Car Shit

Okay, well it's been a fuckin' last couple days. Went to Molly's graduation from nursing school right after work on Thursday. It was a Bellevue so that's always an annoying place to go. For the most part it was like a regular graduation but with a bit of nursing talk. Also some religious crap sprinkled here and there and an overly long photo montage set to bad music at the end. Three of the students told their stories of how they came into nursing. One was really good. She was a filipino girl and she moved to the states with her brother. They arrived at the airport and their father who was living in the us was supposed to pick them up but he didn't show. They have 75 cents to their name and an aunt living there too. They used their money to call the aunt (who they'd never met before, so she had the fun task of introducing herself and asking to be picked up from the airport). She did pick them up, when they got back she gave them $20 and told 'em to go to downtown LA and find a job. So the next day she's doing that all day and after 8 hours, she's interviewing and knows it's another job she won't get and asks the guy what she's doing wrong. He told her there was nothing wrong with her but she didn't have any local experience. So next thing she found herself in the food court of the mall praying for forgiveness 'cuz she was about to lie on this next application (but the way she told it it was funny). So she lied about her experience and got hired. They said they could only pay her $6-something ($5-something was the minimum wage at the time, so she was like "jackpot!"). Then her and her brother spent the next 2 years eating "so much Starkist tuna, so much." She told it better than I'm writing it, but it was a good story.

So after the ceremony everyone (Molly and her family including Josh and the girls and others and also Paul) was going to meet at Ciao Bella's. I'm on the way and I notice my temperature gauge is pointing all the fucking way up. Was something wrong with the needle? No, shortly afterwards my car stopped running. On Poplar right before White Station. Luckily the street was going downhill so I was able to coast around the corner off Poplar and then into a driveway. Called triple a to get a tow. While waiting, I still had my lunch (I couldn't resist going out with coworkers when they said they destination was Gus's!) so I ate that for dinner. After my car got towed I walked over to Ciao Bella's (not terribly far) and Paul gave me a ride home, which was sweet of him. But yeah, my car's at the shop now. So much shit happening to it in the past six months or so. If it's gonna be a lot to get fixed this time, I think that may be it for the car. I really hope it can hold out just a little bit longer til I at least have a couple more raises under my belt and can afford something. I didn't get a call back from the mechanic on Friday so I guess I'll have to wait til Monday to know what's going on.

Yesterday after work Mary Beth and I went to see Best of Enemies, a new documentary about the Gore Vidal/William Buckley debates. The guy who made it is a Memphis dude too (there was a Q&A at the end). It was really good. Gore Vidal is pretty awesome. They did a good job of framing the narrative and context of everything. This morning we went to the Dixon. It was a free day and we finally got the see the Jun Kaneko sculpture exhibit in the gardens (the gallery is closed for renovations though the scultpures were what we were there for). Pretty awesome stuff. It was followed by lunch at Las Delicias.

THE FAMILY GHOST IS PLAYING A SHOW TONIGHT AT THE P&H. In case that might reach anyone (it won't, but habit...). I'm mostly excited about Paul Maceri's solo debut. That should be fucking awesome. His shit has been ruling (can't wait til our collaboration gets off the ground). We practiced once for this show a month ago, though that one practice went very well for a runthrough.