Eight years and (happily) counting!

Sunday night raininva and I celebrated both an early Valentine’s Day, and a late anniversary of the day we began a serious relationship. We drove out to one of Rain’s favorite restaurants as she told me about the incredible gift she’d got me that would blow me away.

Well, we got settled at the table and she presented me with my gift – the first season of Gargoyles on DVD. Now, that was certainly cool and something I’m pleased to have in my collection, but it didn’t quite measure up to the hype she’d been giving me. But I played along, and told her I was very pleased with the gift (not hard to do, since I did like it).

She said, “Yeah, I’m glad you like it; though I did get you a backup gift in case you didn’t.” And she hands me a 1 GB iPod shuffle.

iPod!

An iPod has spent quite a long stretch on my list of “things I’d like to have but I’m not holding my breath”. And I have to admit it’s keen to have a device which plays hours and hours of music on a single charge, with no moving parts besides the control switch. And it’s tiny, and weighs nothing!

A passing waitress saw me looking at The Precious and said, “You must have been a very good boy lately!”

Not really. But my sweetie loves me 🙂

*****

Rain got a nail in her Pontiac’s right rear tire Friday night, and assuming the tire was unsalvageable, we headed to Wal-Mart on Sunday afternoon for a replacement. There was a five-hour wait there! I swear, I’m going to start boycotting Wal-Marts not because of any political feeling, but because they are always overcrowded and scary. I want to start bringing a machete when I go to the Superstore down here!

So, I was about to admit defeat – Wal-Mart was impossible, and everything else was closed – when I saw a Shell station with a bunch of tires propped outside; I rolled the dice and pulled in. Turns out there was a friendly good-ol-boy in there who wasn’t even busy, and had the tire plugged and airtight in 15 minutes, and even re-inflated the spare for us. Only charged about 15 bucks, too!

Here’s some karma for you, guy. You deserve it.