Well, I got new lenses for my glasses today. My lenses were 2 years old, and they went from being annoyingly scratched to nearly useless after catching a .45 casing on New Years day. Turns out my prescription has changed slightly… I could still read the 20/20 line with my old glasses, but everything is SO much clearer now. Or maybe that’s just because there’s no scratches.

Yesterday, I called the local Mazda dealership to see if I could get an O-ring. They wanted $8 for it, said that the earliest I could have it was thursday, provided I went to the dealership and ordered it in person yesterday. That annoyed me, so I called my favourite Mazda dealership in Birmingham, AL. They had it in stock, shipped it to me yesterday, UPS ground. $1.50 for the o-ring and $8.50 for shipping. I got it today at 3pm.

I’ve gotten much of the car put back together. The timing belt is back on and supposedly aligned. Since the car didn’t start the first try last time I did a timing belt job, I’m rather aprehensive about this. But it’s aligned, it is! If it’s off, it would be a whole tooth off, and I can’t see how it could be. But I thought that last time too.

I couldn’t seem to explain to Joanna why I had to work on my car today, since I couldn’t finish today, and I might as well just do it tomorrow. I just needed to. I hate having it in pieces, and it’s always better to work on it sooner rather than later.

I’m worried about money. We have a good bit saved for the trip, we have a good bit in debt, and we’re spending a good bit. At least to me. I’m not sure if this all works out or if we’ll get into trouble later. We’ll be fine if Joanna gets a job when we move to Norman. She doesn’t think this will be any problem. I have my doubts about it. But things always seem to work out for her, so maybe they’ll work out for us now. Or maybe marrying me will cause her luck to run out. In any case, we’re going on our trip. We may not have another chance like this for a very long time, and we both very much want to do it. Consequences be darned….

Then there’s the matter of vehicles. Joanna’s Dad has given her his ’85 Camaro which is in great shape, but which I’m convinced will simply fall apart any day now. I’m hoping we can sell it. I’ve found a Miata which costs less than I think the Camaro is worth, but which will certainly be more reliable and cost less to operate. Gas prices went up 10 cents a gallon today… So I’m thinking it would be nice to swap the two, and Joanna likes the idea.

But we keep talking about a truck. Buying a truck to move stuff for about what we’d pay to rent one. But we’d still have to rent a trailer… And I don’t know anything about buying a used truck, and I don’t know much about maintaining one, but I’m sure I could figure it out without too much difficulty…

All these decisions.

Joanna’s Mom wanted to get fried shrimp and oysters today. Since I’m not much of a fan of either, I offered to make sandwiches from the two left over chickens that they smoked yesterday. Chicken sandwiches, with pepper jack cheese on a toasted bun, berck’s yummy peas and home-made potato chips. It was all quite good. Everyone seemed happy. I like cooking when it makes people happy, and Joanna’s family seems easily pleased.

A note about the journal comments. The system is rather neat, and we like reading comments… But if you make them anonymously and don’t sign your name we don’t know who you are, which has led to all sorts of speculation on our part. We’re not sure whether they’re left anonymously on purpose or if you guys simply don’t realize they’re anonymous. Then again, maybe it’s better if we DON’T know who’s reading.