Don’t be so impatient.

Our usual commute to work takes us by the entrance to an elementary school. Teacher work days, school recesses and holidays are the nicest drive to work days, so much less traffic. I love summer because all the chauffeur Moms are still at home and I hate winter because besides the usual lack of attention paid to the road, things are compounded by putting on coats and hats and wiping off the fogged up windows.

The entrance and exit from the school parking lot is the same road which T’s into a road with a speed limit of 45MPH. Of course there is a steady stream of traffic from both directions to get into the school. The folks leaving the school and are going right usually have no problem, it is the left turn folks that are a danger. About once a week somebody pulls out in front of me because they assume that everyone is going to be turning left into the school. They get impatient if they have to wait more than 2 minutes to get a clear lane to turn into. No way they would go right and just make the extra 1/2 loop to get back home….

Screws Loose

It is still dark in the morning (sunrise 7:30 am, leave house at 7:00) so we got to watch the blue gages in their full glory on the morning commute. Everything looked AOK. I was worried last night after I shut the car down, I don’t remember the temp gage flopping that far to the left with the key off. I did get a surprise though, when I put the car in reverse to back out of the garage a couple of screws landed at my feet. I had forgot to put the last 2 screws that hold the hood over the gages on. no worries as there were a couple of clips holding it in place, I’ll screw them in tonight when I get home.

Today was cloudy, but warmer than yesterday. So we made a little extra trip out of the ride home. Didn’t have to run an errand, but what the heck, it meant a trip through an old section of town that has nice narrow, windy roads. 🙂

It Is Lunch Time Isn’t It?

Once a week my wife and I have a lunch “date” and leave the plant to go to a local fast food place to eat instead of the usual microwaved entree. Today we went to Popeye’s. We both like the food there, nice and spicy, it reminds us of when we lived in New Orleans. Should have guessed we were in trouble when there were 3 people waiting off to the side for their orders and two people still in front of us. They only had one person taking orders and one person handling the drive-up and judging by which the speed of the food was delivered to the patrons, only one person cooking. They should have had a few more people working being as it was 12:15 and the middle of lunch time.

Spicy Lunch Date

Sunny and mid 50’s for today’s lunch “date” with my wife. Today we went to Popeyes and I had their spicy chicken sandwich. No comparison, Popeyes was levels above last week’s Hardee’s spicy chicken sandwich.

Couldn’t wait until Saturday to put in the gage faces, did it tonight. The only problem I had was the location of the switch/dimmer. They suggested a place that my big foot would hit, so I moved it up and out of the way. Can’t get to it while driving, but once it is set who needs to adjust it.

Where’s the receipt?

The absolute greatest invention since self-service, has been the card reader on the pump. You no longer need to go inside and have to wait in line behind people buying cigarettes, lottery tickets, 64oz Giant Gulps or whatever. You just pull up, fill up and go. The stations without these new pumps are becoming rarer and rarer and if I stumble on one, I’ll just drive across the street.

Needed to get some gas today. When I was done and returned the pump handle, no receipt came out. So inside I went, ugh. The woman gave me some lame excuse about it being out of paper, but I know better. These corner quick stops must be losing a lot money in lost impulse buys with those pumps, so they are programmed to every once in awhile not print a receipt so that you have to go inside. While I waited for the person in front of me to pay for their gas, I used my superior will-power to not pick up a butane lighter or one of those rolled up astrology forecasts.

Cool Glowing

Yahoo! (the expression, not the service) Sunny and 60 at 4:00PM. We had haircut appointments at 5 and a whole hour to get there. Put the top down and went the loooong way. Had to put some gas in first though, $10.50 at $1.069.

Cool-Glo gages were on the doorstep when we got home. Probably won’t get to install them until Saturday, but I did take them out of the box, hook all the wires up and use a little 12v battery from a garage door opener to check them out. Nice green or blue glow, gonna be cool (hey, maybe that is how they got named.)

After that I’m thinking of Power Neon Cables in blue. (have you noticed I like blue?) There aren’t any links on where to buy the stuff. Wonder if anybody else carries it?

Invisible Customers

On the way home from work my wife and I stopped into the Food Lion on the way home, we needed one item. Once we got what we needed, we headed for the checkout lines. There was one right at the end of the aisle that we were coming down so we went there even though the light wasn’t on. There was a cashier and another employee on the register side and a “customer” on the other. They were all deep in conversation. As we got up to them my wife asked, “Are you open?” Perhaps they didn’t hear so we waited a bit and she asked again. Still no response. We turned around in dismay and headed over to 2 other aisles that had there lights on. The first one had no cashier at all and the other one was busy. We looked back down towards the three people at the one we just left and there was still no motion to move or acknowledge us, it was as if we were invisible. Needless to say we put down the item at the empty cash register and left the store. Plenty of other places to stop.

We ended up at a Bi-Lo near the house and got an over friendly cashier. (Almost as bad.)