Items accomplished since Saturday

1. Filled up my gas tank all the way
   
2. Got one of those spiffy tape players that hooks into an iPod or CD player
   
3. Realized that I gave away my CD player when I got my (now deceased) iPod..... so my spiffy new tape has no current use in my life, except to take up room in my purse, where it has been since I bought it, as though at the ready in the event that I should stumble across a free CD player just calling my name. Or hey, an iPod....

1. Got up early to make breakfast: a sort of delicious baked pancake, and extraordinarily strong coffee, packed it up, and drove over to Elise's.
   
2. Headed out to West LA to find a guy who is either named "Chis" or who can't spell his name.... unfortunately I badly misestimated how long it would take to get from Pasadena to La Brea, and gave us two hours when it really only took 45 minutes. So Elise and I played 'stake out' ("okay, so I'm Sean, and you're Gus"), and drank coffee and made bad jokes and ate pancakes and apple turnover, and finally got out and called Chis 15 minutes early, because the waiting was driving us insane. Not that we weren't already.
   
3. GOT AN ACCORDION!!!! ( you were wondering what I was doing out in West LA, weren't you? Well, I assure you..... the best of all reasons. A new musical instrument, completely at the drop of a hat and the whim of the heart when offered an incredibly cheap, exciting offer.
   
4. Named the accordion, which is bee-you-tee-ful, 'Chistery' after the guy who sold it to me, who was kind of a big burly Greek guy. Def still don't know if his name is Chis or Chris or Niko.
   
5. Went to the beach, and got a lot of sand in my pants. But, hey, we took great pics, and got lost on the Pacific Coast Highway, and pondered Mel Gibson's recent nearby mishap.
   
6. Headed home, finally tanked up after riding on empty for miles.... and hit up Talladega Nights: the Ballad of Ricky Bobby. A really, really.... amazing? movie. NOT. I've gotta say, I was disappointed. I mean, I know the whole idea of the crudities is that Ricky overcomes them, to become a better, braver, more accepting and less homophobic man, but still, sometimes it was just way too obnoxious. Definitely a bummer, especially since I expect so much from Will Ferrell. Though there's one great line, and maybe it's just the way in which it's delivered: "dear lord-baby-Jesus..... I'm thankful my sons no longer act like retarded gang-bangers" "Amen!"..... And the ending, at the finish of his final race with the French dude, that's a pretty great bit. But otherwise, just not too worth it. I'm glad I went to the cheap theater, and didn't deck out a full $10 on my ticket. As it was, I was counting quarters reaching the $7.50, or whatever it was, because I'd cleaned myself out, between the useless iPod/CD tape, and my sweet-ass rock-awesome accordion.


7. Went home and slept..... I left a note for the tenant that said "Morgan - lock the gate when you go out", because he hadn't, but after a while I felt bad and took it down.

1. Went to work with Elise at JPL, and named lakes on Titan, one of Saturn's moons. Yes, when you have to learn all those names like "Lacus Mud" and "Lacus Harney" and "Lacus Iridis", you'll have us to thank. Oh yeah.
   
2. Broke the ice between Elise and her cool, silent officemate, Dylan, who she'll now go on to marry and have kids with.
   
3. Managed to make a fool of myself multiple times, including leaning over into a desk to pick up a candy bar. It didn't work so well as I had hoped - specifically, I had intended to lean around the desk.
   
4. Saw a whole bunch of freaking awesome stuff at JPL, like the machines that make equipment, and the construction room... in fact, in the construction room we got to see these super-cool space frisbees - the engineers were working on balancing them so that when they get flung into space they don't get off-balance and thrown out of their projected orbit. Elise and I were in this little plastic enclosure from which we could see everything happening, but couldn't really hear at all. One of the engineers held up his cellphone number on a piece of paper, and Elise and I called down, and he explained what they were doing, and what it was for and everything. Amazing.
   
5. Oh but wait. I was at dinner with Elise and her mom and my mom (who had only just come home from Redding, visiting my uncle, her brother), and my cell phone rang. Thinking it was someone else, I answered it with an emphatic "hey!" And on the other end, "Hi, this is Dan from the JPL Construction room you and your friend looked in on this afternoon." And he proceeded to tell me all about how he's in CA for a few weeks from DC, working on balancing these space-frisbees, and did I know any good hang-outs in the area? Oh, gee, well, none that I could think of off the top of my head.... why not ask the front desk at his hotel? Well, he'd already asked them, and what he was really looking for wasn't really a restaurant, but rather a place "to have a few drinks." "Well," I told him, "I really can't help you... I'm under 21, so I don't really know any bars." What I neglected to mention is that I AM ALSO UNDER 18, and therefore NOT available to middle-aged JPL geeks looking for an easy hook-up, with a couple weeks free from the wife and kids. Well, I am being unfair.... I have no reason to suspect he has a wife and kids except for my undying cynicism. But still. I just can't believe he called me back. Though I am pretty impressed at how completely subtle he was about hitting on me, and sort of/sort of not inviting me to go drinking with him. And how the entire time, even when implying that he wanted to get drunk, he referred to me as "you and your friend." Men....

Elise and me staking out the car... ("This one looks purpler than the rest." "I wonder how many dollars I've got in quarters?")

My bellissimo new accordion, Chistery.

Pacific Coast Highway.

It had been a sort of draining day, and when I found the gate unlocked, I just got grumpier. I ended up taking it down after an hour or two.

Deer on the JPL lawn! Stunningly gorgeous, though a bit fatter than your stereotypical elegant, slender doe.... it's from all the food and lazing around, I have no doubt. Very, very cool.

And last but not least, me and Elise goofing off in the Very Important Tools and Equipment room.

posted by Holly @ 8:48 PM