100,000 Miles

Today near the corner of Spring Avenue and Lebanon Road in Collinsville at approximately 6:30 PM (CST) my car's odometer hit 6 digits.

Purchased in August of 2002, my 2003 Toyota Matrix, affectionately named Jacob, has been on a few adventures.  Though not far, my car has toted me on a few trips; Chicago, Indianapolis, Kansas City, and a whole lot of places in between!  It has only managed to stay under the national 12,000 miles per year average by my diligent attention to use of public transportation or car pooling.

So, here it is, officially ten and half years later and my car has hit 100,000 miles.  I think I'll treat him to a new radio!!  (Probably a tune up as well)



In other things, if you have ever wondered what I do all day at my job, I found a video that talks about it (civil and structural engineering).  The downside is that Thornton Tomasetti is all over the place (as it's the engineer's employer).  TT is a great company, and I have nothing against them, but I think there are a lot of great places out there that never get anything close to that kind of recognition and it would be nice to see it.  The other downside is that the guy never talks about all the other things engineers do...the "boring" stuff.  I can't imagine ANYONE would watch the video if he did tell you though.  So here you are...what I do as a structural engineer.

30 Million Dollar Garage

Did you know that if you were going to have a concrete parking garage built in the US, it would cost you about $15,000 per car? So for instance, if you wanted to allow 2000 cars to park in your garage, it would cost you 30 million US dollars.

There are a lot of stipulations that I should note, [you know, all that fine print]. As I am neither an estimator nor producer of said concrete structures, you should ignore anything I have to say...just thought you might like to know that tidbit!

SMART ASS
WHERE AM I?

I am a lake.

My waters come from glaciers.

I claim to have 300 sunny days a year.

Each winter, I have 400 inches of snowfall.

I am the second deepest lake in the US.

My southern shore is known for its casinos.

I am divided between Nevada and California.

I am in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

WORD

yashmak: A veil worn by Muslim women that is wrapped around the upper and lower parts of the face so that only the eyes remain exposed to public view.

Shitty in General

Quickly bringing you up to speed:

Saturday Eva threw me a birthday party. We went bowling at Pin-Up Bowl. Then we went to her house for a bonfire. I got way too drunk to know what I was doing, but tried opening gifts. Opened an embarrassing box of sheep (thanks Rob and Brandy, it was cute, and very thoughtful), told people they could eff off (lol, it's like my new thing to do these days), dragged my brother into things he didn't want to be involved in (no wonder he doesn't really like me). I was crying because I'm old and I feel like an idiot and the anxiety I have these days is beyond overwhelming. I made myself throw up because the amount of alcohol I had in my system was too much for me to manage. Glad that is over with! I did get some really great gifts though.

Sunday morning, a knock on the door, I answer to see our neighbor Jim. He looks alarmed, proceeds to tell me that someone busted out my car window. I was so confused I just nodded and looked from him to the car several times. I dressed and looked. I lost all faith in humanity. I am angry and hateful. I slept all day Sunday since no one would help me become totally obliterated. Someone threw a fist sized rock so hard through my window that it bounced off the opposite side door panel and broke that as well. Still waiting to hear from the insurance company.

Among other things about last week, which was shitty in general (turned 30, heartbreak, I was annoyed by coworkers, had too much anxiety about the party, had jobs creep up on me causing lots of stress, wanted to cry most nights, did cry a few nights, told that our structures group is moving in the office thus loosing space, Ruben is officially out of our department, Andrew is now part time in our department) work was more stressful than I'd ever like it to be for me.

Finished reading You Suck by Christopher Moore, brilliant stuff.

Started reading The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. 33 pages in and I'm already crying and thinking of the people I should call to tell them that I love them, just in case I should die tomorrow, today even.

. . . to Kelly if you are reading this, we both know Mike wants to keep you, and I would venture to guess you know I think we should get to keep you too, but in all seriousness, you are awesome and I haven't seen Mike this alive in many years. So even if we can't keep you (which I think we should get to) thanks. It's good to see friends happy!

. . . to Becky, dude, I am sorry for laying on your boyfriend. He's like a teddy Bear and he was laying on the couch where I wanted to be . . . sorry dude. It won't happen again; and you were looking totally cute on Saturday, don't know if I told you that or not!

. . . to my sister who so awesomely gave me a link for T-Shirts that I've been wanting to get; 80stees.com . . . I'm thinking for sure a Ghostbuster's T-shirt.

So onto today:

Read Janet's blog, and saw these posters . . . done by graphic designer Stephan Massed-Bidal. He takes odd, and old images and then pairs them with a quote. Different, which is exactly what I was looking for this morning.

Words that I have not given you:

eco porn: A corporate advertisement that extols the company's environmental record or policies, usually by a company known to rape and pillage the environment as often as possible.

prevert: A softcore pervert. Someone who is in early stages of perversion.

effed in the a: A different way of saying, "Dude, we're screwed".

Clark Kent job: Your day job that pays the bills but is not what you really want to do.