I have never purchased a new car in my life. Adopting someone else’s misery always seemed like a better deal than bringing home a brand new, expensive, depreciating baby.
Today we brought home our newly adopted child. A 2004 Honda Odyssey. It’s roomy and actually has some git up and go. I drive it like a teenager who drives his parents', well, minivan. I admit that I like driving it. I also admit that I like Helen Reddy music.
But to purchase this van we had to get rid of Doug’s Car. We swaddled it up and left it at the dealership doorstep. They said they would find a home for my baby.
Suckers. They just spent the worst $500 of their lives!
My poor little ‘95 Honda Civic. It held up so well over the past eight years. The 10,000 miles between oil changes. The watered down anti-freeze. The watered down break fluid. I abused that poor car. Acton reminded me of when he and I left a club one frigid winter night and as we sat freezing in the car, I revved the engine to the red line to heat it up. He said I was killing the engine. I said, it’s a Honda.
I slept in the back seat when I had had two too many. I slept in the trunk when I had many too many.
Right there at the end the clutch began to give up on life. The clutch was so bad, the sales guy at the dealership asked me to drive it around to the service garage because it kept stalling on him. As I shut it off, I realized that there was probably 1/100th of a tank of gas left. I timed it perfectly.
Some 16 year old kid is going to get a terrific Christmas present this year. As a matter of fact, I can almost squeeze the first bit of the 12 days of Christmas out of it:
Five fuses blown
Four balding tires
Three quarts low of oil
Two taillights out
And a spare tire with a big fat hole
Three years ago, I got a flat. I threw on the spare and drove off. An hour later, I went through a pothole and my spare went flat. I was only a mile from home so I drove on the spare. For the next three years, that spare was flat in the trunk of my car. As my tires began to bald and show the furry metallic signs of steel belt, I started to think I might need to get my spare fixed. Instead, I traded my car in.
Welcome to the family, 2004 Honda Odyssey. Godspeed 1995 Honda Civic. Join your brother, 1988 Honda Civic, in that great big Möbius Strip race track in the sky.
Today is the first day of the rest of your life
We bought a mini-van.
I just pulled my pants up a little higher and ate a bowl of Fiber One for breakfast.
I just pulled my pants up a little higher and ate a bowl of Fiber One for breakfast.
Ohio State vs Michigan
It’s Ohio State vs Michigan week.
And oddly enough, for the 3rd year in a row, I have a business trip to Guam that leaves at 2:00pm on the Saturday of the OSU v Michigan game. The business trip returns sometime Sunday morning, depending on flights and customs.
Sadly, the trinkets and post cards at the Guam Duty Free Shop are overpriced and I never seem to bring any home.
I do have a series of photos of me there last year. Miss Sally always asks to see the photographs.
Here I am on Mucholohi Beach:
Here I am participating in a native dance ritual:
Here I am at a local street fair:
Looks like it's going to be another boring trip again this year. I'll try and bring back a shell or something. Unless I forget again.
Go Buckeyes!
And oddly enough, for the 3rd year in a row, I have a business trip to Guam that leaves at 2:00pm on the Saturday of the OSU v Michigan game. The business trip returns sometime Sunday morning, depending on flights and customs.
Sadly, the trinkets and post cards at the Guam Duty Free Shop are overpriced and I never seem to bring any home.
I do have a series of photos of me there last year. Miss Sally always asks to see the photographs.
Here I am on Mucholohi Beach:
Here I am participating in a native dance ritual:
Here I am at a local street fair:
Looks like it's going to be another boring trip again this year. I'll try and bring back a shell or something. Unless I forget again.
Go Buckeyes!
Kingy's Pizza Pub
The dudes got together last night at Kingy’s Pizza Pub. I know it is very lame to have a name for your group of friends, but it’s less generic than “the guys” and we all know who we are including when we say dudes. (And I’m not capitalizing dudes because Dudes would be completely faggy.) We would have chosen a cooler name but “Booze Hounds” was taken and the number in “Fab 5” isn’t large enough to encompass the group.
Kingy’s Pizza is in Canal Winchester, right off of 33. It’s almost dead center between Columbus and Lancaster so it’s a convenient place for everyone to meet. Except for Tony who lives up in Delaware, OH. And Doob who’s in Chicago. And for Kit because he’s Kit and can't seem to find his front door.
During our high school years, many of us thought Kingy’s was a gay hangout. Not due to any fault of Kingy’s. There was a rest stop in close proximity that was labeled by the locals as Lollipop Park. Gay people or freaks would go there to hook up. There were a number of complaints and sadly, Lollipop Park was shut down, requiring people that had to pee and gays alike to keep their legs crossed until they got to Columbus. Kingy’s got a bad rap and we idiotically avoided the place.
Right after high school Greg worked at a vending machine company and he would collect money and fix vending machines and video games. One of the places on his route was Kingy’s. One day, someone mentioned Kingy’s. Greg perked up. “They’ve got great food there.” We were all stunned. You eat at Kingy’s? He explained that it was on his route and that if he timed it right, he could get there around noon and stay for lunch.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha! You are gay! You go to Kingy’s and you actually eat there! Fag!
Greg tried to argue that is was NOT a gay hangout and the food was really good. We did not listen and continued to make fun of him for the next five years.
The intersection that Kingy’s was built near went under construction a few years back. It was determined that Kingy’s would need to be torn down for the new overpass to be built. The owners decided to re-build on the opposite side of Rte 33 off of Diley road. Handsome Joe lived around the corner from there and came back with a scouting report:
Hotties. Smoking hotties everywhere. I had to go check it out.
After dredging up all the old Greg is gay jokes, we decided that the dudes would meet at Kingy’s. Handsome Joe was right. All the waitresses were smoking hot. (I’m not going to go into the details of what standards are used in Central Ohio to judge hotness. For rural Ohio, these girls were 9s and 10s when graded on a curve.) I believe that Canal Winchester has a policy of giving the smoking hot, high school graduate girls a diploma, a slap on the ass and a Kingy’s t-shirt so they can start working that night. Needless to say, we were all awestruck and a few hours later, drunk and awestruck.
Now that Fat Cat’s Pizza sucks, Kingy’s pizza is at the top of my list. Just don’t get it to go. Eat it there. Slowly.
Apologies to Greg for all the gay comments. Apologies to the owners of Kingy’s that we incorrectly made fun of your restaurant all those years. And apologies to our hot waitress last night who had to serve a group of loud guys who stayed until closing and still call themselves dudes.
Kingy’s Pizza is in Canal Winchester, right off of 33. It’s almost dead center between Columbus and Lancaster so it’s a convenient place for everyone to meet. Except for Tony who lives up in Delaware, OH. And Doob who’s in Chicago. And for Kit because he’s Kit and can't seem to find his front door.
During our high school years, many of us thought Kingy’s was a gay hangout. Not due to any fault of Kingy’s. There was a rest stop in close proximity that was labeled by the locals as Lollipop Park. Gay people or freaks would go there to hook up. There were a number of complaints and sadly, Lollipop Park was shut down, requiring people that had to pee and gays alike to keep their legs crossed until they got to Columbus. Kingy’s got a bad rap and we idiotically avoided the place.
Right after high school Greg worked at a vending machine company and he would collect money and fix vending machines and video games. One of the places on his route was Kingy’s. One day, someone mentioned Kingy’s. Greg perked up. “They’ve got great food there.” We were all stunned. You eat at Kingy’s? He explained that it was on his route and that if he timed it right, he could get there around noon and stay for lunch.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha! You are gay! You go to Kingy’s and you actually eat there! Fag!
Greg tried to argue that is was NOT a gay hangout and the food was really good. We did not listen and continued to make fun of him for the next five years.
The intersection that Kingy’s was built near went under construction a few years back. It was determined that Kingy’s would need to be torn down for the new overpass to be built. The owners decided to re-build on the opposite side of Rte 33 off of Diley road. Handsome Joe lived around the corner from there and came back with a scouting report:
Hotties. Smoking hotties everywhere. I had to go check it out.
After dredging up all the old Greg is gay jokes, we decided that the dudes would meet at Kingy’s. Handsome Joe was right. All the waitresses were smoking hot. (I’m not going to go into the details of what standards are used in Central Ohio to judge hotness. For rural Ohio, these girls were 9s and 10s when graded on a curve.) I believe that Canal Winchester has a policy of giving the smoking hot, high school graduate girls a diploma, a slap on the ass and a Kingy’s t-shirt so they can start working that night. Needless to say, we were all awestruck and a few hours later, drunk and awestruck.
Now that Fat Cat’s Pizza sucks, Kingy’s pizza is at the top of my list. Just don’t get it to go. Eat it there. Slowly.
Apologies to Greg for all the gay comments. Apologies to the owners of Kingy’s that we incorrectly made fun of your restaurant all those years. And apologies to our hot waitress last night who had to serve a group of loud guys who stayed until closing and still call themselves dudes.
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