Fortunately, I’m not taking a road trip tomorrow.

When I was out in California a few weeks back Valerie played this Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros track for me after our skyline hike. In the time since, I bought the album and have been abusing it heavily, to such an extent that I’ve been forbidden from singing this particular song in other people’s presence. That shouldn’t stop you though – you’ve not been banned, yet. Listen* learn and sing to the mighty irritation of the ones you love.

*I am not responsible for brain damage resulting from permanent adhesion to your neurons.

We were playing around with my little GoPro HD camera this weekend. For this video we took one shot every 10 seconds. Unfortunately the battery only lasted three hours or so so the video doesn’t quite reach the summit.

I’m having a difficult patch in my relationship with my car this summer.

Some backstory-

#1: In the middle of 48 hours this year (way back on May 1st), my driver’s side door handle stopped functioning, quite randomly, as Allison and I were on a trip to home depot for ingredients to build our scale o’ justice. Since then, I’ve either been relying on LZ to open the door for me from the passenger side, or I’ve had to slightly dislocate my left shoulder to reach from the rear door to pop the front door open. Needless to say it is interestingly risky when I’m forced to do this in traffic.

#2: On the way back from my mom’s birthday party (July 17th), my muffler and/or every single pipe connected to it exploded. I’ve been deafening myself and neighbors ever since.

#3: The day before Foss Fest (July 24th), some jackass broke off my driver’s side mirror in the brief hours I was home, between 1am and 6am. This, my dad helped me epoxy back on.

Since I’m trying not to be totally irresponsible (and am road-tripping this weekend), I finally, finally took the car in to get issues #1 and #2 fixed this week. $392 dollars I don’t have later, badda bing, perfectly functioning car! So happy! As I walk over to inspect said beauty in the mechanic’s lot, my bag catches on the epoxied mirror and snap, I break it off again, my own self. The car was totally fixed and in my possession for approximately 30 seconds.

Point being, I have more epoxy, and need someone with steady hands. This could be your big chance to accidentally glue yourself to my ride!

I’ll be back in California this weekend, attending a wedding of someone I was close to in high school but haven’t seen in a disturbingly large number of years. After that, I’m going to look around and find a highish looking point and then walk to the top of it. That’s my entire plan*.

I’m being told that despite my great idea to fly into San Jose and thereby avoiding San Francisco ‘summer’ altogether, it’s projected to be cold and damp down in the Palo Alto area. But given that that information comes from an unreliable source long since spoiled by California perfection it will probably be utterly gorgeous all weekend.

*Ok fine we’re also planning to visit Stanford. And play with miss chloe. And eat as many avocados as humanly possible.

Via UH, Taza is having some flooding problems. They sell their chocolate at Trader Joe’s, highly recommended both on a taste and ‘support Somerville businesses’ level. Also recommended? Checking out the flooding photos/videos from last weekend. Good thing we were all totally safe and dry up in Gloucester.

I successfully enrolled in the 2010 BAA half-marathon this morning, along with the rest of Team HB, plus special guest star LZ. The race is October 10th, a short twelve weeks from this Sunday. This will be my fourth (?) BAA half, and will meet the latter part of resolution #2.

I’m going to need all 12 weeks, as my mileage has alternated between sad and horrific as of late. I last ‘ran’ the day before Nate’s wedding, where approximately two minutes in (just as I was telling KKV of my plan to register for this race) I stepped on the edge of a 5-inch curb and snapped the ever living hell out of the few remaining ligaments in my right ankle. Which would have been fun in and of itself, but for bonus thrills I came just about this close to doing a header into an automobile of the large, fast, oncoming type. What is the proper wedding protocol when a groomsman bites it hours before the rehearsal dinner? I would expect, at the least, some sort of tux discount for the funeral.

Point being, the race is twelve weeks from Sunday, and as of today I’m still not really able to walk comfortably. Can this be done? With the psychic help of the bicoastal* runaholics support group, I’m a confident maybe.

*Speaking of which, only six months later, the hevelonian tag line is no longer “bicoastal, bimodal, bionic”. Help me think of a better one or we’re gonna get stuck with the bouncing baby crap that’s up there now.

**Double speaking of which, Team HardCortex are triathalon-ing it up out in California this weekend. The east-coasters are very psyched for this and are looking forward to hearing of their top ten finish (in the money baby!).