Larsen Repair Again Hits A Home Run

I feel like explaining, once again, why we insist on taking our vehicles to Larsen Repair in Iona to get work done on them.

You've read here earlier about the brake trouble we had on our Toyota pickup over the weekend, and our interactions with yet another Rexburg-area auto repair shop. To recap: They had the truck in their shop for two hours and "Couldn't find anything wrong," but wanted to charge us $400 for new brake pads, turning of the rotors and other ancillary repairs, on top of the $88 they were already charging us for the time spent "diagnosing" the problem.

We demurred, and took the truck -- which was drivable, but evidently only just -- the 26 miles to Iona. Kevin -- in an act of derring-do the others evidently didn't try since they could not "find" the problem -- actually drove the truck around and, for a while, couldn't find the problem either. Then as he was pulling the truck back onto their lot, the brakes locked. He quickly jacked the truck up where it was and found that the master cylinder -- a part the other mechanics didn't mention in their promises of exploratory surgery -- was faulty. We'll get a new one put in tomorrow, for about $200.

So, on the one hand, we had a mechanic who wanted to charge us nearly $500 to guess at the problem. On the other, we had a mechanic who actually drove the truck around until the problem duplicated itself and can fix it for $200. Is it any wonder we keep going back? Oh, and the brake pads and rotors the Rexburg guys wanted to replace and turn, respectively? Kevin says they're just fine.

Kevin and Greg keep singlehandedly repairing the reputation of mechanics everywhere, and we're now 0 for 3 in Rexburg-area mechanics. That's not a good average.

One Fact I Am Proud Of

One fact I am proud of:

BA, 4 years in college, student loan debt of $1,500, paid off in the first year after graduation.

MS, 2 1/2 years, no debt at all.

I worked hard for this education, doing everything from technical writing, which I'm doing now, to working in a cefeteria, replacing windshields, bricklaying, stocking shelves at Target and, help me, taking customer service calls for Qwest.

Bears!

Blogger's Note: Photos coming soon.

Because the kids were disappointed we weren’t able to go swimming, we took them to Jenny Lake instead. Best part of the trip was seeing the bear. After we let the kids wade in the lake for a while, we decided to go walking up the trail that loops around the lake on the east side. We’d walked for maybe a quarter of a mile and some other hikers said there was a bear on the trail ahead. That immediately stopped the kids in their tracks; Lexie especially didn’t want to go anywhere near the bear. So Michelle took them back down the path to a little beach while I walked on ahead with the camera to get a picture of the bear.

And, as you’re walking through a rather silent forest, populated with trees and big bear-shaped rocks and on a little narrow trail that offers no hope of escape, you get to imagining things. I started whistling a lot, and looked for a big stick to grab. Nothing. Then, ahead, I saw three people stopped on the trail, pointing off into the brush. I knew what they were doing. I walked up, and, yes, there was the bear, grubbing about in the underbrush looking for bark or berries or deceased hikers to eat. The people there – man, wife and daughter – were very excited. Dad said to me a bit sheepishly, “They’ve named the bear, by the way. It’s Lisa.” So we watched Lisa the Bear move around, ignoring us, as it went on eating. I took about a billion pictures, hoping at least one would turn out. I have not seen them yet.

So to continue. Other highlights of the trip included driving home by way of Alpine, so we could see the Snake River Canyon, and having Liam fall down on a trail in the canyon and scream as if he’d just met Vlad the Impaler in one of his nasty moods because he (Liam, not Vlad) had skinned his knee. Michelle dealt with him really patiently. I told him, casually, “Hey Liam, next time you scream like that. . .” and didn’t finish the sentence. Michelle laughed at that.

Then, because the kids were hungry, we stopped at the Angus in Swan Valley – a place I’d driven by countless times but never stopped at – for dinner. Typical small-town greasy spoon, with shelves of books for people to browse in as they’re waiting for their food. I had a “Dorothy Burger,” which consisted of a hamburger embellished with ham and Swiss cheese. Good, but I never did get an explanation as to why it is called a Dorothy burger. I don’t recall Dorothy eating such a burger on the way to see the Wizard of Oz, so I assume there’s no L. Frank Baum connection.

We took the bat route home through Archer, of course. Very dark. I’m not sure I’d want to take that route in the dark if I weren’t familiar with it, because it was fun enough for me in the dark when I knew where I was going. It’s a stretch of about ten miles that cuts about another 20 miles off the trip home, so it’s worth it. But dark, as I mentioned. Going home the Alpine way meant we only had to cross the Teton Pass once, which is about as many times a trip as I prefer to cross that pass in the first place

BAMSPHD?

I find out this week, of course, if I've passed my online class on building an online class, representing the last three credits I need to earn a masters degree. I have high hopes. I know my final paper and website for the class aren't perfect, but I think I worked hard enough on them to accomplish something a little better than average. I have been wrong before, of course.

So now begs the next question: Since I may soon have the right to add the MS to the BA already behind my name, do I go on for the PhD? I'm listing pros and cons here, with cons first, as is my pessimistic wont:

• Sounds like just about any subject I pick has a teaching element involved.
• Not that teaching is terrible, but that means I can't complete the program and remain employed where I am, unless I want to drive myself crazy by driving all over the place. Nearest doctorate-issuing university to me is Idaho State, 75 miles. And do they have a program I want?
• Obviously I could continue at Utah State, get a PhD in professional communication. But that means moving to Logan.
• I can't provide for my family on what pittance I'd get from the university during the program. No way entirely. I'd have to work and go to school at the same time.
• I know people have done this, but do I want to do it? It sounds insane.

Yes, narrative style is helping me think these through. Now the pros:

• Earn big money, after spending big money.
• Honors and benefits, and at the age of nine.
• Working to accomplish something this difficult would be an amazing thing.
• More, better job opportunities, as masters degrees are going the way of the bachelors, in becoming a dime a dozen.
• Teaching experience on top of anything else. Could lead to better things, get me out of RWMC (not that it's bad, mind you) and into BYU-Idaho (not that BYU-I is necessarily nirvana).

One more con: I'd have to buy a suit.

So in a word, I don't know. I think a little more research is needed. That's a good place to start, right? But I'll have to act quickly because, like Cuzco, I ain't gettin' any deader.

Love Your Love Handles

And now for something completely different. British comedian Mitch Benn singing his song, "Love Handles." It's great, and fits in with the beefy/bespectacled (but not pompadoured) motif of the last post here.

Erik is NOT Dead

This, my friends, is Gaston Leroux, 19th century Paris journalist. I have a lot of respect for this man, and not only because, like me, he's beefy, bespectacled and blessed with a preponderance of puffy pompadourish hair. He's also the author of probably one of the best books I've read this year: Phantom of the Opera.

This is not, you besotted ones, the Phantom made popular by Andrew Lloyd Weber and Michael Crawford. This is not the phantom with the dinnerware on his face and the character depth of a mud puddle. This is the book that gives the phantom feeling, Christine Daae a soul and a mind and, frankly, makes the Vicomte de Chagny into kind of an impretuous, foppish dandy while the real hero of the story -- the Persian, a mysterious fellow from the Phantom's past who doesn't actually get a name -- is cut out of the musical entirely.

Do yourselves a favor, Phantom fans. Read the book. You'll get a lot more out of Christine's character, for one. She's such a soggy heroine in the musical, all fainting and nebbishness and no brains at all. In the book she's a rather strong woman who faces an incredibly difficult moral dilemma, and passes it.

You'll get a lot more out of the Phantom, too, and find out that behind the waxy persona, the schizophrenic mind, the dreamer, the composer of Don Juan Triumphant, that you basically have a normal guy who figures out in the end that it's not the having that counts, but the wanting.

And can I tell you what, this book has something the musical will never have -- exposition. I suppose the musical is written, in a way, for people already familiar with the story. Unforutnately, it's a crippled version of the story that leaves out a lot of the explanations. I know, it's the vogue these days to leave things up to the imagination, let the reader or viewer -- or soppy love-story lover -- to fill in the details. I like it when an author is in control and fills in the details for me. I like seeing how they all fit the story. Leaving things up to the imagination is fine to a point, but once and a while, explain something for heaven's sake.

Don't get me wrong. I love the musical. It's a fine story in its own right. But it's not really Leroux's phantom. If you love the musical, do yourself a favor and read the book.

The New Economy

Yup. Empathy is disappearing from the human race. Thank heaven the humor is still there.

Campers of Doom

Truth be told, I've had worse camping spots. At Warm River, the little dumpy spot we got was sandwiched between the water pump and the parking lot. We had no grass, just a little patch of gravel a picnic bench and a fire pit.

So the spot we had today was better. Grass. A nice big willow tree. A picnic table. Rather nice. But as it was behind an automobile dealership where we were stranded with the camper because on the way to Heise the truck's brakes locked up for no good reason. We sat there -- had a picnic; used the stove in the camper to boil water for hotdogs and had some baked beans -- for two hours as they fiddled with the truck. It was nice of them to fit us in. But they couldn't find anything wrong. At all. And wanted us to spend $400 for something or other which might or might not have solved the problem they couldn't find. So we drove home and will take the truck to Iona on Monday.

I have this cloud of doom that follows me, that's what it is. We've just been cursed for camping this year. First time was at Warm River and we ran out of propane and the battery died. Second time was to Wolf Flats and we had a heck of a time finding a new battery and the canopy fell off enroute. Then today. So I think I'm done camping for the year.

Child in the Man

Once and a while, I like to spool this up and watch it, just fo fun. Does it mean I want to revert to my childhood? Not necessarily. Though I did watch a lot of Sesame Street -- and The Price is Right, come to think about it; I even made a replica of the "Three Strikes, You're Out, You Don't WIn A Car Game" out of cardboard -- there are aspects of childhood I would not revisit. So I can, through my rose-colored glasses, simply re-live the good memories. Like this:



Re-watching this particular clip reminds me of the days I spent home from school alone because I was sick and everyone else had stuff to do. It also makes me grateful that we don't have TV at home, because my children would be as rich with such similar TV drivel as I am.

Ghostbusters, circa 1950

So, what if 1984's Ghostbusters had been filmed in the 1950s? Someone mashed together clips from The Absent-Minded Professor, The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Ghost Breakers, and a few other classic films to imagine this little cinematic trailer gem:



It's hard to see Fred MacMurray in Harold Ramis' role, but the Flubber MacMurray has kind of that professorial seriousness about him that Ramis brings to the role of Egon Spangler. I can see him trying to figure out some kind of mathematical formula on, well, in the '50s it would have had to be a slide rule, only to have Bob Hope's Pete Venkman slap it out of his hands. And who better to play the role of Ray "Get Her" Stantz in the 1950s than Dean Martin? Well, Jerry Lewis, whom I assume the mashers of this clip bring in for the role of Lewis Tully. Oh well, They couldn't get everything right.