Yeah, so I went and bought myself a car yesterday! I borrowed my mothers' Impala, picked up Chris and went tooling around looking at different auto dealerships, used car lots and so-called "buy here, pay here" joints. It was rather entertaining trying to be sold on purchasing any variety of the Civics I viewed. One dealership in particular tried to sell me hard, working with my $4000 offer but never really giving me what I wanted. We had been at it for a few hours and were just about to toss in the towel when we made one last stop before heading back to find food.



Only thirty or so minutes after making that last ditch effort, I was driving away in my new car with Chris in the Impala behind me. I got a Black 1994 Honda Civic EX Coupe 5-Speed. There are only a few minor items that could use some attention, but with them I am not concerned. The car drives nicely and seems to have been taken care of over the years. The interior is nearly perfect and the body only has a few minor dings here and there. The windows are tinted, there is a power sunroof (something I have wanted for a while) and a Sony CD player that works, but needs to be rewired (memory is lost when car is off). The only major item that requires attention is the air conditioning, which is not functioning. It could just need a Freon recharge or perhaps the compressor itself is shot. I plan to hit up an air conditioning repair facility that offers free estimates in order to determine what the problem is there. I thought the power door locks were malfunctioning at first, but then I remembered today how Honda configures them to prevent one from locking their keys inside.

The best part about this whole deal is the price. The dealer was asking $6000 for the car. The resold dealer value I found to be approximately $5500, with all the features included. Now consider we arrived at this lot about thirty minutes before they were set to close. Suffice it to say, the staff was helpful, but did recommend perhaps waiting until Monday to think and make a decision. After taking a short test drive down SR 50, I made my offer of $4000 cash inclusive of tax, tag and title and the salesperson, Edwin, took it to his manager. When he came back, I was told that the manager was made aware of my offer and that we would be able to negotiate. The price went back and forth, but in the end my initial offer stood. Their only prerequisite was that I purchased the car right then and with cash.

As I was able to negotiate the price down to $4000, I still have about $200 with which to use on possible repairs or maintenance. Needless to say, I am very excited to be in an automobile of my own again. I was two days shy of one full month of non-mobility since the "white Civic" was in the accident. Moreover, it is paid for and done with: no more car payments!

Since I have been on my work hiatus, it is easy to forget the value that the arrival of Friday has to the standard nine-to-five employee who likely has the following two days off from work. Now that this Friday has come, I find myself in that familiar position: eagerly anticipating the day. But in this case, it is not because of the significance of the non-working days that immediately follow, but in the day itself.

It is only a bit past midnight and I am ready for bed, only waiting to finish writing this and drinking my water before crawling into my cuddly sheets and blankets. I hope I will be able to get to sleep quickly. I had not been nervous about things until now, but as several friends reassured me online earlier tonight, I know I will do fine in my job interview tomorrow morning. So, no pressure; I am going to go into this confident, see what happens and let things fall as they may.

And now for your enjoyment and as a proximate result of my own laziness and desire to get to bed at a decent hour, here are a few bullets:

• So far the vehicle search has turned up nothing solid, but I am awaiting some return telephone calls from some possibilities.



• I have decided to stop syndicating my links on blogrolling.com. It seemed silly to me that every time I added, edited or otherwise modified my links list (which is supported on Mount Sutro using a homegrown script) I had to pop over to another site and make the same changes there. However, please feel free to still use your blogrolling.com account to link to us.



• {insert something witty here}

The highest court in Canada's largest province, Ontario, has ruled that gay and lesbian couples have the right to marry there. The ruling upholds a lower court decision and challenges the Canadian Government to change its laws on same-sex marriage. The appeals court ordered that gay couples seeking a legal union should be issued a marriage licence immediately.

The case had been fought by a gay couple, Michael Stark and Michael Leshner, who wasted no time in getting married hours after the ruling. Another couple, Jeff Parker and David Wood, saw the ruling on the internet and immediately went to Toronto City Hall to get their papers ready for an August wedding.

The 61-page ruling says the heterosexual definition of marriage violates gay couples' rights under the country's constitutional document, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Ontario is the third Canadian province to strike down the federal heterosexual definition of marriage in court decisions. [ full story ]

Ok, so I lied. My Gay Days is now officially over and I am tired. Ernie, the gang and I ended up going to dinner at the local Jungle Jim's and then to Disney's Pleasure Island where we danced, drank and checked out the scene until the early morning. It would be out last time to hang out together as their flight left in the afternoon yesterday. Last night I was taken out to dinner by my friend Frankie and then the two of us hung out with Travis downtown. We ended up talking and drinking until late until Frankie realised he needed to get home to bed in order to go to work Wednesday.

In other news:

• I really need to purchase a vehicle before this week is over.



• Chris has been helping me locate used vehicles that might just work for me.



• I have a job interview I am excited about on Friday.



• I have said it before, but XM Radio fucking rocks, especially Channel 81, BPM.

I just got home this afternoon, official concluding my Gay Days weekend. I went over to Chris' house on Friday night so that he would not have to pick me up to go to Disney the next day. I talked to Ernie that night about getting together, but as the night quickly grew into morning, I decided just to stay in and get some rest for the day ahead.

Disney was a lot of fun, much more than I had imagined it would be. Chris and I arrived just a bit behind schedule and met up with a few friends of his with whom we spent a better part of the day together. It was a great time walking around, checking everyone out and of course, riding the rides. It had been a few years since I was at the Magic Kingdom. Somehow with the who-knows-how-many visitors, I managed to run into a whole bunch of people I know from around town (maybe ten or fifteen people) and even Ernie and the gang. With the exception of a few downpours, the rain was relatively mild and knowing our wonderful summer weather here, could have been much worse. It was great watching some more femme guys running for cover in the rain. Hell, one was even skipping through the rain, gay as could be (pun intentional). The Thunder Mountain Railroad ride had been closed when we all originally went to ride it, but after Chris' friends left we rode a quite a bit of rides just the two of us, that one included. I was wearing the requisite red garb, in my case a tank top I would have never even thought about wearing fifteen pounds ago. I even managed to get just a bit of sun, too, but not too much.

I ended up getting to ride just about everything I wanted before Chris and I decided to head back to his place in order to grab some food, get all pretty and head out to the Parliament House to check the scene out there and watch Cyndi Lauper perform. The length of the show itself was rather disappointing (only thirty or so minutes) and the drink ticket bullshit he mentions should never be repeated again. We milled about and checked things out before and after the concert prior to just deciding to get on our way (last call was past and we were out of cash). We spent Sunday together just hanging out and watching marathon Star Trek: The Next Generation (hold your comments: it is the only television show I really enjoy). And well, I guess that is about it.

Speaking of that troublemaker Ernie, after I submit this I am going to be heading back down to their hotel to have dinner and hang out again before him, Mike and Don all fly back to the city by the bay. Oh, and I got the pictures back from the other night so I will be going through those soon and putting them in my Gallery. Their pictures will be coming soon too, as soon as they get back and have a chance to e-mail them to me. Well, with that I am off...