7:09 PM 3/31/2008 – Monday morning and I already am running late. Did not sleep with the CPAP machine last night. I have tried to use it again the previous two nights. But I can only sleep with it on for a few hours.
I had made plans on Saturday morning to go into Austin for guitar strings and mandolin strings. I generally loathe my trips to Austin. Its not because I loathe Austin. I miss the old Austin and with bitch and moan about the sprawl both upwards and outwards but that’s not why I loathe going to Austin. I hate traffic – I hate driving. I hope someday I can find a station in life that involves much less driving – but not because I am feeble. The “feeble” station in life seems all too iminent. Anyway, I also needed some jeans so I told wifey we’d make a shopping date of it. She was all too happy to agree. I suggested we have breakfast at one of our old Austin fave’s and we settled on Kerbey Lane cafe. Wifey mentioned the destination to her sister on the phone that morning and her reply was “you’ll be standing in line with all the hippies”. Decision validated.
When we arrived I circled around for a parking place (another reason to loathe driving) and actually lucked upon one of two spots right in the front. The other spot was at the same time being occupied by a highly modified Chevy Vega. I was familiar with the DeLorean expiriment of the 80’s because my closest friend and band-mate of the Kansas period of my life drove one for quite a while. We drove it to gigs and to be repaired mostly. When we entered the restaurant there was a moderate line of interesting looking people. The wait was 20 minutes but there were a few seats at the end of the counter which we took. And wouldn’t you know it, Vega guy took the other seat. We discussed his Vega, which was really hardly a Vega at all any more. It was only a Vega in body. Not even much of the chassis was Vega. It was tricked out for drag racing including a nitrous tank. But the guy was not really a drag racing kinda guy. As it turned out he was a journalist turned newspaper owner turned oil and gas lawyer turned politico turned – well – life enjoyer. His enjoyment of life includes motorcycles and cars. We discussed all kinds of things about Old Austin. He was a very interesting conversationalist and I felt validated in my decision to have breakfast in Austin. http://www.flickr.com/photos/oldaustin/
We went to Guitar Center to get strings. I had called the day before to make sure they had what I wanted. I got the strings, some polish, and a capo for my son. I very briefly perused some of the other guitars and keyboards but I get overwhelmed quickly. Then we started shopping for jeans. I have been told by my family and friends that my jeans are less than flatteringly baggy. So I was faced with the arduous task of actually trying on pants and looking at myself in a mirror. It was surprisingly difficult and I only found one pair that seemed to fit comfortably but not be loose in clown proportions. However, I did find a cool linen jacket and almost a 1/2 dozen shirts. Counting the jeans I spent more than $160. That’s $150 more than I’m really comfortable spending on clothes but I don’t buy clothes but once every few-nty years. We also purchased some groceries and I purchased a toy for my granddaughter. Toys for granddaughter cause me to make choices in packaging and sweat shop labor production which I highly disapprove.
Sat afternoon I got a good chunk of yard work in, in spite of some rain. My first real significant effort of the year and really overdue. Got a good visit with Pop and Kay too. Watched basketball in the evening mostly because I was intimidated by the job of restringing the instruments. Began reading Doug Fine’s “Farewell MySuburu” (www.dougfine.com).
Sunday morning I did the church thing. Played mandolin on two tunes and this time made sure that the soundperson had me in the mix. Got lots of compliments on the playing which I tried to accept without too much self loathing. Was nothing too great – scale noodling kinda things. But provided something new to their ears. Had breakfast with wifey. Headache came on. Medicated and listened to music samples on internet I had noted during the weak. Got headache under control. Went to pickup a little phone table wifey had purchased at an estate sale. Then she wanted me to go look at some other end tables in Martindale. She purchased them but I will pick them up later. What is her problem with tables anyway?
On the way back I saw my baby brother’s suburban pulled over the other side of the highway and he was walking away from it. It looked like maybe he had lost a hub cap. Do cars even have hub caps anymore? I pulled over and he explained his daughter had been driving this way earlier in her Passat and a broken signal light housing had come off her car in that area. So he pulled the tailgate down my my truck and I crept along the shoulder so he could look for the taillight. No luck.
That afternoon I watched “our” team lose to the Cardinals in the NCAA basketball tournament and dozed. Had dinner with friends in a whole other “Old Austin” at El Gallo. That’s two times into Austin in one weekend and without medication! Well I did have a vodka tonic before dinner.
Addendum. This morning on my way to work I stopped to contribute to our petroleum based doom. I have for the past months been refusing to put more than $50 into Old Blue (1998 F150 gas guzzler – HEY ITS PAID FOR!) at a time. Unfortunately that has still been almost once a week. This morning I had to fill up the two 5 gal plastic gas tanks used to fuel my other green house gas destroying engines – lawn mowers etc. Total bill $75. Geez. But what really makes this story sad is that in my morning fog I forgot to put the tailgate up. I realized it some 15 to 20 miles into my commute to work. I pulled over to inspect and I had lost one of the gas tanks. I drove back along my route all the way back to the gas station hoping to find the tank. Not so much for the $12.50 worth of gas in it as rueing that I had polluted and possible created a driving hazard as well. No such luck. !@#$$! !@!@#! 1@# !@!@#%^^.
