i love me a two-hour delay

probably because they felt guilty about not giving us a delay on wednesday, mason city schools called early this morning, saying we didn't have to be at school until 9 today. glory! the only thing that would have made it better were if i had found out before i had showered and gotten dressed. but i'm not complaining - at least i wasn't already on my way to school.

and with a two-hour delay, i get to do one of my favourite things - go to morning prayers. something i desperately need. been an exhausting couple of days - i was in bed by 9:00 last night. haven't done that since...well, so long ago i cannot even remember. only one day this week was i home before 6 pm. waiting for new tires monday, academic team wednesday, film club thursday. and i'll probably go try and get an oil change and alignment this afternoon. we'll see.

i know you're sitting there reading, thinking, "tires? why did you need tires?" on saturday, on the way home from celebrating my mom's birthday (yay mom!), my left front tire decided it was tired (sorry, couldn't resist) and literally shed its skin and went bad. i sat on route 4 across from eastwood lake for a good two hours before help arrived. i called my mazda roadside support, who originally said i was covered, but then said i needed to give them $65 to have someone come help me get my tire off. i had jacked up lorelai and gotten the lugnuts off but the tire would not budge. turns out i need to buy a rubber mallet so i can crawl under the car and whack the tire until it comes off. gee, thanks for making it easy, mazda. what's the point of having a spare if you can't get the tire off? anyway, i finally got home after driving on the donut (bad, bad, i know) and figured i better just get all four tires replaced since winter was on its way and my tires were abysmal in the snow. so i went to tire discounters monday. who told me it would be a two hour wait for new tires and an alignment but only an hour for just the tires and i could get the alignment later. so i went with the latter option so i could get home at a decent hour. an hour and 45 minutes and $715 later, i had four new tires. just what everyone wants right before christmas. to make it worse, when i went back to try and get the alignment done, the wait was now 4 hours. no thanks.

speaking of christmas, i'm not there yet. my tree's not up and i haven't even begun shopping and laurie's christmas party is tomorrow and i have yet to get my exchange gift. this year i'm acutely aware of the overwhelming consumerism surrounding christmas and am just not feeling it. hopefully that will fade soon. i do love christmas and would hate to see it spoiled by my inner scrooge.

been reading coupland's latest, the gum thief. this is the longest it has ever taken me to finish one of his books. not sure if it's the book or if it's just my life right now, but i cannot seem to read more than a few pages at a time. probably a combination of both. i already know i'm going to have to reread it before making any judgments. the list has been pretty quiet about it, other than a slew of reviews from publications posted (well, except for anne's lovely review). cannot say it's blown me away, but i think that has more to do where i am right now than the book itself. it's why i'm a big proponent of rereading - we're never the same person we were when we read it the first time.

need to get going. didn't hear back from CMT about my audition, so no call backs for me. not surprised - i'm not really lead character material. could still make it as a fork or something i suppose. we'll see. my biggest asset is my ability to sing bass - most of your musical theatre boys are baritone/tenors. not me. i prefer to rumble. anyway. more waiting. we'll see what happens.

ok, to kroger, then to prayers, then to school. i wish every morning were like this. but no, we have to start at the ungodly and unhealthy time. not that i'm bitter or anything....
Æ

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