We didn’t leave until nine the next day. We slept in.

Half way through Nebraska, the Jeep decided to get weird. It overheated about five times; we were able to travel about 25 miles in each hour for several hours: stop and fill up the radiator and five one-gallon jugs with water. Get on the Interstate. Drive about 25 miles. Watch radiator fluid spray across the windshield. Pull over. Wait for engine to cool down. Fill up radiator. Limp to next gas station. Repeat.

We weren’t running the A/C and the whole ordeal sucked, although we managed to maintain a pretty good mood throughout. After making a couple of calls to find out if people would be willing to rescue us, the Jeep self-healed and the rest of the journey was trouble-free.

We called Ron and asked him to go rent a trailer so he could come get us if necessary. We called Joe and he said he’d be willing to come get us and tow us all the way to Ron’s! (Ya gotta have friends!) After both guys said yea, the Jeep never overheated again. We had to pay for a trailer we never used, but it was better $40 for an unused trailer than the many more expensive alternatives.

When I called Joe to tell him the Jeep seemed to be behaving itself, he actually said, “Damn, now I don’t have anything to do tonight!” Is he cool or what? He’d have driven 600 miles – twice that if you count going home – just ’cause he’s cool.

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I’ve been ‘net free since we got here late Saturday night. I finally broke down and got Ron’s Mac OS 9.2 laptop on dial-up with Earthlink this morning. (Yes, I’m actually paying $10.97 to connect to the Internet via fucking dial-up.) The whole ordeal took about two hours, because the Earthlink setup CD had expired or something and the 800 number it’s supposed to dial to get a local access number kept terminating the call, which meant I was swapping out phone lines and checking modem settings etc. etc. etc. I finally called in and since the CD promo code had expired I had to actually pay. *sigh*

After I get done with this blog entry and a look at Rants, I’m off to see if I have any money in my checking account.

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Ron’s house is awesome. Killer view, as Brett had said. Basically, we’re in Golden, CO but the local area is called Coal Creek Canyon. We’re up at the top of Hwy 72. Brett had me convinced Ron’s place was all by its lonesome out in B.F.E. but it’s not – you can hit several neighbor’s with well-aimed rocks if you feel so inclined, but due to the steepness of the terrain no one really seems that close.

The drive to civilization is about 40 minutes, but it’s no biggie ’cause there’s a tavern, gas station, coffee shop, vet, Italian food place, and grocery all within a few miles of here, so one can at least get the necessities without going all the way down to Boulder.

Brett’s been working all week, and I’ve been here at Ron’s doing not much of anything. (Well, Ron’s kitchen is spotless, of course, but whatever.) I loaded my PPC up with ebooks before we left so I’ve been reading even more than usual. I’ve been knitting but not too terribly much. I’ve been napping. And meditating and doing yoga and watching tv. Today I’ve got the Jeep (which is totally fine now, btw) but it’s out of gas and I’m not sure I care enough to risk seeing if it will make it to the gas station. If I can find a gas can I might try it, but since nothing’s level around here it’s impossible to tell what the gauge even says, really.

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Jim and Joy and Ella will be coming out this weekend. Jim will join Ron and Brett at work, and Joy and Ella and I will have to amuse ourselves. I’ll be ready for company for *sure* by then. If there’s money in my checking account I guess I could go find stuff to do today, but I don’t know if I care about shopping enough to just blindly go in search of it; Ron’s girlfriend, Amy, says she knows of a great LYS and I’d love to go there with her, but I don’t really have the budget to just go looking for stuff to spend money on.

I play well by myself, anyway.

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Damn Macs. I keep hitting ‘fn’ instead of the Apple key when trying to paste.

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Ron’s got a killer deck. There’s a hot tub on it. Brett and I have been hottubbing every other night since we got here. Brett’s back is better, but not perfect.

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Saturday night we got here late. Like, midnight. We hung out with Ron until about two local time and then crashed.

Sunday we went with Ron on errands: coffee, gas, return the unused trailer, Amy’s house twice, hardware store, gas station, etc. There was a little BBQ getting underway at Amy’s the second time we stopped by but Brett and I were exhausted and made Ron take us home, even though I suspect he’d rather have stayed at Amy’s.

Monday Ron and Brett went grocery shopping. They were gone for over two hours and came back with $250 worth of fridge stuffing. (When we arrived, Ron basically had condiments and beer.) Later, Amy came up and we went to a tavern and had fried food and pesto pizza. I got drunk. We came back to Ron’s and had a frozen pizza and salad around nine; Amy crashed ’cause she’d been up on call in the wee hours that morning.

Tuesday morning they all got up *way* too early and drove off down the mountain. I mean, it wasn’t even dawn yet. Freaks! Tuesday night I drove some of the groceries (T-bones and tilapia) back down the mountain to meet Ron and Brett at a gas station and follow them to Ron’s sister’s house where he was nephew sitting for the night. We had a BBQ then Brett and I came back to Ron’s and sat in the hot tub before going to bed at ten-ish.

Last night Brett was followed home by Jeff, and the two of them stood on the deck and carried on about tools and job insurance and work stuff in general. After Jeff took off, Brett at some of the potato soup I’d made and we hot tubbed again. Ron came in about ten minutes after we’d gone to bed.

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So that’s my vacation so far. The weather up here is utterly stable; cool in the mornings and evenings. Warm during the day. Very slightly breezy. Dry. It’s warmer in town, of course, and driving up and down the hill makes my ears pop and hurt (I’ve always had problems with my ears and altitude). I’ve been eating lunch at 11 every day because that’s when I’m hungry. Brett thinks I’m weird for not being out ‘exploring’ but how fun is it to drive around by yourself? I might drive to a location – restaurant, bar, bookstore – but I’m not from the driving planet! Hehe.

This morning I washed Ron’s sliding glass doors. He’s the kind of guy who will notice and be stoked about it; there were dog nose prints everywhere so I just went ahead and did it. The place is basically spotless so as my guest-tithe I’m doing all that tedious detail cleaning no one with a full-time job ever gets to: I detailed all the kitchen appliances, cleaned the glass-topped end tables, dusted the electronics. I think I’ll vacuum all the throw rugs today because they’re all covered in dog hair… our dogs’ hair.

And now that I’m on the ‘net I’ll SURF FOR AWHILE FOR CHRISSAKES.

Ciao from sunny Colorado, babies!