Dwellar Photos RFN, 2015

[Undertoad]

And Jim is working doubly hard this week due to office vacation schedule. It was difficult to work me in, but he did.

And when I got home, I realized had to drive 30 miles back to the dealership; I had given them my entire set of keys, including my house key, when I handed over the old car. Jim was hard at work with a customer so I didn't bother him just to give an embarrassed re-hi.

But -- I was driving in a reliable car that wasn't going to suddenly have its transmission die and leave me without power. And for the first time in 7 years, a car with under 160000 miles on it. So it was an amazingly joyful mistake. ("Oh! I get to drive back now!") I asked Duke, Jimmy's part-top salesguy and part-annoying nemesis, what percentage of people are utterly happy when they buy a car from him, and what percentage remain steadfastly miserable. He wouldn't commit to a number but admitted that, sadly, yes, there are some people out there who are just miserable and nothing will sway that.

You got to adjust the audio in a new vehicle... I played Saint Etienne's "Urban Clearway" while driving through the Vine St. expressway tunnel. That's an on-the-nose choice for that section of road, since it is an urban clearway.

The instrumental song opens with unhuman analog synth, becomes clubby-dancy; and builds, to slowly (and wildly!) mix in full, real human orchestration. Halfway through the synths re-assert their position in the song, but at three minutes, the strings and brass and flutes kick back in completely, and take over the song, and it's glorious and I emerge from the tunnel and have an orgasm.