Tuesday, June 29, 2010

3 weeks..........

I get to go back to work Thursday night after 3 weeks off due to knee surgery....I've been bored so this is a long post.

Most folks would enjoy having 3 weeks off......I was pretty much ready to go back to work the day after the operation. It wasn't really much fun, had to stay off my knee most of the time and keep it elevated.

The doc said the typical recovery period for what I had done is at least 4 weeks...I told him the day after the operation I was going to do my P.T. every day so I could get back to work earlier- I'm pretty pleased with myself that I recovered enough in 3 weeks instead of four or five.

I'm also a candidate for a knee replacement in the next 5 or 10 years so, I really gotta take care of what's left of my knee (I'm totally missing my ACL) so if make it that far, good stuff...about the only thing I can't do as deep knee bends....fortunately.....I don't have to do too many of those when I make donuts.

Can't be too upset about the situation.....the pain is manageable without any strong painkillers, lots of folks out there have way worse problems then a bum knee.

I sent this video to my next door neighbor...he owns a really sweet Porsche Cayman and he's a pretty good driver like the guy in the video.....me? I'm perfectly satisfied with my 210 horsepower Taurus and sticking to the speed limit (most of the time).

It amazes me that an 8 year old Taurus with 160,000 miles on it is tighter and more quiet than my old minivan that had less then 70,00 miles. The inside of my brand new used car is like a cave because it's all dark grey leather and it's got a few minor scrapes and bad paint spots, but I clay barred it and gave it a good wax it looks pretty good considering.

I was always a "Ford guy" before I bought my Plymouth Caravan back in 99......I think I'll stick to either Fords or Subaru's from now on.

Saw this video on YouTube from some guy overflying the oil slick in the Gulf.....an old neighbor used to have a saying ......."It is what it is"- not one helluva lot anybody can do about what's already happened and unfortunately- it's going to get worse. I can only imagine what fresh hell a powerful hurricane would do right now.....nothing you can do and you know bad things could happen at any time.

I saw this video on YouTube as well. I'm all over the place politically, but to be honest.... I think it would be cool to learn how to shoot guns like that. Personally- I don't own any guns and don't really plan on buying any, but some folks forget that 240 years ago....our forefathers used guns to obtain our freedom from Britain.

I'm not a "gun nut", but I think that unless you've been convicted of a felony-you ought to be able to wear an unconcealed handgun whenever and wherever you please as long as you take the time and trouble to get certified on it's safe and responsible operation.

I'm a big fan of Top Gear-this is hilarious....sue me, but I bit torrent the show every week

I guess Amazon has chosen to ignore my emails concerning getting a partial refund or credit for the Kindle I bought 6 weeks before they dropped the price by 70 bucks....sure, I'll still buy stuff from Amazon, but they are gonna be the choice of last resort from now on.

The way you take care of a customer?....I bought some PDF editing software from Foxit nearly 3 months ago...they recently made what I bought 12 weeks ago a free software download- they e-mailed me and offered me a free download of their deluxe PDF software which costs the same as the basic PDF editor I bought back in April. Nice move guys.... from now on-I'll put their software on all my clients PC's in place of Adobe PDF reader.

I love when I get to help senior citizens with their computer problems.....I helped a client with a bunch of malware and when I took her PC back to her house, I set up a laptop she had previously purchased to network with her other PC and printer.

She though it was magic that I could sit in her kitchen with her laptop and send something to her printer in the other room without the laptop being connected to anything. She asked me how I remember all that stuff...beats the heck out of me- it's kinda like learning how to ride a bike- once you know how....it's second nature.

I'm also buying a PC for another client this week.....if anybody is looking for a nice bang-for-the-buck system *this is a nice one* you'll just have to uninstall all the HP crapware....on some new computers...I'll uninstall 15 to 20 useless programs that do a really good job of stealing CPU cycles. My record is 26 programs running right after boot-up on XP with a printer installed.

Another good deal from Newegg? Noise canceling headphones....we've had these for awhile and to be honest -I can't tell the difference between these and the Bose cans that sell for 300 bucks. Newegg is about the only place I trust to buy electronic stuff online....their customer service is uptight and outtasight.

This chopper is way, way off the hook. Nothing like my chopper whatsoever. It doesn't even look rideable. My neighbor has a chopper but his is way cooler and he built it himself....not many guys that have choppers can say that. Oh yeah....mines for sale if you want to buy it.

This is one of my favorite websites.....I work in a retail bakery-this happens from time to time. Worst thing I've ever done? Several years ago, I dropped a customer's cake on the floor right in front of them as I was boxing it up....the customer was very understanding, but boy was I ever embarrassed.

I'm a knife junkie..... I saw this at Harbor Freight and had to buy one. I took it home with the intention of using it at work ( I like a very sharp knife to dock Italian bread right before it goes in the oven), but my wife liked it so much...I gotta go back and buy another one. Most of the stuff at H.F. is useless junk, if I get a couple months out of the knife....I'll be happy.

Like me...this guy also wants to tear his eyes out if he hears anything more about the iPhone 4....Here's the link to the YouTube video BUT there are lots of F-bombs and other profanity---definitely not family friendly so don't click on it if you are easily offended...click here instead.

What do I do when I buy stuff from Apple? I let the first-adopters be the guinea pigs.....I'd be pissed if I bought an iPhone and had that many problems with it.

This is pretty cool.....to be honest- I was raised to do the same exact thing I'm not sure how someone could keep the money and sleep at night.

This just sounds flat out nasty. I'm not that big a drinker in the first place, salmon flavored vodka just doesn't sound appealing whatsoever....

The 3rd Depression......I consider myself very fortunate to have a good job with great benefits. I have a trade where I can go just about anywhere in the country and get a job if I really had to. Not everyone is as lucky as I am....it would be pretty tough to outsource fresh baked goods to China.

Don't get me wrong....I ain't the skinniest person in the world....but this is some scary stuff. I guess I don't help the problem all that much as a make a few hundred thousand calories worth of donuts every night.....sorry about that.

till later.

Monday, June 28, 2010

iPhone 4........

So help me God...if I come across one more iPhone 4 article online-I'm gonna pull my eyeballs out with a rusty pair of pliers.

That is all.

till later.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Comcast is really dropping the ball.

I'm not the largest computer consulting company here in York.....in fact, I probably have one of the smaller customer bases out there.

That's just the way I like it- when one of my clients call me- I can usually get back to them with a solution to their issue or fix their computer within 24 hours.

Having said that-one of my clients is so damn mad at Comcast right now, they are considering legal action against them. Missed appointments, poor connectivity, poor customer service over the phone.....you name it- Comcast must be reading out of the "How to Piss off Customers and Lose Clients" handbook.

My client works from home and absolutely, positively needs internet connectivity to do her job.

No internet-she's dead in the water and is making "0" dollars. My only suggestion is to purchase a USB aircard from T-Mobile.......for some reason all my ideas cost money but that's about all I could come up with.

Comcast- you need to get on the ball and start rotating, or else you'll end up like GM in 20 years.....put out crappy service and trust me- someone will eat your lunch, that's how business works here in America.

till later.

Friday, June 25, 2010

Off the deep end.....

I really need to get back to work- been watching too many episodes of Cupcake Wars

I almost want to open up my own cupcake bakery........

Almost.

Problem number one...finding people willing to pay 3.99 a piece for a gourmet cupcake.

Since I live in the Snack Food Capitol of the World....I should be able to find a few food junkies out there.

Problem number two......owning your own bakery is a lot of work, at least 60+ hours a week and probably closer to 80 hours.

I think I'll stick to making donuts.

till later.

Thursday, June 24, 2010

Yay.

If all the planets align and everything goes to plan.....I'll be back to work next Thursday night.

I'm pretty darn happy about that.

Having off for a few weeks was nice, but 90% of the time so far, I've been in some sort of discomfort....I had my knee drained again this morning- that ain't on my Top Ten lists of things to do in the future.

Been watching way too much TV during my time off, saw this show called "Cupcake Wars"....gotta be the dumbest show ever.

Maybe I should open up a shop that fixes computers and sells cupcakes and call it "Computers and Cupcakes"

Okay.....maybe not.

till later.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Pissed............

So far....Amazon has refused to credit my account for 70 bucks, since I bought a Kindle 6 weeks ago for 259 bucks and they are now 189 dollars.

I started a Facebook group...not that's gonna do anything-but it makes me feel better.

till later.

Monday, June 21, 2010

Puzzled.....

I think our cat likes doing ( or maybe undoing) puzzles.



Meow.

Are you serious..........

Not that the Kindle I bought 6 weeks ago isn't worth the money (or else I wouldn't have bought it) but just today.....they dropped the price by 70 bucks.

Pissed doesn't begin to describe how I'm feeling at the moment.

I wrote a polite but very curt e-mail to the wonderful folks at Amazon asking for a 70 dollar credit.

I'm wondering how one of the top rated companies for customer satisfaction is going to take care of this for me.

I'm betting I get screwed out of 70 bucks.

I'll keep y'all posted.

till later.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Make no mistake.........

I am not a web designer by any stretch of the imagination, but I've been wanting to re-do my consulting website for a quite some time.

Here it is.

Yeah, I know it's pretty simple and everything is on one page but that's partly by design. I want to be able to print out the entire site and hand it out to potential clients.

Trust me, I'm not quitting my full-time job ever.....I like making donuts and I work for a great company with great benefits- the computer consulting helps pay for college stuff.

My favorite quote............

From Mark Twain........



"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years."

I'm pretty sure that when I was 14 years old, I was ten feet tall, bulletproof and invisible.....thank God my old man was around to pull my head out of my ass when I needed it.

Happy Fathers Day dad......you're the best.

Love, your son.

till later

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Extreme boredom has set in.............

Wow.....if this is what retirement is gonna be like- I better get some hobbies. In all seriousness, these past 2 weeks haven't really been all that much fun.

If I were to have a life of leisure like I'm currently having...I think I'd be okay as long as I could ride my bike and at least go to the mall for a walk. No-go at least for the next week, if I am going to be on my feet for more then 5 minutes, the doc said I have to use crutches.

That pretty much leaves me with my computers and my Kindle. I'm sure glad I like to read or I'm not sure what I'd do. A friend of mine suggested I read Stieg Larson.....it's a done deal-the files are on my computer in less then a minute and I I have to do is drag them into the Kindle....I love modern technology.

Stopped by work yesterday to pick up my paycheck...talked to the store manager- he said to take my time and not rush my recovery. He knows me well enough that he knows I don't play games...the second I am released to go back to work-I will be on the phone with my manager to have have put me back on the schedule.

I gotta say, he's probably one of the tougher managers I've ever worked for....but I think he's also extremely fair. I really respect that- He isn't there to win a popularity contest...he's there to run a business, make money, keep the customers happy and take care off several hundred associates.

Like him or not (I happen to like him)....you have to respect what he's accomplished in his career. He treats his career and what he does very seriously and God help you if you don't feel the same way.

It's my favorite management philosophy ....lead, follow or get the hell out of the way.

till later.

Friday, June 18, 2010

Not fun...........

Went to the doc for a follow up visit yesterday..........I had to get some excess fluid drained out of my knee.

Gotta say, that was fairly unpleasant-I probably scared the patients in the adjoining cubicles with the loud grunting I did when he stuck that needle in the side of my knee.

I also found out that I am completely missing my ACL in my left knee. Missing as in not there. I'm not sure what happened to it....I know I had a lot of "offs" in my mountain biking career-maybe I landed bad and toughed out the pain for a few weeks.

I did go to work with broken fingers, ribs and a clavicle at different times- so I know I have a fairly high pain tolerance.

Whatever, it makes me a candidate for knee replacement sooner then later. The doc said he'd like me to go until I'm 60, but if I needed it done earlier- the knees they have now would probably outlive me.

I'll take a couple years to build my sick pay back up to full and probably get it done. I'd rather get it done earlier then later so there are less age related complications.

At any rate- I am bored out of my mind at this point, but from what the doc said yesterday- I'll be off for another week at least.

My buddy Hank sent me a link to this story here where we live in York PA. That pretty much sucks the whole way around. I was under the impression that as long as the motor on your bicycle is 49cc's or less in PA....all you need is a valid drivers license.

Since my bike looks nothing like a moped- It's basically a mountain bike with a small motor mounted next to my rear luggage rack......I plan to fly under the radar for the time being. I'm not even sure my bike would be considered a moped, but I'm not going to ask a bunch of questions either.

Like the guy in the article- I'm not out to change the world or make a lot of waves....I just want a little fresh air once and awhile.

till later.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Cake success or failure......

My lovely wife made a cake for St Joes Carnival to sell at thier bake sale/cakewalk....she didn't like it, but my son and I did.....so we bought it from her for 30 bucks.



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I'd say it was a success....a win for St Joe's (they get the 30 bucks) and my son and I get delicious cake.

till later.

I'm not the brightest bulb in the chandelier....

For the last 2 years, I've been paying AT&T 70 bucks a month for a wireless access USB stick for my laptop. I originally bought it for my computer consulting business and while the times I needed it where few and far between.....when I needed it- I needed it....so I happily paid for it month after month.

After shopping around- I found a far better deal with T-Mobile for the same thing and since our daughter needs internet at her apartment for the next 15 months while she is in grad school- she get's to use it for the time being.

Instead of me buying another wireless card from T-Mobile and paying for 2 of them...I found this, for the times I need to access the internet at a client's house-it's perfect. Not sure if AT&T will shut my account down if they find out because they want 30 extra bucks a month to tether my phone to my computer.....I don't plan on telling them and I don't think I'll be using the Shark Modem thing all that often-AT&T gets enough of our money every month.

One of my best and most favorite clients spends his summer in Nantucket every summer at a private club managing every thing pool related- they have a swim team and from what it sounds like-it's a lot of work but also a lot of fun.

He also owns several business's that he still runs from his house with the help of his administrative assistant......I spent an hour on the phone with him trying to resolve several issues.....I guess I'm not that good at phone support-I think we fixed one out of the three problems he was having.

If my leg wasn't absolutely killing me.....I'd have my son drive me up there to get his stuff fixed up- I hate it when one of my clients isn't happy.

The knee?......doing pretty good.

The leg? ....sore as hell.

I can tell the doctor has made the knee itself much better, my only problem is that every muscle from mid calve to mid thigh is still sore.

I guess I'm just impatient and want to get back to work....but I'm not going to rush things and take a chance of screwing it up, so I'm trying really hard not to climb the walls with boredom.

I'm really glad I bought a Kindle a few weeks ago- been reading tons of stuff on it. It wasn't the cheapest thing I've ever spent money on...but so far- I couldn't be happier with it. Imagine 30 years ago if you would have said that there is a device that can get and display most any popular book in less then a minute? I love technology.

Seriously....do we need to turn everything into a political game? Here's an idea- let's concentrate on turning off the oil first then take a few months to play the blame game. Politicians make me sick.

This is gonna being interesting.....pretty much how WW III is going to start. Yeah, sure their are politics involved (when isn't politics involved?) but there is also 1.5 million people that probably don't give a shit about the politics... they just want food in their kids bellies.

Just finished watching a New Zealand TV show called "Neighbors At War"....if my neighbors behind me are reading this....really sorry I called the cops on your son. The little guy (I think he's about 12) was in his backyard shooting off a paintball gun.....I called over and asked him what he was doing, he said he was shooting his paintball gun.

I told him that's illegal to do in our township.....he went inside for a minute....came back out (I assumed he asked his parents about it) and continued firing away. That's when I called the cops and I assume they went over and told mom and dad that junior has to put the paintball gun away.

Sorry if that makes me the asshole, but I live in a pretty nice area and I figure that if I wanna listen to loud country music, barking dogs, paintball guns and have neighbors with Trans-Ams with no wheels....

...I'd move to a rundown trailer park.

till later.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Black and blue.......

My knee is turning all kinds of different colors now....black, blue, purple. In a couple of days, it should be in full bloom- I'll take a picture and post it. I know our daughter loves looking at that kind of stuff.

The good news is that I have relatively little actual knee pain...but every muscle from mid-calve to mid-thigh feels like it was worked over with a baseball bat.

More good news is that I am getting out of the house with calls for computer help....our son gets to drive me and lug all my stuff around, but hey- it's part his company too and once we are done helping our daughter through graduate school...he gets all the profits for the consulting work, so I don't feel bad at all for making him work a little.

My father-in-law bought one of his grand kids a laptop for high school graduation and we'll be setting that up today. He gave me a fairly nice budget, so I was able to get a decent laptop, a printer, ink, a mouse, a thumb drive and a laptop cooler.

If you buy a laptop, buy a laptop cooler to go along with it-heat is the enemy of laptops and the one I have in the link is hands down the best cooler for the money out there.

Obama is going to address the nation Tuesday night concerning the oil spill.....I'm one of those nutjob Libertarians that likes less government regulation so I'm really conflicted on this one. I'd like to see the President somehow make BP pay for anything and everything disaster related up to the point where it bankrupts the company.

Sure, it would suck for anyone owning BP stock, but that's the risk you take when you buy stock in a company...ask GM shareholders.

till later.

Saturday, June 12, 2010

Joke........

A woman in a hot air balloon realized she was lost. She lowered her altitude and spotted a man in a boat below. She shouted to him,
"Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am."


The man consulted his portable GPS and replied, "You're in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above ground elevation of 2,346 feet above sea level. You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude.


"She rolled her eyes and said, "You must be an Obama Democrat."


"I am," replied the man. "How did you know?"


"Well," answered the balloonist, "everything you told me is technically correct. But I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help to me."


The man smiled and responded, "You must be a Republican."


"I am," replied the balloonist. "How did you know?"


"Well," said the man, "you don't know where you are or where you are going. You've risen to where you are due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem. You're in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but somehow, now it's my fault."

Friday, June 11, 2010

Way better today............

My knee is still swollen like a MFer and it's already started turning purple.....but I can walk short distances without crutches- so that's an improvement.

Bored as hell sitting around- I've been off work 3 nights and I'm ready to go back. That's not gonna happen for at least a week, so I think I'll enjoy being lazy for a few days.

About the only thing on my to-do list is reorganize my computer work area.....I've kinda let it get cluttered and disorganized, as soon as I get my latest client's laptop and printer done- I'll be tearing into it.

It is so weird being around the house in the evening- I normally don't watch much TV, I saw some of "So You Think You Can Dance" last night.....wow, those kids are talented. I was going to buy tickets to their roadshow last year but didn't because good seats were going for about 80 bucks a pop.

This year, I think I'm going to spring for them...my wife and I don't get to go out much together and hey...you only live once.

till later.

Thursday, June 10, 2010

No effing wonder it hurts so much...........

Just got back from the docs.....I had a torn ligament, he reshaped some bone ends, cleaned out dead tissue and repositioned another ligament so my kneecap floats better.

I seriously think he had all the tools he owns inside my knee all at the same time.

Time to hit the pain meds........

till later.

Bad joke time....




Gary's casket.

Ouch.

I think I came through surgery with flying colors.....I had the same surgery done to my other knee last year-so I pretty much knew what to expect.

I don't remember it hurting this much though......I'm not one for taking any pain meds if I don't have to- I figure that masking the pain isn't the best thing to do as it would be easy to injure my knee further if it doesn't hurt.

Having said that- I've been sucking down Oxycodin like it's going out of style....it hurts like a MFer. At this point I've been up most of the night, I have a doctor appt at 830....I'm pretty sure I'll be sleeping most of the day afterwards.

Still not used to our son having his drivers license...kinda weird when he goes out for a movie with his best friend Sophie and nobody has to pick him up or take him.

He is doing a great job driving so far-he's getting smoother the more he drives. I want to get him out to an empty parking lot on a rainy day so he can play around with how the anti-lock brakes engage. He older sister drives like I do, she isn't reckless-but if she can go 10 mph over the speed limit safely.....she will.

Our son, on the other hand is under strict instructions to not exceed the speed limit under any circumstances. I think he pretty much sticks to that because he knows that if he screws up just once (speeding ticket, at fault accident, etc) he loses his driving privileges. Not many 16 year olds get the use of a car with as few restrictions as we are giving our son.

Honestly, I don't think I have anything to worry about....he's a good kid.

till later.

Tuesday, June 08, 2010

Tomorrow is the big day......

Yup....it's time for the doctor to go digging around in my knee.

Yay.

If I could do the operation and go back to work the next day.....I'd do it in a heartbeat because it's gonna be a MFer to not sit around and eat. The doctor says i should be off for 2 to 3 weeks.....I'm aiming for 2 weeks max.

Fortunately I'll have my son with me to scold me into not eating bad stuff.

He's basically my 2nd conscience...several months ago when I started my quest to lose weight- I told him to point out in no uncertain terms when I was being an idiot concerning my diet.

So far, it's worked like a charm- last week we were in Sam's Club and I wanted to buy some snack food.....Daniel told me to buy fruit instead- what a kid.

One of my most important clients had his main laptop shit the bed last week right before he left for his summer job in Nantucket.....couldn't have been worse timing. To make matters worse- his back up laptop is giving him problems *needless to say* I'll be up until midnight if that's what it takes to get his laptop up and running later today.

Good clients are hard to come by and even harder to keep.....it always surprises me how other business owners treat their clients. I read a lot of blogs from other computer techs and some of the bad service stories are pretty hard to believe.

Half the battle to please clients is just showing up on time and following through on what you promise the client. I've found that if I don't know how to fix something- I'll admit that to the client right up front.....honesty is the best policy.

It's really been weird for the last couple of days....instead of driving my son to school-he's driving himself. Both of us are really digging our brand new used car- it's soooo much quieter then our old minivan.

No rattles and the air conditioning is ice cold....so far so good- The burgundy color is starting to grow on me, when our son graduates next year and goes to college, we are gonna have to duke it out to see who gets the car:-)

till later.

Monday, June 07, 2010

Friday, June 04, 2010

This is a "go see"

Saw this trailer on one of my favorite fellow bike bloggers. Ray rides about as much as I do and he pretty much lives the kind of life I'd like to....minus all the dog hair.



I love stuff like that.....shit blows up, people and things do weird shit, yeah...my kind of movie.

On the driving front- our son completed his first 24 hours as a licensed driver without mowing down any crowds of pedestrians....I'll take that as a win.

Oh.....my knee hurts like a MF'er in case you were wondering.

I'm the only person in my department that's currently on the injured roster but I still got 16 hours scheduled overtime on a holiday week.

I'm not complaining..(I absolutely adore money).... I sorta wished I wouldn't have volunteered to work so many damn hours this week.

But then again......I gotta go back to the previous sentence- I really like having a few extra bucks to spend on my kids....so it's worth the pain.

Our daughters college don't pay for itself and now that our 16 year old son is driving.....man, I really don't wanna see that first insurance bill.

Last night at work.....a customer wanted me to decorate them a cake with an Hawaiian luau theme. I had to explain to them that while I know how to decorate cakes.....I just didn't have the time to do something like that on such short notice and too be honest- I'm not that good of a cake decorator....it woulda turned out like a Hawaiian themed tsunami cake.

One other thing......what the hell happened to people at least giving a slight shit about how they look and smell when they go out in public?

I may be expecting too much at 2 in the morning but if I can smell your body odor from behind our sales counter and you are a good 6 feet away from me and you look like you just shit your pants....somebody needs to hit the shower more then once a week.

till later.

Thursday, June 03, 2010

Be afraid......

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Yup....that's our son on his maiden solo voyage in our brand new used car.

Worried?

Nope.

He had some very good behind the wheel training at school and yes....he's only 16, but he's a very smooth and careful driver. Hopefully, the smooth and careful part will help him get the behind the wheel experience he needs without causing anyone bodily harm.

My driving standard was that he got to go solo when he went through the Mt Rose/ Rt83 interchange in the morning without my stabbing an imaginary brake pedal on the passenger side and making me feel 100% comfortable.

Mission accomplished and while he still makes tiny mistakes once and awhile-he immediately recognizes what he did wrong and fixes it. If I hear about or see him do something stupid- his driving privileges will be revoked until he's 18.... no questions asked-no second chances.

Driving 4000 pounds of steel around formed into the shape of a car is serious stuff and I want him to treat it as such.

The brand new used car part?

I pretty much got the shits of driving around the Plymouth Grand Voyager and traded it in. The air conditioning didn't work, only one window out of four worked, the engine made random squealing noises, the transaxle shifted funny from time to time and it made more and more rattles and weird noises the longer I drove it.

The new car?

A 2002 Ford Taurus previously owned by Verizon....I had access to the complete maintenance records so the 160,000 miles on it didn't scare me a bit. The car was well taken care of and it's amazingly tight with no rattles whatsoever. Red ain't my favorite color and I really don't like leather interiors but for 2400 bucks...if it lasts 2 or 3 years- I'll be ahead of the game.

Buying used cars is a gamble but having all the records available with the car already having a bunch of stuff replaced...hopefully the odds will be stacked in my favor.

Knee surgery next Wednesday.....I am so ready to get this done and over with.

till later.