I find it highly amusing that men feel a compulsion to look under the hood of a car. These are really smart men who know lots of cool and brain busting stuff, but who know nothing of the workings of the internal combustion engine. Yet they feel a need to play 'the man' and look under the hood of a car. It's an insecurity of sorts isn't it?
(Not my man, he single handedly rebuilt an entire truck from scratch in his basement.)
I speak of other men. The men, for instance, who came to look at my car on Monday to see if it was worthy of purchase. They drove it around the block and then when they came back they popped the hood and stood there first staring and then reaching in and jiggling hoses and tapping things. I tried not to laugh but it wasn't easy.
Have you EVER seen a woman, oh I don't know...what...Oh, have you ever seen a woman go into a clothing store and examine the seams or examine the zippers to see if they were appropriately 'installed'? I mean, of course, women who don't sew. Or look at the box of frozen pizza and muse out loud as to how it was assembled and pre-cooked and whether it was properly seasoned and if the crust was over handled? Women do not feel compelled to feign knowledge of these things. And incidentally, by their not feigning this knowledge don't we assume they just have it, just by virtue of their being women?
So maybe if men didn't look under the hood we would automatically assume that they know what's under there and that nothing in the test drive made them doubt the 'sea worthiness' of the vehicles engine?
Well, at least the guys that came to look at my car didn't actually kick the tires, because that would have ended it all for me and it would have taken me several minutes to compose myself.
Oh, yeah, I'm selling my beloved Mercedes. I placed an ad on the AIT website forum on Sunday and had three responses by Monday. Plus there is someone at S's office who is also interested in buying it. So between them we'll hopefully have a buyer.
The selling of the car means that I'm really leaving. Really leaving and sooner than first thought. We had originally bought our tickets for the 27th of July, but changed them last week for the 20th of July. The fact that I have less than a month left is starting to sink in. Aidric has spent a couple of bewildering days with me setting him on the floor of one room or an other as I drag out suitcases and make piles of what to take, what to get rid of and things I'll take if I have room. This is tough because whatever I bring will have to sustain the two of us until sometime in November, I think. Everything else will be left here for the movers to pack in September sometime and we will not see it again until it is unpacked, when the shipment arrives at our final destination.
So the goodbye-ing begins and I'm sort of sad. I'll miss this house (sans creatures) and I'll miss our little town. The trolley looks like it might actually come in, the new downtown market square is almost finished, the new Picard store has just opened and they are finally resurfacing the main road to my favorite grocery store. And I read in my Newsweek magazine that Toulouse will be competing with Paris for the 2016 Olympics. Wouldn't that have been cool?
I spent the day shopping and walking with Mags and Paula today. This was probably the last time I'll ever see Paula, and even maybe Mags, as she's very hard to get a hold of these days. We had lunch at Place St. George at a little tea place that has the best chocolate cake you've ever tasted and lunch was a salad with scones of sun dried tomato and mozzarella. It was a quintessential French lunch experience and I savored every second of it. The days are moving too fast now and I'll miss the city with all its insanity. I learned how to park like the French and today I got a little too creative with my parking and I got a ticket. I guess there's a first for everything and maybe the ticket is just to make sure my Toulouse experience was well rounded.
That's all I've got today, just a huge mixed bag of emotions.
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