Pull Tight

December 10, 2005 Sometimes when Austin and I are riding in the car, we have these philosophical discussions. Usually we discuss something much more basic than black holes or quantum mechanics; although I am holding out for him to be the next great theoretical physicist. Yesterday it was car parts and repairs. I was explaining to him how all of the parts, particularly electrical parts used to be replaced at much greater frequencies. Head lights used to cost a fraction of now, but you replace several of them over the life of your car. I told him that his Grandpa used to wear out multiple pick up horns from calling cows. We talked for a while about calling cows; Austin thinks that his Grandpa probably still wears out horns, even with the newer technology. Austin has recently discovered rock and roll from the 60s and 70s. As we were driving, Austin had Jimmy Hendrix in the CD player. I speculated that with the advent of better sound systems in cars, Grandpa could condition his c...

Did you ever see the movie Groundhog Day? The premise of the movie is a guy living the same day over and over attempting to make it come out better. It is a pretty good movie starring Bill Murray if you are interested. Wednesday was one of those days for me. We just bought a new Civic coupe mostly for Lauren to drive to school and wherever else seniors seem to always be going. We hadn’t made the first payment. She left for school early Wed to pickup her boyfriend for school. We had a couple of words before she left. She had permission to do this once per week and this was the second time. He lives across town and we were concerned about her being out before daylight by herself and not getting enough sleep from getting up so early. About 15 minutes after she left, we received a call from her. She had an accident and was very upset. The accident was only 5-6 blocks from home. The new car was totaled, but her only injury was to her wrist (it turned out to be sprained). When ai...

Yesterday was Lauren’s 18th birthday. We took her and the boyfriend to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. Her boyfriend, an aspiring actor played the part Jack Nicholson played in the movie of the theatrical production of A Few Good Men. He is actually pretty good. Bought a new Civic last week Nancy is driving to Dallas almost every day and we needed another car so the kids wouldn’t be stranded. Lauren will probably take it to college next year (if she maintains her grades).