Good news, bad news
Jan. 2nd, 2006 03:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
howeirdThe good news is the weatherpersons were assuring us this morning the rain would be gone by afternoon. The bad news is they didn't say which afternoon. Because it certainly wasn't this one.
The other good news is the brake job was done in record time - 1:20 pm - which meant I could go there in daylight. I walked the 32-minute trek in the rain equivalent of a blizzard. High winds, higher gusts, amongst large drops of significant vertical and horizontal velocity.
On my walk back from the shop this morning, I had peered over the bridge to see how Stevens Creek was doing at Evelyn Rd. The current was torrential, and there was a large tree trunk caught on the point of a Y where the creek divides into two channels. On the trip back, the tree trunk was gone. We're talking 12-foot-long 1-foot-diameter tree section, here. And it is nowhere in sight, so I think the water pressure is what knocked it off.
Anywho, at least I got my exercise for the week.
Amusing footnote, on the walks there and back I noticed several Christmas trees left on the side of the road and a lone latex glove.
The other bad news is they did a complete inspection of the car, and several things which Toyota was supposed to have done in the 60k inspection a year ago apparently were done not at all or poorly, my battery, which was just replaced a year ago July, is "marginal", and my 80,000 mile warranted tires are down to 3/32 of tread after only 1/4 of that.
If I still have a job next month, maybe I'll look into getting a newer car. I'd like a hybrid, but Prius is both out of my price range and unavailable (there's a 6-month backlog of orders, I understand). Maybe a used one? Or the Honda, though I have a problem with Honda cars because when I was growing up, all they made was lawn mowers and low-powered motorcycles.
It was raining so hard when I drove home, I didn't stop at the office to pick up the package which was delivered on the 31st. There will probably be another one in the mail, so I'll wait till after the USPS snail arrives. Meanwhile, my socks are in the hamper, my jeans are in the dryer, and the umbrella, jacket, hat and tennis shoes are drying out in the livingroom. I think I'll go downstairs and join Pumpkin, who is atop the recliner, and watch some football. And maybe start reading The Dark Tower.
I was going to start reading it last night, but instead did my family duty and opened up the massive tome which my big sister had mailed from Israel. It is her master's thesis in creative writing (English), a series of short stories about life in her community, which is a religious co-op called a moshav, not to be confused with a kibbutz. I lived there for six months in 1977, and wanted to see if I recognized anyone. So I started reading the first story.
I had forgotten what a good writer my sister is. Partly because she rarely writes to her relatives, and partly because most of the work she has sent me has been in snippets. Her job is writing for WIZO, a non-profit women's Zionist organization, and I think a lot of her work is in Hebrew. What she has sent me of her work work is mostly snippets and collections of 1-page blurbs. All good stuff, but none as ambitious as the thesis. It's not as much reading as I thought it would be, since it is done in 12-point type, 1.5-spaced, single-sided. So that will be my bedtime reading and Roland's Traveling Road Show will be my lunchtime reading.
The other good news is the brake job was done in record time - 1:20 pm - which meant I could go there in daylight. I walked the 32-minute trek in the rain equivalent of a blizzard. High winds, higher gusts, amongst large drops of significant vertical and horizontal velocity.
On my walk back from the shop this morning, I had peered over the bridge to see how Stevens Creek was doing at Evelyn Rd. The current was torrential, and there was a large tree trunk caught on the point of a Y where the creek divides into two channels. On the trip back, the tree trunk was gone. We're talking 12-foot-long 1-foot-diameter tree section, here. And it is nowhere in sight, so I think the water pressure is what knocked it off.
Anywho, at least I got my exercise for the week.
Amusing footnote, on the walks there and back I noticed several Christmas trees left on the side of the road and a lone latex glove.
The other bad news is they did a complete inspection of the car, and several things which Toyota was supposed to have done in the 60k inspection a year ago apparently were done not at all or poorly, my battery, which was just replaced a year ago July, is "marginal", and my 80,000 mile warranted tires are down to 3/32 of tread after only 1/4 of that.
If I still have a job next month, maybe I'll look into getting a newer car. I'd like a hybrid, but Prius is both out of my price range and unavailable (there's a 6-month backlog of orders, I understand). Maybe a used one? Or the Honda, though I have a problem with Honda cars because when I was growing up, all they made was lawn mowers and low-powered motorcycles.
It was raining so hard when I drove home, I didn't stop at the office to pick up the package which was delivered on the 31st. There will probably be another one in the mail, so I'll wait till after the USPS snail arrives. Meanwhile, my socks are in the hamper, my jeans are in the dryer, and the umbrella, jacket, hat and tennis shoes are drying out in the livingroom. I think I'll go downstairs and join Pumpkin, who is atop the recliner, and watch some football. And maybe start reading The Dark Tower.
I was going to start reading it last night, but instead did my family duty and opened up the massive tome which my big sister had mailed from Israel. It is her master's thesis in creative writing (English), a series of short stories about life in her community, which is a religious co-op called a moshav, not to be confused with a kibbutz. I lived there for six months in 1977, and wanted to see if I recognized anyone. So I started reading the first story.
I had forgotten what a good writer my sister is. Partly because she rarely writes to her relatives, and partly because most of the work she has sent me has been in snippets. Her job is writing for WIZO, a non-profit women's Zionist organization, and I think a lot of her work is in Hebrew. What she has sent me of her work work is mostly snippets and collections of 1-page blurbs. All good stuff, but none as ambitious as the thesis. It's not as much reading as I thought it would be, since it is done in 12-point type, 1.5-spaced, single-sided. So that will be my bedtime reading and Roland's Traveling Road Show will be my lunchtime reading.
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}