Blah, blah, blah

Been too tired and too busy to give much of an update lately. Besides, I don't think anyone's reading this thing :P

First, an update on the car. I picked it up yet again after they replaced what turned out to be a faulty speed sensor in the transmission. Yes, a faulty speed sensor in my brand-new transmission. Fine, I get it, the check engine light stays off, and I'm good to go.

Until the next morning when I manage to back it out of the garage but can't get it to move forward once I put it in drive. This is the worst it's ever been; I've always been able to get the car to hobble around at 25 or 30mph at least. We're talking dead stop here and I was blocking the private drive that my other neighbors need to use to get to the street. Finally, after revving the car to 6500rpms (dangerously close to the red part of the tachometer at 7000rpms) I finally manage to get the car back into the driveway. Had to have it towed back to Honda AGAIN.

When I walked in I told the service guy, "No offense, but I'm really sick of seeing you guys." I mean, c'mon, I'd been there 3 or 4 times already in a matter of days. Got back into the same stupid Chevy Cobalt rental and drove away. Turns out they hadn't tightened a bolt enough and the transmission fluid had leaked out. It's really lucky that I made it all the way home with that problem and it didn't manifest itself until the morning when I was safely in my driveway. I miss my Honda service people out in Menlo Park; they were great, none of this shoddy work crap.

Nonetheless, we did decide to put off the new car purchase for now. The Civic seems to be driving OK again (finally) and the prices weren't as good as we expected them to be this time of year. I pretty much decided I wanted an A4 but they weren't budging much on their new or certified used prices so I said forget it. Incidentally, car shopping isn't much fun. Thank goodness for W's gearhead brain to protect me from doing something stupid out of a sheer desire to just get the buying process over with. So, hopefully the little Civic will hang in there for a bit.

On the bright side until very recently the temps here have been in the 60s. Definitely atypical for New England in November. It's dipped into the 40s during the day in the last couple of days, but it's supposed to go back up a bit I think. I'm glad the area weather gods are taking it easy on me for my first winter back on the East Coast.

Did you all have a nice Thanksgiving? It was great to be with my family again for the holiday since I haven't celebrated Turkey Day with them in six years. I made two pies: pumpkin and chocolate cheesecake. Both went over pretty well. I also made 44 sweet potato and bean burritos...yum! We all ate a ton on Thursday only to get together again for more food on Saturday to celebrate little cousin J.'s fourth birthday. He's a little monster--way too much energy, short-tempered, and willful, but with a dimple that never fails to charm.