thanksgiving weekend redux

i used vista some while in brady because my parents’ new computer has it. i don’t really like it. it seems kind of clunky. and it looks like it’s trying to look cool, but it just doesn’t seem right. kind of like metallic silver paint over plastic as compared to actual chromed metal. i guess it just didn’t feel natural to me either. if i used it more and did some tweaks to it i’d probably get used to it. but i shouldn’t need to do that, thankfully.
when my dad and i were in mason we stopped and ate at a locally owned place called the northside cafe. they are a burger and fries kind of place, located in the small building that for years was the northside grocery. (which was run by a leifeste. there are no leifestes involved in its current incarnation that i am aware of.) it’s off the beaten path — a few blocks off the square — but it’s worth it. they have imperial sugar dr. pepper as a fountain drink, and that’s reason enough to go. but they also have really good made-to-order homemade style burgers. and not expensive.
i listened to the first part of the a&m/t.u. game in the pickup on the radio (we’d gotten a late start due to all of the calling around i had to do related to the elemen), then watched the rest of it on tv. it’s nice to see a&m win that match.
the bel air made the trip from alpine back to brady with no problems. i learned it doesn’t like to shift into first gear unless it isn’t moving at all. i also learned the driver’s side door lock is finicky. the brakes are pretty soft, but work. they appear to be driven off a single master cylinder (like my pickup).
when we stopped at the edge of alpine to get gas before we went down the highway, i stopped and bought a big red even though it was cold outside and the car didn’t have the heater core hooked up. when my dad and i went to mason and bought my first vehicle ever — a baby blue 4-wheel drive chevy luv pickup with mud tires — i stopped on the way out of town and bought a big red and got some kind of candy bar (what it was for sure escapes me). anyway, i thought it would be appropriate to have the same initiation for this car.
it never got unbearable, but the last hour of the five hour drive in a car with no heater core and the temperature between 33-36 degrees the whole time was uncomfortable. i had bought a cool drink and wanted to drink it warm, but it actually stayed colder in the car than when i bought it from the store.
i’m glad i decided to get him to have new tires put on it for me. the weather was cold and misting/damp the whole way. i would have been nervous about the whitewalls from 1979 on the car. he put all four old tires in the trunk. with the full size matching spare, that makes five full size tires in the trunk. and i think i could still fit a couple of bodies in there. i told him to put blackwalls on it. the blackwalls make the car look tougher or meaner or like it means business, more than the flash or showy look of the whitewalls. i originally was kind of disappointed i wasn’t going to be able to consider my options and make an informed decision, but i’m pretty happy with the look of what i ended up with.
on the way from brady back to houston, i had my first disappointment with the vehicle. i hadn’t ever really punched the gas, so at a highway stoplight i decided to give it some acceleration. the vehicle next to me evidently decided i was trying to race, so i quickly decided to give it a shot. a 3-on-the-tree manual isn’t really designed for speed shifting. i got beat. it was some bmw suv. i guess bmw makes nice, performance vehicles at least. but my car will always be cooler. *grin*
i thought about stopping to see if my roadkill was still on the side of the road, but i ended up not doing it. it’d be cool if i went by on my way to pick up my element in austin and it was still there. well, the horns at least.