More Yawns

Right, here I am! Still tired, though, whew. Carlos and I both wanted me to stay in bed this morning. Alas, as I told Grandma when leaving yesterday, if I stop going to work, they stop paying me. It was a stressful day, though, for several reasons, which I could have done without.

One reason was that we had a fire alarm in the building this morning; it seems to have been a drill, given that the man who waved us back in had earplugs, but it was reallyreallyREALLY loud and nerve-wracking, and gave me some much-unneeded adrenaline to cope with.

Then, since the walls in the office are so loud, I could mostly hear a meeting that involved one of my co-workers apparently being in serious trouble for something, and I felt very stressed by what was happening. Which is kind of ridiculous, since it was nothing at all to do with me, but I've always hated being around fighting or even loud disagreements, and just the idea of what it seems he did made my stomach clench. Ugh.

The main reason, though, was car-related--I know, again! Which led from the "another $400?" question right to the "is this the tipping point? Do I need to go car-shopping now?" question. I went with the compromise of fix-this-now (I can't fathom buying a new car in the next three days, or worrying about the car all the way to Rhinebeck and back), but need to start doing some looking and pondering now, so that when the time comes, I'll have an idea what I want to get (though I will probably still beg one of my friends who can actually negotiate to come with me then). Great; more on the to-do list.

Anyone want to weigh in on what to get? Not too expensive, obviously. I've been driving the Mazda3 wagon for seven and a half years; the Saturn for 10+ years before that. What I'd really like is to be a bit higher up off the road--I'm sick of being so much lower than most of what's around--but of course I don't need anything all that big. One friend mentioned the Toyota RAV4 as a possibility, so I'll test that one and see how it feels. I only know good things about Toyota. I'm not really in the mood for another Mazda, as you might imagine. What else? Talk to me!