Soooo, yeah. I haven't posted in forever. However, I just had enough stuff go on in a short period of time to make me want to post.
Let's start with the earliest. Krista and I just got a new puppy a few weeks ago. She's a Nova Scotian Duck Tolling Retriever. She's about 4 and a half months old, and she's named Toki. 5 points if you know what that's from. Here are some pictures of the insanely cute demon:
OK, so now that you're sickened by cuteness, I'll dive into some of my recent happenings. I went to New Orleans for work about a month ago. That was fun. I learned to love drinking from a plastic container on bourbon street. I also learned that something named a Hand Grenade will absolutely KICK YOUR ASS. Upon arriving back to Richmond, I found out that it contains the following:
1 shot white rum
1 shot gin
1 shot grain alcohol
1 shot vodka
1 shot midori.
Yeah, getting a large one of those, then one to go... Bad idea when you have work in the morning.
Also, last Friday I had an experience, to say the least. I had a fun day out at a winery in Northern Virginia, so I drove up there. Drank some wine, won some money from wine trivia, and had a good time. Unfortunately, it was raining, so we were delegated to indoors. Regardless, that finished up around 2:30, then i started my drive home. Too bad I missed my turn and ended up hitting 495 around 4 PM... On a Friday... In the rain. To say it was a clusterfuck of traffic would be an understatement of the highest order. So, instead of dealing with that, I went to a restaurant and killed some time. It ended up being around 7:30 or so when I hit the road. After I drove about 30 miles or so, I noticed that my battery and ABS lights came on. I pulled off at the nearest exit, stopped somewhere, called my dad for some advice, then ultimately said fuck it and started my drive home, hoping that it wasn't anything bad. Well, when I was talking to my dad my cell phone died. I drove another 5 miles down the road, then my "trac off" light came on... Then my speedometer stopped working. Then the rest of my lights came on. Then my headlights went waaaay dim. I tried to punch it to the nearest inhabitable exit, but that wasn't happening.
So there I was - 8:30 PM on a Friday night, 60 miles from home, on I-95 south, in the rain. With a dead cell phone. In other words, fucked. I stood outside hoping for a good samaritan, but knew that there was no chance of that in the rain. So, I opted for screaming my head off. It sure helped with the stress. About a half hour of that led to a cop stopping by, lighting some flares, and calling AAA for me. An hour or so later, the tow truck showed up. I lost my AAA card for a while, so I didn't even make it in to the nearest inhabited area (Fredericksburg) until about 10:45 or so. Thankfully, the tow truck driver let me use his cell phone, so I called Krista and had her come pick me up. She comes up, we get home, and it's like 1 AM.
The next day, I call the place where the tow truck driver dumped my car. Apparently their lot is retarded, and the way he dumped my car was blocking 3 spots. To make matters worse, there wasn't anybody there to leave my keys with. So, I had to have Krista drive me back up to Fredericksburg to give them my keys. I ask them to charge my battery and take a look at my car to see if there's anything else besides the alternator that needs work, and give me an estimate. So they do that, call me up, say it'll cost ~$400. I balk at that a bit, but on my drive there I decide that a tow + repair in Richmond would probably cost more than that. However, once I showed up, the guy I was talking to went into the thickest Indian accent ever. However, I did make out $1009, as in how much they wanted to charge me to replace the alternator and the battery. My BS-o-meter went off the scale, so I told them that I was just going to drive it home. He said that I wouldn't make it a mile, but I said "I don't care, just give me my keys". So, I grabbed my keys, paid them their $25, and hopped into my car. I turned off the A/C, took the face off the stereo, and pulled the fuses for my headlights - no need to waste battery power to run those useless daytime running lamps. I made it from Fredericksburg back to Richmond - about 50 miles - without any trouble.
To make it even better/worse, my car started just fine on Monday when I took it to a reputable shop. They charged me $300 for the repair. I was tempted to call that rip-off location and tell them I made it back to Richmond when they said I wouldn't make it a mile. I told my dad about it, and he said that he should just drive down and shoot those guys for trying to pull that kind of shit. Gotta love Dad.
So, back to some good news - I finished my Tusken costume for halloween. Hope y'all like it:
Sooo, yeah, that's it. When something else remotely exciting happens to me, I'll write about it. In other words, see y'all in 6 months or so.
One last thing - Ping Julie - I've got the D*Con '08 room already booked - in Thursday, out Monday. I'll see about pulling some strings (with my "Silver Elite" Status) for late check out on Monday. It's $165 a night this year. Also, look into picking up your D*Con membership. They're $50 until 11/15.