Fri Sep 16 - What a day. Yoikes.

I thought, yesterday, that I really only needed my oil leak repaired. But once upon a time, I also had gone through my "car book" and checked how long it had been since I had the brakes looked at or the struts. So I asked my car guys to check them, too, since they were already spending hours on my car. Turns out that my rear struts were in bad shape and they had actually damaged my suspension. [Don't ask me what that means, it's just "car words" to me, and I can barely tell if I'm reciting them correctly in context. And please don't bother explaining them to me: I plan to write a book someday called "I Refuse To Learn About My Car" in which there will be features like "Will It Break My Car If I Don't Fix This?"]

Anyways, I got to the car place at 7:30 am. I was able to finally leave at 4:45 pm. They did the oil leak repairs, rear struts, front and rear brakes, two tires (that had been damaged by the suspension thing), replaced two belts that were looking bleak, replaced a damaged rear bearing for free, comp'ed me much of the labor and some of the tax, and had my car-credit-car limit nearly doubled so that I could charge the whole thing and not spend any of my budgeted cash.

So, in a strange need-to-comfort-myself and waste-a-few-hours way, I went shopping. Well, actually I walked nearly five miles, and went shopping. It's about 2.5 miles between the mall where my car repairs were being done and the place where I donate blood. Since I've been eligible to donate again since mid-April, I decided I might as well walk down there and back again to kill the day. Along the way I stopped at Payless Shoes and got some comfy little tennies, since I was in some low heels that were falling apart. I found my favorite office heels again, which was good because *those* are falling apart at home, too, so I can toss them out when I get home. And I found another under-$10 pair of generic work heels, so I wandered off in the morning with three new pairs of shoes.

I stopped at Target (because I knew they had nice bathrooms) and found the hair clips my Mom had been admiring. I'll be seeing her Sunday, so I wanted to take the clips to her.

By the time I got to blood place, I just sat under a tree for a while, resting. The donation itself went well this time (it doesn't always, so I'm always thankful when it does). Although the strangest thing—I think the guy who took my vitals and interview information might have been flirting with me. I was joking, as I so often do, about being an "international rock star" and that I have developed my "rock and roll signature." He actually is a progressive music fan (he told me about Roger Waters next solo album release coming up) so of course I gave him one of our band business cards.

I designed our band cards purposefully without any phone numbers or even band member names. This way we could hand them out and personalize them however we like. He seemed disappointed that my number wasn't on the card, and he gave me his card in exchange for mine. It felt only a little bit creepy, but it reminded me why I'm paranoid sometimes about my address, phone, and email. I use my mailing address in another town for exactly this reason.

On the walk back I stopped off at one last store to check blouses and personal clothing items (*blush*) and found several new niceties for "Buy two get two free" so I splurged one last time for the day. I got back to the car place a little after 2 pm, but they weren't done yet. So I had lunch in the mall and browsed several stores, not really finding anything else I really had to buy.

They have a row of those massaging chairs upstairs, which for a dollar will move these little rollers up and down your back for three minutes. I enjoyed the first 3-minute massage so much that I sprang for a second set, and promptly fell asleep during it. I didn't realize I was so tired from walking on and off for 4-5 hours, but I enjoyed the rest immensely. Browsed Waldenbooks, found another LED book light to use as my car light, and headed back down to the car guys. They had just finished up as I walked in, so it was time to head out.

In the process of returning some cell phone calls, I ended up chatting with Tina and we decided to grab dinner before heading into our frantic evenings, plus we had some catching up to do on each other's lives. So I didn't hit the freeway until about 6:30 pm, and didn't get home until nearly 8:30 pm. Not at all what I was expecting for a "get-ready-for-the-event" Friday off from work, but I'm glad my car is repaired again.

Now I'm home and have so much to do until tomorrow, that I'll just have to catch you all up later.
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Recently Listening to: Poe "Haunting"