austin_tycho | Post Yule up to Parental Abode

So, what's been going on with me the last few days?

I got a few hours of sleep on Thursday and hub was able to sneak out of work early that afternoon. We went to Ace restaurant supply where he spent up most of the $400 gift certificate Gordon so generously gave him in a transparent ploy to get Eric to cook more (and for him to be invited. This will probably work like a charm, actually). He (hub) had a great time picking out pans and whatall. He even let me talk him into going to see the lights on 37th Street that evening. It was quite temperate so there were about a bazillion people there so it took longer than expected, and there was no place open to eat after that sounded good- so we went home, ordered pizza, ate it, and went to bed immediately after. So much for my diet. We shall speak of it no more.

Friday I went to work while hub stayed home and baked cookies all day. When I write it that way, it looks like a big gender-role swap, doesn't it? But he made many batches, including Splenda cookies for me. By the time I got home, he'd packed up most of what we needed to visit the family in Sweetwater, and we were able to get on the road without incident. We stopped at Sonic to grab some dinner (So much for my diet. We shall speak of it no more.) and then again at a Starbucks because we were getting sleepy. They have peppermint mocha frappucinos (Smfmd. Wssoinm.) for the holidays! There's a whole assload of nothing in between here and Sweetwater otherwise, so it was an uneventful drive and we got to the parental abode around 1am. I managed to keep it closer to the speed limit than I usually do since there were many police patrolling the roads, but even so we made pretty decent time.

XM radio is quite wonderful! We listened to commercial-free music for some of the 5-6 hour drive, and one of the comedy channels too. It was almost startling when someone would say 'fuck!' or something similar since we're so used to hearing it bleeped out. The commercials on the talk stations are not even all that bad; there's not near as many of them and they're for weird little outfits rather than the same big car lots that have been running the most irritating loud echo-effect laden commercials for as long as I can remember on the local stations. So, fewer commercials and less irritating ones besides, and so many different kinds of music. The 'band alert' feature works nicely; if you like a band you hit a certain button to save it, and if the band comes on elsewhere there will be a little unobtrusive beep and the display says "hey these guys are on over here; want to check it out?" so I have Dave Matthews Band plugged in , of course (though not Dave solo- darn). Oh- the display! It shows the song title and the artist, which I think is fabulous.

The only downside so far is the reception- and it's a pretty small downside. When we parked under the metal overhang at the Sonic- nothing. The overhang managed to completely block the signal. But aside from that and a couple of maybe half-second fade-outs, there's been no other issues with it at all. It picks up in the house just fine, which is nice. The instructions say you should mount the antenna for the car unit on the outside of the car, like on the roof somewhere. But that's a huge pain in the ass, and it seems to pick up fine just on the dashboard, so I'm tempted to just leave it there.