why hast thou forsaken me, lincoln mercury dealership?

See, I brought my car in for a few minor repairs the other day and they called back and said, "Yeah, you need X dollars of repairs done," and I responded with a demure "WHAT?!" and tried not to hit my head on the counter while passing out in the kitchen. Ok, so I didn't pass out, but I almost did, since X dollars was darn near the amount of money I have in my bank account, and also a good chunk of what it cost to buy my fabulous mildly ghetto station wagon in the first place. I managed to tell them that I'd have to call them back, and then responded the way any rational, mature, self-assured grown woman would: I called my father and freaked out.

Anyway, one day later, I've picked up the car and it seems to run and it's got, well, a third of the repairs they said needed to be done completed. They wanted me to pay over three hundred dollars to replace my windshield wipers because the slowest speed won't work! Eff that! They're all, "I can't pass your inspection without it," and I was all, "Well fine, I'll just get the inspection done somewhere less thorough, buddy." Maybe I didn't use those exact words. But really, who needs that lowest speed on the windshield wipers? You can just turn them on manually every three seconds and have the same effect! I'm sure doing them manually also burns at least ten calories and boosts one's hand-eye coordination! Or something.

Anyway, it was all very dramatic and scary and why am I sharing this with you? Because I live a very boring life and these are the things I have to talk about. And also, if I die in a fiery crash anytime in the next few days, you'll have learned a valuable lesson: always listen to your Lincoln Mercury dealership.

I will be very upset if I die in a fiery crash sometime in the next few days because, well, I'll be dead, but also because I will have died before The Big Trip. This trip could also be known as The Trip Which Causes Me To Question My Sanity since, well, I have very little money and no long-term employment and look! There I go! Jetting down the Eastern seaboard! Because *NSYNC is there!

I maintain that I never took a really fun Spring Break vacation while in college and I deserve one, dammit. The only time I went away from home, I went to Milwaukee. MILWAUKEE. I was visiting a friend and it was a trip that cost money and took up time, but again, it was Milwaukee. Does that even count?

(Not that Milwaukee isn't a fine city and all that, but for Spring Break? You get what I'm saying.)

I'm very excited about my trip! I keep having nightmares that I'll forget my glasses or my contacts, or my contact lens solution, or any one part of my four-step skin care regime. Lots of stuff I can't forget. I think the idea of backpacking around Europe is very cool and quite romantic, but I'd need a wrestler to carry around my backpack, considering all the things I'd need to carry. I'm very high maintenance, which is kind of pathetic since after all the high maintenance, the finished product isn't all that shiny and impressive. It's more dull and unobtrusive. But I work hard to be dull and unobtrusive, dammit! It takes EFFORT to not be The Blotchy Mustached Girl when you come from Black Irish stock!

In other skin-related news: I went to my brother's baseball game the other night and managed to get a bit of a sunburn, which was annoying in and of itself, but even more annoying because it was only on the left side of my body. And also, I was wearing my big sunglasses and so I have a big pale sunglasses imprint on the sunburned side of my face. It's really quite the look. Thankfully, the sunburn is fading with little peeling and the sunglass imprint is barely visible. There's a story with a happy ending.

Another story with a happy ending: tonight my brother's American Legion team won the county championship, probably the last baseball game I'll see him play. The district championship's this weekend and I'll be away, and he doesn't think he'll play in college, so tonight was probably it, and it's so strange! I've been watching Jimmy play baseball since he was five and they needed coaches to tell the players which way to run after hitting the ball, and now they're out there turning four double plays in four innings, throwing out base-stealers, laying down sacrifice bunts and all that. And now it's probably over, which is kind of sad but happy too, because rah rah! They won! And Jimmy's ready to move on, so I suppose I have to be, too.