Stuff

Today was my first day back to school for the semester. I have the same professor for Physics as I do for Differential Equations - strange. I hope he ends up being a good professor. I can already tell he puts too much emphasis on homework. Homework is purely for the benefit of the student, so I like the idea that you don't need to turn it in, and whether you do it or not is up to you, as if you don't, you typically won't be prepared for the exams. He collects every assignment, but at least he waits until exam days. He also cares about attendance. Ugh.I just got home from work. I felt like taking my boyfriend up on his Christmas present to me and going to pick out my new car stereo parts, but when I called him he was in a terrible mood. On the way home from work today, he hit something on the freeway. He was in the fast lane, and something flew out from under the car in front of him and hit my boyfriend's truck before he ran it over, making noise the all the way through. He just spent thousands of dollars on bodywork to the front of his truck to pimp it out. He got a new hood with a sweet scoop and new sleek mirrors (obviously not affected), but he also replaced the front bumper with a new piece, and another piece under that to mount fog lights. He had it all painted, too; it was beautiful. He's not sure how much damage there is, because it's dark, but the truck's definitely fucked up. He's not even sure if he'll be able to drive it, because some of the pieces look like they're pretty low down. I seriously hope that nothing besides the body is damaged. Unfortunately, he won't be fixing that right away because he still needs to take the truck somewhere that can diagnose his damn engine problem. Three times people have thought they "fixed" it, and it's still seriously out of whack. He's going to try a transmission shop next (the RPMs are going berserk), but the problem probably arises somewhere in how the computer system is reacting to his supercharger. I feel so bad for him. I didn't even get to take a picture of him with his truck, yet, like we planned. We're both having some bad luck with random catastrophes to our cars.

Next Car

When my Trans Am's paid off, I'm going to replace my current commuter car. I'm thinking of what car I actually want to get next. My two main options right now are the new Pontiac GTO and the new Subaru WRX STi. The GTO comes with 350 HP stock, 365 ft-lb torque, and has the LS1 5.7L V8 engine with rear-wheel drive that I love so much in my Trans Am. The six-speed manual is always good. The car is really non-flashy, and bears to resemblance to the original GTOs. It is more aesthetically similar to a Honda Civic than an American muscle car, which I am sure they did to increase sales as the younger generations aren't very impressed with doors that reach into the next zip code and surprisingly small interior size (my Trans Am is freaking beautiful, dammit). If I bought the GTO, that would be my third Pontiac in a row - strange. The Subaru WRX STi lacks horsepower, presence, that sexy two-door look I love so much, and has cheap interior, but in the last issue of Hot Rod, they demonstrated that, with its all-wheel drive, 2.5L turbocharged four-cylinder boxer engine with 300 HP, 300 ft-lb torque, actually outperformed the Mustang Cobra on the quarter-mile, and would no doubt cream any rear-wheel drive on a windy course. That all-wheel drive comes in handy. It's like a turbo-charged go-kart!Depending on where I'm living at the time my Trans Am is paid off (as that governs my financial state), I may just end up being conservative and getting a Toyota, because I can get those at cost - it's just no fun.

Blah!

I went to the company party by myself last night. I didn't feel like dressing up, so I wore jeans, a black top (which my boyfriend objected to, as he objects to me wearing any top that shows a remote sign of cleavage), a black jacket, and black Vans shoes. I arrived a few hours after it began, and the 2nd person who I ran into was the Vice President, who looked at my outfit disapprovingly (the jeans and shoes, not the top). I found my friends / employees there, and sat at their table just in time to catch a cheesy magic show. I took a few pictures of people, and snuck out the door before I actually interacted with anyone else. In total, I spoke to about 8 co-workers. Boy, was that a fun night.That night, my boyfriend stayed up all night playing Socom 2. He is majorly addicted. He didn't stop playing until 1 in the afternoon, and had decided that he would stay up the rest of the day so his sleep schedule doesn't get adversely affected. Then, at 2 he decided he wanted a "nap", and I was supposed to wake him up at 3, and we would wash our cars. I couldn't get him up until 5:30, when it was time to go out to dinner for my dad's birthday. My boyfriend had a headache, so he didn't want to sit near my mom, because she is uncontrollably LOUD, but as we were the last two to show up, we sat directly across from her. She drank a bottle of champagne by herself. We're home again now, and he is back asleep again. He does this every weekend, and always has a hell of a time getting to work on time on Mondays. He really needed his truck washed. He has has bird poop on it for about 2 weeks, and the hood is freshly painted.My brother and his best friend are planning to go to Vegas this weekend. I may go, but I'm not quite sure... my boyfriend may not want to go, because he is real adamant lately about his weekends being to relax, and it might be hard for me to talk him into going on a trip. We usually take his truck to Vegas, but it's having some transmission problems right now. I don't want to take my little car, because I don't trust it to hold up on a long drive. I don't want to take my Trans Am, because I don't like parking it in public parking lots. It's already been hit twice while parked, and I only have 9000 miles on it. The first scratch / dent (see picture here), was a $500 repair, and the second scratch is not repaired yet, because my boyfriend said he'd pay for it - the car was in his possession at the time, about one week after I got it back from the body shop from the first repair.Damn, I was supposed to get some cleaning done around here, but everything is such a mess!

Bored

I was so anxious to leave work today that I left work 45 minutes early, even though I didn't have any other plans tonight except to watch the new episode of SG-1 (LOVE that show) with my boyfriend. I got home and I've been pretty bored ever since. I should do laundry or something, but I kind of feel like doing absolutely nothing right now. This is my last free weekend before I have to go back to school. My boyfriend called me after work, and he's not going to be able to come over here. He had a hard time driving to his house, and he could barely keep his eyes open (we were up really late last night), so he thinks it would be too dangerous to drive over to my house (~17 miles). I guess I'll be watching SG-1 by myself tonight. What an eventful Friday evening.I have to go to my company's annual party tomorrow. My boyfriend won't go with me. I don't think it's fun, and neither does he, and thus refuses to go. I guess I'll be going there by myself, too... but I was considering taking one of my guy friends, one of my brother's friends, or one of my boyfriend's friends as a fill-in date. That sounds like too much work and planning, though. I'll probably just go by myself, stay a short time, and return home.I had my windshield replaced in my small car today. My parents replaced the windshield as a Christmas present. I felt slightly bad, though, when my boss called me while I was still at home and told me the windshield company was already at my work to replace my windshield. I was 1.25 hours late for work, not at all unusual for me. He ended up leaving and coming back later in the day, and wasn't cranky about it at all. :) That's always good. So now my windshield is all sparkly, new, and not cracked. One thing that sticks out in my mind from today is that the windshield guy asked me, "so what do you do around here? secretarial work?" Oh my god! Well, I know he was fixing my cheaper car, but that makes me wonder if he assumed it because I was a woman, because I don't look bright, because I don't dress or convey an incredibly professional demeanor, because the car is on the "cheap" side, or what? Pretty much, any of those besides the worth of the car are marred rationale. I don't think even think the car rationale is reasonable, as at my work, one Ph.D. drives a old, beat Toyota, the Ph.D. who directs our synthetic chemistry division drives a standard Toyota Corolla, and the Director of my department (Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs) drives an 80's model Toyota Celica and an '84 Toyota Pick-up truck. Oh well, at least my poor little neglected car is getting some attention and much-needed maintenance.That reminds me... I read a disturbing survey in a pharmaceutical magazine I subscribe to. They held their first ever salary survey. The results of people in my position were slightly out of balance. The overall average salary was $101 K + (the highest option), while the average salary for women was $70 K to $80 K. The other average is an overall average, so even with the majority of women being under that, they did not pull the overall average down from $101 K. It appears there is still unfairness in the workplace.Aww, I just remembered that my boyfriend was going to let me take pictures of him this afternoon, with his truck. Damn - I hope he lets me take them later, because he normally avoids cameras at all costs, while I love to gather pictures of people I love (mainly myself though - is it wrong to love yourself? No!).Update: I called him and woke him up after SG-1, and he came over here in time to catch the next replay of it with me. Now he's playing SOCOM 2. :)

Computers

I don't know if any of you work with computers all day - but damn - you don't realize how much you actually use them at work until the network goes down.Today we had a worm infect my company's intranet, and we had to do our best to accomplish something without the use of the network, internet, printing, or e-mail. It was pretty bad. Not only did I have to try to find tasks I could accomplish without the help of my little electronic friend, but I had to try to keep my staff of 5 people busy all day. They brought in our entire IT department from a site a couple cities away and cleared the problem just as I was leaving for the day, so I'm glad I won't have to deal with that tomorrow. Damn I love computers. I like the era I was born into. The numerous advantages over our parents' and grandparents' generations make me very appreciative of our current technology... even though I'm pretty sure if my future children or grandchildren read this they'd be laughing uncontrollably at me and the primitive environment I was raised in.

Doing Nothing

I'm just sitting her procrastinating going over to my boyfriend's house - I usually like going over there, but he received Final Fantasy 10-2 for Christmas, so he'll likely be playing it the entire time I'm there. He was very good about not playing it on Christmas day, though - it must have killed him to leave it sitting in the box so long. He's the biggest video game fanatic I've ever known.I took my little car to the dealer today, hoping that they will find the problem with the brakes. At low speeds, it's been locking, unlocking, locking, etc. in quick succession for almost a year now, and no one can ever find the problem, but it is a little disturbing when I start skidding through a stop sign. When that gets back, I'm going to take the Trans Am in, because when I hit the brakes in that car at high speeds, the steering column vibrates. I don't know what the deal with my brakes are... I mean, I hardly ever stop - my 6 speeding tickets show that.My boyfriend bought me a new stereo for the little car for Christmas - I had originally spent a few thousand on that stereo, but it's almost completely dead, and I want to upgrade to an MP3 player anyway, because I'm too lazy to change CDs. My brother bought me K&N intake for my Trans Am, and he'll be installing it this weekend. My parents are donating towards the cause of repairing my brakes, and I got some miscellaneous pajamas, socks, hair things, and make-up from parents (mine and my boyfriend's).I haven't done anything productive so far on my Christmas break, but it feels pretty good... I keep feeling like I should be accomplishing something, though - damn nagging feelings.

Political

Where do you fall on the liberal - conservative political spectrum? (United States) brought to you by QuizillaStrange - Apparently I'm conservative. I wonder how accurate this thing is.