Okay, this is in no way to make my husband, parents, or other loved ones feel bad about any shopping they’ve already done…I’m just wishing…and may be wishing for many of these for many many years.

1. a few bottles of the champagne that we had a few days after Cooper was born…I have NO idea what it was, since I was well medicated and sleep deprived, but it was one of the best I’ve ever had…ever (Justin, you just may need to consider this for my b-day in January since I know you’re already done shopping for me for Christmas)
2. a 2-hour massage…with the sleep deprivation and back-to-back illnesses these lovely children have been sharing with me, I could use a good, long back rub, with the permission to pass out immediately afterwards
3. my credit card company’s computers to blow up and lose all record of the total amount I owe them
4. a new car…considering a Hyundai Tuscon or something else with a spectacular warranty since I do not have any luck with cars
5. longer vacation time from work to visit family that I miss…and who haven’t gotten a chance to meet Cooper, or even Gavin, for that matter
6. two or three straight nights of good, restful sleep…no kids, no cats, no dogs…maybe no husband (although he bothers me the least, except when he snores)
7. homemade chex mix…I’m totally NOT kidding…I’ve been jonesing for it for a few weeks now and am too lazy (and busy!) to make my own and the premade stuff is just not that good
8. a shorter commute…whether because I have a new job, or traffic lightens up, I don’t care…I am just REALLY tired of being in my car nearly 3 hours a day (and I’m kind of annoyed at myself when I snarl at people who complain about being in the car for 30 minutes for their commute)
9. a relaxing trip with my husband to wineries in California…Napa Valley, Sonoma, doesn’t matter…just would like to drink wine with my husband like adults
10. new carpet for my family room and upstairs hallway, although I’d be happy with a good old fashioned (free) steam-cleaning, eh Stanley Steemer?
11. A month’s reprieve from litterbox duty.  Even when I was pregnant, I would suit up and scoop out.  So…a month off and meanwhile someone else will lovingly clean the litterboxes instead.
12. a fantastic steak dinner with a wonderful caesar salad and wine
13. more time with my husband and kids

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I have been totally slacking in the Blogging Department.  Let me add that I have been totally slacking in the Cooking, Cleaning, Mother, Wife, Employee, Reading-Other-Blogs, and Breathing-Without-Coughing-and-Gagging Departments as well.  That is because I was struck down with bronchitis (heh, you’d think I had diphtheria or something).  Meanwhile, my healthy and illustrious industrious not-very-busy husband has been blogging away here and there, and all around the square, saying “catch me if you can”.  No.  Not really.  Well, yes, he’s really been blogging and taking pictures and such, but not really quoting lines from “Frosty the Snowman”.  Well, maybe, I don’t pay attention to what he says in his sleep.

So yes, I had bronchitis.  Gavin had a little cold for like three days and was fine.  Cooper had the croup for well over a week, kept me up middle of the night for over two weeks, but has gotten better finally and is starting to get back into a better sleeping pattern at night.  This entire time I had a little cold that got worse and worse and worse, especially when I can only get 2 of sleep at a time due to my lovely children ganging up on me.  Eventually, bronchitis took over and made for a fun and noisy holiday weekend.

But with a nice Z-pack from the doctor, I am feeling considerably better, though still sound wonderfully nasally…not that I didn’t already have a nasally/shrill voice…but it is so much more nasal…and deep, too.  Really sexy stuff, I tell you.  Reminded me of the episode of Friends where Monica was sick but was trying to be sexy because I think her and Chandler were trying to get pregnant, and proclaimed she was “in duh pwime ob mah libe” while feverish and covered in Vicks vapor-rub.  Only I’m not looking for anything except some sleep.

I mentioned briefly earlier that weird , like a lot of things in life, is relative.  I heard this from Mike Warnke, a Christian comedian, back when I was still a kid.  I took it to heart because it was so stinkin’ true.  I hope Mr. Warnke doesn’t mind that I roughly plagiarize paraphrase this because it’s still a pretty funny bit:

Weirdness is a relative concept.  What happens to you may not be weird to you, but it may be weird to me.

Think about it.  If normal things happen to normal people, that’s normal, right?  And if weird things happen to normal people, that’s weird, right?  So then if weird things happen to weird people, that would be normal, right?  Which means that if normal things happen to weird people, that would be weird.  Thus, weirdness is a relative concept.

So in light of that, it makes you wonder if the weird things that I encounter are actually weird or not, because I’m already a little strange, and I’m pretty sure those weird things don’t really happen to normal people, or at least they’d think they’re weird too…maybe even weirder than I think of them.  Hmmm….  something to think about, folks!

Yep…it was the ignition coils located within the ignition housing in-between the two sets of spark plugs.  There was electricity arching between the coils causing a short, which caused the misfires on plugs 1 and 3.  When our garage guy, Brendan, was showing us (with my old coils and housing) what was going on, it was incredibly interesting…and we could see how it was nearly impossible to see this happening without tearing the car into a gajillion pieces.  I blame GM for their really crappy design flaw that would (1) allow the coils to be so stinkin’ close together to tempt them into arching electricity and (2) having such a cheap plastic creation instead of a more robust and reliable ignition set-up.  So they replaced the ignition coils, the housing, and all four spark plugs (they were due soon anyways).  And it cost less than the ignition module (aka computer thingy that controls the ignition).

 But it works great now!  So my offer is still on the table–$4,000 or Best Offer (and it better be good…I think I’m still paying off the waterpump and timing kit from this spring!!!).  Great little car for a teenager who needs to just drive to school or their after-school job, or for someone to putter around town in instead of their big gas-guzzling SUV.  Any takers?  Huh?  Huh?

No?  Okay…well…it’s out there.  I know someone will love it.  And if not, then someone in West Virginia will end up buying it off of a dealer for like $6,000.  You know how those dealers like to mark up a used car!

Well, I may be kind of quiet the rest of the weekend…I need to upgrade my WordPress because I am now some backhills hilljack who doesn’t know nothin’ about no interweb!  Also, depending on what kind of fun we encounter at dinner tomorrow at our friend’s house.  Yeah, I’ll just be rippin’ on someone else’s family for a change.

So Happy Turkey-Day, Y’All!!!

Hey, it’s a great little car…when it runs!!!

Friday night, I pick up the kids from daycare and pick-up Justin from our house so that we can go pick up his truck from the shop.  He had a bunch of well-needed maintenance work done and the shop we go to are great about letting us pay over the phone and pick the car up after-hours (since I usually don’t get home until around 6:30pm).

Justin gets in the car, he’s in a great mood.  Gavin’s happy to see Daddy and Cooper is sleeping.  We go to the shop, pick up the truck, Gavin jumps in with Justin, and we head out for the 6-mile or so trip back home.  While waiting at a light, my car stutters a second.  I think “hmmm…that’s weird” and put it in neutral until the light changes.  I then put it in drive and gently ease it through the intersection.  About half-way through, it starts stuttering and shuddering and stops responding well to my increased pressure on the gas pedal (hey, just wanted out of harm’s way).  My traction light comes on (tells me that the fancy traction thing that keeps me from sliding all over the road in bad conditions is not working) and my yellow Check-Engine light starts blinking.  I throw on my hazards, call Justin (who was, by now, 1/2 mile in front of me), and tell him I’m breaking down and I’m pulling into a Burger King.  He’s very calm over the phone, which was a good thing, since I was panicking because I was starting to lose my power-breaks.  As I’m waiting to turn left into the restaurant, the car continues to get noisy (like it lost its muffler or something) and shuddering worse.  I see a big break in oncoming traffic and prayed a little prayer to get past safely.  As I hit the gas and turned, I felt the car shudder again and I lost my power-steering, too, and had to nearly stand on the gas to not only make it through two lanes of traffic, but to also give me more leverage to turn the silly car so that I didn’t hit the curb instead.

So I get into the parking lot of the Burger King and was literally rocking back-and-forth in an effort to will my car to continue forward towards a parking space (and not the driving areas of the lot).  I rolled into a space…well, over a couple of spaces…and couldn’t get the silly thing any farther.  So I put it in park, turned it off, sent up a prayer to God for keeping Cooper and I safe while I tried to cross that busy traffic, then promptly burst into tears.

I’m not exactly sure why I started crying, although I know I was annoyed when Justin asked me.  I guess I was scared because it broke down while I had one of the kids with me, scared because we REALLY don’t have the money for what seems like another costly repair (we’ve already sunk over $2500 into the silly thing since April), upset because we’re really budgeted tightly right now with our giant increase in daycare expenses, annoyed because I really try to make sure I take care of this car so that it will last us a while because we’re not at a point where we can afford a car payment right now (it’s paid-off) or the increase in insurance that a newer car would bring, and sad because I really do like my little car but I just cannot trust it as much anymore, it seems.  So literally, that entire paragraph went through my head and out it came as tears and steering-wheel beatings. Also, nasty oaths about leaving it in a bad part of town where someone who won’t love it as much will take it and defile it and put a really funky-huge non-manufacturer endorsed spoiler, like this one.

So really, if anyone wants a little car to putter around to-and-from the grocery store, or for short commutes (less than my 60-mile/day commute), just contact me.  According to Kelley Blue Book, it’s worth about $4,600 once I have it repaired.  I’m willing to sell it at $4,000 because I know if I try to trade it in, the Dealer will screw me big-time even though the car is in excellent shape (besides the silly non-running thing right now).  Here’s a list of all the great attributes of my little car:

• it is a 2001 Chevy Cavalier LS, 2.4 L sport engine, four doors, good paint, indigo blue, clean grey cloth interior with a rear spoiler (extra sporty!), and that increased traction control thing I talked about earlier
• it’s got a CD player and a cassette player, power windows, power locks
• about 84,500 miles (highway miles, baby!)
• tires are 2-1/2 years old, but are in EXCELLENT condition…we’re stunned at how great the tread looks on the tires considering how long they’ve been on the car
• brakes and rotors done last fall…still in great working condition
• new water-pump, timing kit and belts, and new battery in April
• new body control module (aka electronic computer thingy) in July…three days before I gave birth to Cooper
• it parks nicely into small spots
• has working heat and a/c
• when I don’t have all my crap in the car, it comfortably seats four adults (or two adults and two car seats, or any variation there-of, although not three car seats cuz then one would be in front and that is just bad, bad, bad)
• uncomfortably seats five adults (or three adults and two car seats, or four adults and one car seat)
• new ignition module (aka ignition computer thingy) nope…back to square one…new ignition module doesn’t make a lick of difference…going to return useless ignition module and hit Plan B–tear the thing into five bazillion trillion and ten pieces and see what else it could be

So everyone, be sure to go out to your garage, your assigned parking spot, or wherever you park your vehicle, and be sure to give your well-behaved car a hug.  And prayers for my problem-child car would be greatly appreciated (as well as a bake-sale or candy-sale to raise funds for repairs…I also wouldn’t mind some wine right now so that I am prepared for the shop calling me with the repair quote).