December 25, 2002 Merry Christmas one and all! Yes, it is a white Christmas this year. Who would have thought? Sometimes I feel like it is a little too much to ask for peace on earth and good will towards men. Well, maybe not too much to ask, but an awful lot to hope for. But faith is the belief in things that are hoped for, the evidence of which is not seen. Faith is never easy, it wasn't meant to be. Beliving at Christmas and Easter time is simple. Holding on to that and living the other 363 days of the year is the difficult part. December 23, 2002 My weekend...it rocked! I got to see Steph and Scott and Rachel, and Ericka, and Rep and Pete...well I got to hang out with just about everyone! Steph wrote this awsome LARP*... for sixteen people called Season's Turning. Keep in mind that for the most part we're all in costume for our respective characters/roles. Mei does not typically wear pleather on weekends. Mei usually doesn't speak in the third person either. Early October, Steph e-mailed me "I really want you to be my NPC bad guy don't tell anyone!!!!!! Not even Scott!!" I couldn't resist. For years she's wanted to make sweet little Mei the evil bad guy because no one would suspect me. Tee hee. Mwwhahhahah it worked! I'm still tickled to death that I got to be evil. Of course I lost, but this is the only game where it's just as much fun to lose. I'd go more into how totally awsome seeing everyone and how well-written the game was but I think I may bore anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, and make others who do know extremely jealous. This site was not working, so now the comcast site is looking more an more like an actual mirror site. Some links on that site are still showing up in the original Barney/Death to Smoochy purple and some don't work at all. I'll try to fix it but that probably won't happen before 2003. So it seems that I only have today to do all of my Christmas shopping for my family. Why do I shop for my famliy last? I think it's because I'm not certain of seeing all my friends or co-workers near Christmas. Eep. *L.A.R.P.= Live Action Roleplaying...for the uninitiated...think "How to host a Murder" game, but you just write your own instead of buying the $40 boxed game you really play only once. December 20, 2002 Good news! Things are looking up. Today, I bought my first car...okay it's my second car but the first one that I bought on my own without a co-signer with my own hard-earned cash. It's downright liberating. Except for writing a check with more zeros than I have ever written in my life. Yipes. It's the oddest thing to have a dealer go in to bargain down the price with his boss, then write out a contract, that says that I will purchase this car for $____today. He turns the page so I can see it and pushes it in my direction to sign on the dotted line. I hadn't intended to actually drive anything off the lot today. But here's how my day went: I went to Carmax this morning to drive other brands of cars comparable to what I was looking at in the Honda Dealership. The Hondas at Carmax were good, I'm sure, but there was a no-haggle price that didn't include tax, title, or warranty. I could have gotten a car that had more bells and whistles than what I finally boughtcar would have had twice the milage on it and would have been $3000 cheaper. I limited myself to looking at 2000 models and the interiors of the Carmax cars looked very worn out for their age. One car looked as if it had been repainted at some point, the other had some insulation around the radio coming loose. I test drove a Nissan Altima to get a feel for a different car. It was a nice ride but not as solid as the Accord and the door closing didn't have that nice, solid thud to it. And the carmax guy said that IF my dad was a co-signer he MIGHT be able to get financing as LOW AS 7.9%. The Honda dealer ran my credit and said he'd have no problem getting me 5.9% without dear old dad. He also welcomed me to find better financing that he would try to match. I came home, with a car and my old one had been hauled away. Ach and I didn't even get to take any pictures of it before it disappeared. I guess that's timing for you. So what am I driving? 2000 Honda Accord EX with less than 34,000 miles on it still under the original warranty. The above one is almost exactly like mine, but my car doesn't have a spoiler. I haven't gotten a chance to take actual photos of it. Frankly, it's more car than I want or need at the moment but given that the last car I drove was an '87 Olds Calais in tip top shape, I intend to have this one for a long time to come. E-Mail me and I'll give you a few more details, and pricing and stuff because I have three days of buyers remorse before the contract is final. December 13, 2002 Remember when I said I managed to both mangle my car and start dating in the same weekend? I also said that I don't believe in signs. Suffice it to say that I will believe in signs from now on. More importantly - about my car - it gets worse. So the phone charger in my car got pulled out and took the socket with it, and my radio stopped working too. Last night the service engine soon light came on and I smelled burning fuel when I was in Jacksonville so the entire way home the car was driving rough. The insurance guy is going to check it out sometime next week to discuss estimates with the dealership. And as a result of this car fiasco - the idea of me driving Mom's car to Fairfax is still being taken "under consideration" for next weekend, so I may have to hitchike my way to there to Steph's Christmas/Winter Solstice Party. **Gasp** All is not wrong with the world.. Star Trek Nemesis came out today. But even better, Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers is out next Friday. I think I'll call Tim and Karen to find out if they're available to come out further my way (*ugh* car issue again)...maybe Thelma will join us too. I haven't seen all of them since Final Fantasy came out. December 9, 2002 Someone told me how many shopping days left there are. I'm concerned. I love Christmas shopping but I don't have any time to do it. I love writing Christmas cards, but I rarely get around to doing it. I mean, there are important folks that I want to keep in touch with...most of them are on this page. The others..well they kind of took all of the cool pictures and are always neatly behind the scenes. Well as for the misadventures of Mei-Ling: I managed to both mangle my car and start dating in the same weekend. I don't believe in signs. Perhaps I should. Dad says that he went to Boyle Buick and got an estimate on my ice-related argument with a telephone pole that happened to be about $2200 in damages, for a car that would be worth $1200. Does that mean I totalled it? That car is certainly worth more than that to me. It's my first car for pity sake. Curtis thinks I should get a new car...he thinks I'd be good in a Jeep Liberty like Sue, but Chris thinks I should get a Subaru (like his) and Carl says he likes his Honda...but Chris---the one from Rockville, thinks Hondas are a piece of junk... and I still want to fix my car. :-( For pity sakes I even named it...well I named it after the factory color ...Rosewood. It is a fifteen year old car but it's been reliable. What more can you ask of a car? I don't have the heart to put the pictures up of how mangled it is. As for me I escaped with a little soreness and a bruised knee from tensing up before sliding into the pole. Speaking of soreness...I think going to be would be good for me right now. Want more?