Pay Attention

I consider myself to be an alert driver with good defensive driving skills.  Last night, on my way to choir practice, being alert paid off.  I was in the right hand lane on 3rd Ave by the Civic Center, and passing a slower car that was in the left lane.  The speed limit is 30 mph on this road.  He was driving normally, but as I came up to him, something told me that I should pay attention to this car.  Sure enough, when my front seat was about even with his back seat, he started making a lane change into me.  Somehow, I was expecting this, and immediately hit the brakes and laid on the horn.  My tires squealed, and he quickly moved back to his lane, visibly shaken because he had no clue I was there.  My heart was racing from the close call, but I also found it amazing that right before this happened a little alarm went off in my head that told me to watch this guy closely, because he might not know I was there.

This was actually the second time in the past month that a person almost hit me because they didn’t check their blind spot before switching lanes.  The first incident had the potential to be much worse.  It was on Highway 52, in the rain, at 55 mph or so.  There is construction on that road through Rochester and the left lane has less than a foot of shoulder room and then concrete dividers, so I had nowhere to go.  I make a point not to hang around in a person’s blind spot, and to pass as quickly as I can.    I also try to always keep an eye on the traffic around me because I know there are a lot of bad drivers on the road.  Help me out though and make sure you check your blind spot before changing lanes. 

Bye Constantine

One of these things is not like the others, one of these things is Scott Savol.  I’m sorry, but Scott really needs to be going now.  Compared to the other Idols, he just doesn’t have the star quality that they have. 

With that said, I was also rather happy to see Constantine go home last night.  He took it very well at least…much better than his mom and Paula.  I think there was something between him and Paula.  I didn’t see Randy crying, but the cameras didn’t constantly show Randy like they did Paula.  The sad thing was that he sang one of my favorite songs, and one we used to play in Vicinity, How You Remind Me by Nickelback.  I wasn’t really impressed with his version.  I think I’ll like the show a lot better now without Constantine.  I was really getting sick of the hype around him. 

When all else fails...

Things have been pretty mundane lately, so I’ve been having a difficult time coming up with stuff to write about.  I guess when all else fails, I can talk about Payton.  Yesterday when I came home from work, he was super excited to see me.  He yelled out “Da Dee” and ran to the gate at the top of the stairs to greet me.  It’s amazing how something that simple can make you feel so good inside.  That was really the first time he had said daddy in context too.  He usually just babbles dada a lot, so I wasn’t completely sure if he associated it with me or not. 

Payton has a couple of words now, and a few signs.  He’s really good about signing “eat,” “more,” “kitty,” and “milk.”  The other words he has are “nana”  or “danana” for banana, and thanks to my mom, he calls a clock a “tic toc,” or actually more like “tih tah.”  It’s definitely fun to watch him grow and learn to do new stuff.  Just in the past week or so he’s started running up to us and giving us hugs.  Also, just this week, he decided that if we put food on a fork or spoon for him, he wants to hold it and feed himself.  He’s always liked to feed himself, but never with utensils before.  Maybe this means less mess?  I can always wish.

Driving Thoughts

Yesterday we went to Holly’s parents’ house in Clear Lake, Iowa.  On the way, we drove through Austin, Minnesota, home of the SPAM museum.  I get a kick out of some of the billboards they have for it along I-90.  Two of the best I’ve seen are “Yes, we answer the ingredients question,” which is currently up, and “Not all hogs make it to Sturgis,” which was up one summer.  I had a free sample of SPAM at the county fair one year, but other than that, I’ve never had SPAM.  Sometime we are going to stop at the SPAM museum.  I’m curious to find out what is all there.

It amazes me how people complain about the high gas prices, but yet they drive their huge SUVs at 75+ mph.  Everyone knows that SUVs get poor gas mileage, but those highway mileage stats are for 55 mph.  The gas mileage is only going to get worse for every mile per hour faster they go.  I don’t think people consciously think about this when they are driving, but it’s going to make a big difference as the gas prices keep going up.  This was just something that crossed my mind as I was travelling on the interstate yesterday and getting passed by SUV after SUV. 

That's disgusting

There are certain places where you’d expect to find used chewing gum stuck.  Those include under school desks, under movie theater seats, and under restaurant tables.  It’s pretty sad when you find gum stuck under a conference room table at work.  I would have thought that people would have outgrown this practice and been able to find the garbage can sitting fifteen feet away.  Maybe it’s too much to ask educated professional adults to dispose of their gum properly.  It just seems pretty irresponsible and childish to me, not to mention disgusting when you find it. 

Happy Joe's

I read today in the Post Bulletin’s blog that a Happy Joe’s is coming to Rochester before the end of the year, and I was really excited to hear that news.  I have always thought that a Happy Joe’s would do well in Rochester.  It had been an idea of mine to open one up here someday, but it takes considerable money to do that…money that I don’t have.  So, now I’ll just have to make sure they stick around here by giving them my business. 

This makes me sick

Today was Holly’s birthday, and her parents came up to visit.  They took us to Red Lobster for supper where we had a great meal.  It was Payton’s first meal in a restaurant since about Christmas time.  He was very well behaved, so I think we’ll have to try it again sometime soon.  Anyway, the day had been going along very nicely until we went back to where we had parked the car.  My stomach dropped when I saw this:

We were parked in the Center Street parking ramp, and there was a guy backing a mini van up in a 99 point turn right by our car as we were walking up to it.  I assume he was the guy that hit it.  At first I thought it was a hit and run, so I tried chasing him down.  He didn’t stop, but I got his license plate numbers.  Luckily, we didn’t need it because Holly or her parents found a note on the windshield.  Since I’d never really had an accident before, I wasn’t really sure if we should involve the police or not.  Holly’s dad is in the insurance business and he said just to call their company in the morning.  We were about to go with that decision, when we noticed a police car at the stop light at the bottom of the ramp.  I figured that couldn’t just be a coincidence, so I got his attention and he came on up to file a report. 

There’s not much I could have done differently to avoid this accident.  It just makes me sick that it happened.  The other guy’s insurance should cover the whole thing since I’m not at any fault.  It’s just ironic that I’ve never been in an accident before, but two weeks after I raised my deductibles, my car gets hit. C’est la vie.