Was I the only one that didn't know that Jilli has been immortalized in plush as the Dork Tower Gilly plush doll?

Here is a pic

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billytea! I was telling JZ this morning about Bill Haast and the Miami Serpentarium and she was agog at his superhuman tales of freaky anti-venom blood so I tracked down this article about him. Weird cool careers in herpetology.

Aww. It's heartwarming, really. Or heartstopping.

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Jilli has been immortalized

I really have to find my Perky Goth t-shirt.

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Cars. Hmm. We need a new one. Problem is, I've never paid more than $3000 for a car. Always bought used ones. The thought of car payments, especially on top of mortgage payments, makes my head hurt.

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Buy a more recent used one, Burrell, then you get reliability and value. A car loses a good percentage of its value the second you drive it off the lot. LA has lots of people who treat their cars well and buy brand new ones every year or so, which is good for the rest of us. I can get the BF to ask about good used places in the area if you want.

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See, that's such a benefit. I had Sherman for almost 5 years *after* he was paid off. That's 5 years without a car payment, which, let me tell you, helps a lot. And I plan to have the still-unnamed-Echo for a long damn time as well, since I have 4 more years on the loan.

We do this. We buy new, and drive them into the ground. Right now, our good car is a '98 minivan, when we only had Julia; Ben was still a bump, and Chris hadn't even been thought of. Our auxilliary car is the '91 Toyota Corolla I bought new when Scott was still a fairly new boyfriend.

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I've got four years left to pay on my Echo, Winifred, and I am fully planning on her being alive for a good long time. Toyotas are nice for that.

ION, I just took my mom to the movies to see Phantom. As thrilled as she was seeing it, and I almost had to pinch her so she wouldn't hum along, I think that she was happier that I took her out. I bought her a 6 dollar matinee ticket, and she was beaming. She told the ticket girl "My daughter just paid for ME!". It's the kind of thing that makes me want to both giggle at her, and cry.

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I buy new cars and I tend to keep them 4 to 5 years.

I'd buy used, but since I work freelance getting up in the morning and having a non-functioning car is not an option. Even if it's something minor and cheap that is fixed quickly it can cause me to lose a gig or a client.

I know that buy new does not guarantee against that, but it does cut down on it. When I got rid of my Wrangler is was still running great and was 5.5 years old with around 90,000 miles on it. Part of the reason for leaving the car was that it had just hit that point there minor repairs were cropping up. Never anything major, never anything expensive. However, every few months I'd have to have it in for a day for something or other.

The Liberty is now about 2.5 years old with almost 50,000 miles on it. I'll probably get a new car in the next 12-18 months. I won't lease. Did that twice and never again. The biggest beef with it is that at the end of the lease you have no equity at all. You have to come up with drive off fees all over again. Also, you are locked into getting a new car on the dealership's schedule. At the end of the lease you either need to refinance the thing, or buy a car, or lease again. I much prefer buying. After 2 years or so on a long payment plan to start to have equity in the vehicle, and if your financial situation hits a point where you just need to keep on with what you've got you always have that option.

Of course, with the Liberty I dodged all of the payment/lease issues and paid in full, so I own the damned thing.

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Emeline is the cutest!!!

My car advice is if you are buying used go certified pre owned, also if you are looking at types of cars Toyotas are really good.

It's raining here and rather cold. I think on Wed it was in the mid 70s, yesterday the high was 50 something. A fire would be nice but I'm not sure if there is any wood.

Dad just informed me that his GF left him for a guy closer to his age. I feel bad for Dad and I feel like I should do some kind of father daughter bonding thing, but I'm not sure what it would be...maybe I can find a dvd we haven't watched recently. Maybe I should ask if Dad wants to do something or would rather not. He needs to get out there and find someone his own age, which shouldn't be too hard.

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Firefly!

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