This Yellow Taxi Cab In Which I Ride

This has been a rather taxing week. I have been going to Albany each day for training for my job, which adds about 45 minutes to my commute. Thus, I have been having to get up an entire hour earlier, which after a week takes it toll. Of course, I stayed up late for open mic on Thursday, which made Friday seem even longer. And, since I had been at training all week and returned to my actual job in the afternoon, I had a whole load of work that had piled up and included a few important phone calls that I needed to make ASAP. Which was stressful. Friday night was another late night with Rock Band, which was a great way to release the stress of the week, but lead to me being incredibly tired and quite cranky today. So cranky, in fact, that I'm going to vent a little and probably wish in a few days -- once I'm no longer cranky from lack of sleep -- that I hadn't written what I'm going to write. Inside the Open Mic is the first topic of my vent. I posted an episode on YouTub

Last night some friends of Stephanie came over to make sushi and tempura and eat it. I have had sushi before, of course, but have never made it myself. It proved to be fun -- five people around a table cutting vegetables, fish, and such, telling stories and making jokes. Particularly, jokes about the possible pronunciation of the wine that we were going to drink. Here is a picture: Friday night was Rock Band 2 (as always). I decided to use some colored light bulbs to make stage lights. I also set up this neon guitar light that I have to add to the ambiance. Some might consider this to be a bit ridiculous. I don't. And Thursday was quite possibly one of the best open mics ever! There was a very long list: 29 performers. I had to make the call that it was a one-song night, but I added that if people stuck around, I would go through the list again and let people play an additional song. There were a lot of great performances throughout the night and about seven or so performers stayed

This is a very blurry-crappy-cell-phone picture of two people who went to see Coraline in 3D yesterday. The one that looks like me wearing really huge, goofy-looking 3D glasses is, actually, me wearing really huge, goofy-looking 3D glasses. The one that looks like Stephanie not wearing her 3D glasses, is -- actually -- Stephanie refusing to put her 3D glasses on until she is in the dark movie theater where no one can see her wearing 3D glasses because they are rather huge and goofy-looking. We decided that we really enjoyed the movie and, especially, the 3D-ness of it, which surprised me because the last time I saw a 3D movie, I was given paper glasses with one blue "lens" and one red one and I became kind of dizzy watching the movie, trying to balance the focus of my two eyes (if you balance too much on the left eye then there is too much red and the 3D doesn't work right and if you balance too much on the right eye then there is too much blue and the 3D doesn't wor

The guy who works at the garage where I take my car when it's broken is a nice guy. I can never remember his name (Bill? John?) because every time he calls me and says, "This is ________ from Warren Tire..." my mind always shifts to: don't be too much, don't be too much -- and so I miss his name. Still, he's a good guy and has given me a break on things and offered alternatives and whatnot. I have been taking my car to him for years after being screwed over by the last place that I was going to, so we have developed a rapport and I trust him. Anyway, I left my car at the garage last night because the muffler is falling off. First thing this morning (about 10 minutes after I finally stopped hitting the snooze button and rolled out of bed), he called. Again, I missed his name as I braced for "how much." 400 plus. I need new tires in the front. I knew I was going to need new tires and an alignment. My car seems to lose it's alignment easily. I coul