Things I accomplished today:

• Going out to lunch with a friend from work (who works totally different days from me, so we never see each other there).
• Walked to farmers' market, shelled out $9, came home with 2 green peppers, a pint of adorable little teeny baby cucumbers (smaller than cherries), 5 Japanese eggplant, 2 slender yellow summer squash, and a kohlrabi.
• Went to the grocery store and acquired some fancy olives from the olive bar, tomatoes, cherries, red bell peppers, some frozen veggies, and a couple chuck eye steaks.
• Scrubbed out the kitchen trash can. The less said about that, the better.
• Brought some laundry in off the line.
• Made a vegetable stew with several of the items listed above.
• Made a southwestern corn salad, omitting green onions because clearly I did not buy enough fresh produce today.
• Made brownies, kinda goofing it up - box mix, instructions call for 1/4 c. water and 1/2 c. oil, but I used 1/2 c. water

and 1/4 c. oil. Not on purpose. But since that is the sort of switcheroo I might try if I were trying to reduce the fat content of the recipe, I'm not terribly worried.

• Took a nap.
• Read some.
• Crushed some castles.

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I wholeheartedly recommend doing one's banking at a credit union, if ever you decide to change banks.

I agree. CU's are so much better. JZ, sorry you two have to go thru this BS. Clearly they want to smack you with a fee somehow. If you were doing the transfers at ATM's, I might understand, unless you were using WF ATM's. But online? @@

I can't even get started packing until I throw away the stuff I don't want, and so far, that's something like five garbage bags full, and there's still a ton of junk left.

When I moved to TX, I stopped counting how many bags. Lots of junk. I filled a pick up truck with old equipment, computers, cables. And then anything that wasn't junk, I'd put in the alley by the dumpster. Most of it went within a few hours. As I brought more stuff downstairs, the previous stuff was gone.

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That excessive transaction fee is BULLSHIT. First they charge you for using live tellers, now they charge you if you do too many transactions ONLINE?? WTF?

These fees are designed to hit the people who can least afford to pay them the worst and are such a horrible fucking way to do business.

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Too many transactions is ridiculous, indeed. Though I guess maybe it's like how I'm only "allowed" to write a certain number of checks per month on my savings account, because it's a savings, not a checking?

I'm sad, because I hauled ass three hours drive home in order to meet up with two friends for dinner--I've been looking forward to this for WEEKS (it's been on the calendar for a month)...and it just got cancelled!! No yummy food, no fun conversation. WAAAH. And we're all so busy not sure when it can be rescheduled, if anytime in the next few weeks. (The one person has a dog who is sick, and the other one was cutting out of work and agreed no point if it's not all three of us...)

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I'm still trying to figure out the logistics of buying a car. I really want to get a Mini Cooper, but the nearest dealer is 100 miles away from where I'm moving to. My parents say it's better to buy a car from a dealer nearby, so that they're right there if something goes wrong. I'm looking at a Scion, which I know is much more practical for a lot of reasons, but I kind of feel like I really want that Mini.

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100 miles? Are you buying new and are there closer places than a dealership in emergency? I wouldn't write it off.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to buy a car this weekend. Used. I wish I had someone who knows these things to spot me.

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The Scion is also a lot less expensive than the Mini. I guess the first step would be to test-drive the Scion and see how it feels. A lot of cars, even small ones, are really uncomfortable for me to drive, and I know that I'm comfortable driving the Mini. So, I'll see how the Scion feels.

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No yummy food, no fun conversation. WAAAH. And we're all so busy not sure when it can be rescheduled, if anytime in the next few weeks. (The one person has a dog who is sick, and the other one was cutting out of work and agreed no point if it's not all three of us...)

oh, I feel your pain. J and L and I try to do dinner once a month. J cancelled at 6:20 for a 7PM reservation, and L and I were trying to decide if we were still going to do it. We did it, and we also decided that our policy would be if one person cancelled, we would go forward.

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Hil, may I also suggest testing a Toyota Matrix while you're at the Scion store? A coworker who is 4'11" just bought one, and likes the way it fits her. (This is amusing to me since we have one, and mr. flea, 6'6", likes the way it fits HIM!)

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(This is amusing to me since we have one, and mr. flea, 6'6", likes the way it fits HIM!)

This is because Toyota actually uses TARDIS technology. (See also, the Toyota Echo. No one ever believes how much stuff I can fit in my car.)

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