SO much because my dress poofed out big and it was awesome.
2. The snow started to creep down the foothills, and it looks beautiful. My drive to work is now scenic and dangerous, since the road up the canyon is now icy. I'm enjoying the slightly warmer weather we've been having these last few days (highs in the upper 40s!), but I'm wistful and longing for snow. Maybe just a little flurry to blanket the ground with an inch. This is supposed to be a colder, snowier winter than the last one, but so far, no dice. I'm not looking forward to having to use chains in the pass, but I love the way everything looks covered in snow. And I figure if it's going to be cold enough to freeze my car doors shut every night, we deserve snow to soften the blow.
3. Since we got cable TV and the movie pass at Blockbuster (unlimited rentals for a fixed price) I watch a lot of TV and movies. And those of you who know me know I fidget a ton and totally cannot sit still through a movie. I needed something to do with my hands. So I bought a kit and learned to crochet. It took me pretty much an entire afternoon to learn the basic stitches, but the diagrams in my book weren't clear, so I was just guessing along until I stumbled upon the right way. I'm working on a scarf, which was originally going to be a Christmas present for my mom, but now I'm going to keep it. The first foot and a half are lumpy and uneven, and I kind of want to save it as a souvenir, my first project. I wish there was a craft store in Ellensburg, though. I need better yarn.
Yesterday was Free Latte Day at the Wildcat Wellness Center. Their goal is to raise awareness on issues such as alcohol abuse, contraceptive use, and abusive relationships. Each spring they run a survey of CWU students on the topic of alcohol and then use it to make motivational posters encouraging students to do the right thing. ("Drive in style: 76 percent of CWU students designate a driver when they drink.") The statistic they were publicizing yesterday was "88 percent of CWU students put school before drinking." This floors me. Not, of course, because nine out of ten students think their education should be a higher priority than getting trashed, but because 12 percent disagree. Say there are 5,000 students at CWU. That means that about 600 of them think drinking is more important than school. What the crap is this? Who are these students, and why haven't they dropped out yet? Why are they paying for college when they could get all the benefits of drinking without shelling out thousands per year? And why doesn't the Wellness Center realize that people can do math, and that people will wonder about this like I am?
