All walk and no car make Brian something-something

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I have a feeling that a conspiracy is going on. I am sure this has nothing to do with the fact that I have been watching the television series “24” almost nonstop for the past two days (allowing time to pause for work, sleep, and other frivolities). Fixing the transmission on my car should have taken about 3 days, or so I was told. It has now been two weeks. The two weeks, though, has been a constant “it will be ready tomorrow.” Had I known this up front, I would have rented a car. I would not have been “hey, [insert friend's name], can I have a ride to work tomorrow? Can you take me to the store? Can we go grab some lunch? It's just for today.” I feel like I am taking advantage of friends for rides because I am always telling them “It's just for today and tomorrow morning. I'll get my car tomorrow afternoon.” I cannot say HOW MANY time I have repeated that last quote.

Anyway, I keep getting more and more crazy excuses. “The other parts were in L.A., but there was one part in Atlanta that needs to be shipped.” “The shipping was delayed because of the rain.” “We took it apart and were going to put it together, but one of the replacement parts was changed this year, so we need to order a special new tool to work on it.” I get the feeling that a trash truck accidentally dropped a dumpster on my car and that they are scrambling around, working day and night, trying to cobble together a replacement car using enough of the parts from the original, so as not to make me too suspicious. I know it sounds crazy, but I can mentally see them removing the seats (with the leather worn an irreproducible way from my phone holster belt, and knife) from the old car, and inserting them into the new. This is the ONE CAR that I have not almost completely rewired for my own subversive needs, so I am not intimately familiar with what it looks like behind the dashboard and under the hood.

It is about now that I wish I had that '02 Harley Sportster 883C that I was looking at earlier this year.

To add insult to injury, I was supposed to start Christmas shopping 2 weeks ago. It was all supposed to be done by now. Because of transportation issues, very little of it has been completed.

I am currently listening to “The Physics of Christmas,” downloaded from audible.com. If you got the geeky email that was passed around a few years ago about the thermodynamics of Santa and the reindeer running around trying to hit every house in an evening at supersonic speeds, this book is basically that., only very detailed, greatly researched, and (when read aloud) 8 hours long. The current chapter is about Brussels sprouts, English children, and the fact that they typically only get the proper amount of veggies once a year (at Christmas). In fact, a number of people over there have cancer that could have easily been prevented by eating vegetables–not eating MORE vegetables, but simple eating ANY vegetables! Anyway, they are talking about how children are more sensitive to the tastes of things like broccoli and Brussels sprouts because they are more sensitive to the “toxins” that cause the flavor (which are toxic to bugs, but supposedly have a little bit of benefit to humans.) It would seem that 25% of people, mostly women, are supertasters (much more sensitive to taste), 25% are nontasters, and the remaining 50% are normal-tasters. This reminds me of the They Might Be Giants song, “John Lee, Supertaster.” I thought they just made that up. There really *IS* such a thing as a supertaster!

Posted in: Books Dear Diary Television

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