Stuart asked his Mom to watch Erica yesterday and we headed out, just the two of us, to watch LOTR: Return of the King.

It was beautiful though Stuart and I were both getting a bit aggravated with the extended "climbing up the sides of mountains" bits. It could have used some cutting of those types of scenes.

I cried a few times but not as much as I thought I would. Maybe when I see it the next time, it will all sink in. I can't wait for the DVD with the extended scenes to be released.

It was nice though, to go see a movie that both of us love.

During the movie, I somehow managed to drop what looked like (afterward) two junior mints onto my lap, where I held my jacket and Stuart's jacket. I had also worn my gray zippered hooded sweatshirt under my winter coat. At the end of the movie I decided to stop by the restrooms before facing the 45 minute drive back to the house.

I'm very glad I did because it look like someone had pooped all down the front of my gray jacket. With a sinking feeling I looked down and found more offending smears on my regular winter jacket and even a little bit on my pants.

Good God. And here it was about 30 degrees outside and I had to traipse through the mall and parking lot with nothing but short sleeves on since I was NOT going to wear the jackets. Duh, Renee!

-&-

Right now I have a whole chicken basted in barbecue sauce in the oven along with some banana bread cooking and later it will be chicken with homemade mashed potatoes for dinner. Yum.

-&-

I have a nice little pinched nerve under my shoulder blade that is still killing me today. I didn't get much sleep last night because every time I moved, I kept yelping in pain and waking up. AND my heating pad is no longer working.

Great.

-&-

2002 Mitsubishi Galant

Rear view.

My how clean it is!

My car. The very first car I've ever owned, in only my name, that wasn't older than my children are. Being born in 2002, this is the real baby of the family. It's hard to believe it still but it's mine.

The interest rate? 5% through my credit union. Whoo!
How much was the car? $10,000 including taxes, tags and a new set of tires. Whoo!
How many miles on it? Under 20,000 when we got it home.
Warranty? Some bits are still under factory warranty for another 10,000 miles. Yay!
The official color name: Titanium

It handles pretty decently. I'm loving it.

Even better: we still have the Saab. I think the current plan is to keep that for Mikey when (IF) he gets to drive. It's much safer than the one other vehicle that we have, a very old, Toyota pickup with about 250,000 miles on it.

Stuart doesn't really drive anything except the little Ford Ranger Company Vehicle that work gave to him to use.

The tags and license plate finally arrived in the mail yesterday. Good thing since those 30 day tags currently on the car, expired a few weeks ago. I'm very glad the price of that was included in the sale price for the car because parting with almost $360 right now would make me weep.

I'm looking forward to making a driving trip of SOME sort this spring/summer. Besides to Wilmington. Stuart wants to see the Shenendoah Valley (in Virginia) where he spent many of his summers as a kid.

It's just nice, I must confess that I can't completely relax though. Cars are just going to break down and always do so at the most inopportunte times and I just keep waiting for the other axle to drop.

I keep reminding myself that the other options are not good ideas: horses and mopeds though Erica would be quite happy with the first one. I can just see me pulling up to the daycare on a horse....

Now that's a mental image.