Ike

Yes, I am fine.
No, we don't have power.
Yes, we are very glad the weather is nice enough not to need fans or AC.
Yes, we have water.

Still Upright and Facing Forward

I bought rollerblades today. They looked like a lot of fun, and I need something fast to do while Steve Jr. is getting a tune up next week. I didn't ride Steve Jr. very much while in NM, but there are a lot of nice biking trails in Houston, so it's much easier to get out and enjoy Going Fast. Steve Jr. has ridden on the bike rack across the country twice since his last tune up, and I suspect he picked up just a little dust and dirt in the process. I will have to wash the Buffalo Bayou mud of him before he goes to the bike hospital, which will be a bit disappointing, but I am sure we can get him looking pretty (not to mention Much Cooler than those wussy road bikes) in no time!
Anyway.
I bought the rollerblades. They're very pretty. My driveway has about a 1.5-foot elevation change, all at the bottom, which seemed like a bad way to start out my first stab at rollerblading (I think I was on rollerblades once, about 7 years ago - doesn't count). So I took the skates down to the curb and put them on there. I laced them up. I tightened the clicky thing. I stood up.
That's when things got amusing - for everyone else, anyway. My first trip up and down the block was... well, disappointing. I had a great deal of trouble moving forward. Then I noticed a distressing lack of ability to keep both feet pointed in the same direction. The neighbors' chihuahua started chasing me, but soon gave up because I wasn't going fast enough for it to be a challenge for him. He did, however, stand near me and continue to bark, probably to make sure that no one inside the house missed seeing this. I made a rude comment to him, which was cut short by the abrupt realization that there was a curb about six inches in front of me. Curb made a good brake, turned out.
The second trip went much better. Not sure why. I just... got it, I suppose. It went well enough that I... went... down... the road! That's right, a public road, in broad daylight. And somewhat surprisingly, I did not hear any laughter. A young man enjoying perhaps his fourth or fifth year of life did ask me why I was on rollerskates - a valid question, and one that I frankly did not have an answer for, other than, "It seemed like a good idea at the time."
I made it back to the house with all my blood inside me. Today's status: sore as hell.

At Least They Don't Say 'California'

I did it. I finally went to the license plate store last week.
First I went to the building one block from the office with all the signs pointing to it that say "Vehicle Titles and Registration ->" and stood in line in the room covered with pictures of license plate choices, only to be told that this was not where a person goes to get a vehicle title or to register said vehicle. The Helpful Young Man had a list of places where a girl COULD get a license plate or two. I only recognized the street of one of them, and did I have my handy Map-o-Houston in the car? No. So I drove about 10 miles to an actual license plate store, which was labelled "County Tax Assessor."
I suspect that when it is time to pay my taxes, I will have to find a building with a sign reading "Zoning and Permits."
The nice lady at the actual license plate store was very helpful, and soon I was the dubious owner of a pair of Texas license plates. I brought them out and showed them to Fiona, and explained to here that she was going to have to wear them, but not till August 31st (when the NM plates expired).
On August 31st, at about 4 pm, I decided I could no longer put off the inevitable: the Texas plates went on. New Mexico is a one-plate state, and as I approached Fiona's front bumper, I realized that when I removed the front Minnesota plate, I had not put the screws back into the license plate holder. I had already made a trip two the hardware store (two, actually) for a set of metric sockets, and was unwilling to admit that I might need two visits to a store to put a damn license plate on my car. Off to dig through the thing-with-all-the-drawers-that-you-store-random-hardware- in! Within about five minutes, I had found not one, not two, but ALL FOUR of the original screws that came with the car.
Lesson learned: Grandpa was right. You should save EVERYTHING.

Butterflies

I took some pictures of pretty butterflies at Como Zoo last weekend. They are on my Flickr site. Any help identifying the little suckers would be greatly appreciated.

Don't Send Flowers; She's Allergic

My car, Fiona, is going to the hospital. It's been a little over a week since the transmission started acting up... a long, stressful week. First I was told that I needed a tranny rebuild. At 90k? Ridiculous! Then I was told just don't drive it when it's hot out. Um, I live in HOUSTON. Next I was told there was nothing wrong, it just needed a tranny flush... oh, and just ignore those lights on the dash that are coming on. Uh-huh. After that I was told to come on in and have those lights checked out fairly soon, but go ahead and drive all I want in the meantime.

Current status: the tranny is toast, but Honda is paying for it. I suppose that is the best I could hope for at this point. I would rather not have a transmission problem at all, but apparently with an early-2000s Honda that's not an option. So I'll be grateful it didn't happen 10,000 miles later, when the warranty would be expired.

That Could've Been Worse

Dolly has moved on, and I have survived my first hurricane. I got wet taking a walk, and I didn't have to water the yard for a while. Sounds like a pretty fair deal to me.

I Have a Lot of Photos of Rocks

... and most of you aren't terribly interested in them. But for those of you who are, I have made a page on Flickr so you can see them.

There's other photos there, too. Right now there are some pictures of Plants I Like.

There will be more photos, probably this weekend.

Good Things About Houston, Part II

I have not forgottened my intention to find some Good Things about Houston. It's been hard... really, really hard... but today I managed to discover two Good Things about Houston. Here is the first one:

Yes, it is a six-pound can of tomato sauce. I haven't seen one of these in years. I think I still ate meat last time I saw Mom make sauce with an enormo-can. Today I made a batch of sauce using only one can of Hunt's, instead of the three or four I have had to use in the past. The size of my batch of sauce is now limited by the size of my biggest pot (thank you, Mumsy, for the big pot) instead of how many cans I could open before I got bored (thank you, Grandpa, for the impatience genes).

Ok, now for the second Good Thing:

It's bread. Or at least, it was bread about an hour and a half after this picture was taken. It took only about an hour for this blob to double while sitting out on the porch, in the sun, with a damp cloth on. The second rising took less than half an hour.

Go, porch.

House of Toast Report

Thursday: HoT closed before I got there. V. sad. Guy said they ran out of toppings anyway.
Friday: Wheat toast with hummus, garlic, and tomato. Mmmmm.
Saturday: White toast with Nutella, Cap'n Crunch, and sprinkles. Also mmmmmm.
Also Saturday: White toast with cheesy artichoke topping. Say it with me: mmmmmm.

Ahhh, House of Toast...

Sorry, I've Been Busy

Where were we? Oh, yes:
27.5 hours until House of Toast!!!!!!!