The daily rundown, April 29

I had really high hopes of getting up early this morning. Unfortunately, once my girlfriend headed off to work, I wound up lying in bed for "just a few minutes" and didn't wake up until a little after 11. Once I did get up, I wandered over to my "office" and checked my e-mail. At least I thought I was going to check my e-mail. It turns out that the internet connection was down. I went downstairs and unplugged the modem and router, since rebooting is always the I/S department's best friend. I did notice that the cable light on the modem was blinking slowly, though, and that's just usually not a good sign. So I turned on the TV and, sure enough, there was no reception there, either. And, since I'm kind of a guest at the place, I didn't really feel that it was my place to call Charter and gripe about things, so I was kind of screwed. I did a little bit of stuff that I could on the computer with no internet service, then went and took a shower and got myself a bit more ready for the day.

By the time I had eaten a little bit of lunch and had myself ready to head out the door, it was just about time for my girlfriend to get home for lunch, so I figured I'd wait around and talk to her for a little bit. She was not having the best of days, and it was rather unfortunate that I was in sort of a chatty mood, probably because I couldn't get my chattiness out on the internet, at the same time that she was pretty much just wanting to be left the hell alone. I talked to her for a little while, then left her to have a bit of her quiet time. She stayed a little longer than usual, because she was going to have to work late because her co-worker called in sick again. She always seems to take up the slack for everyone else around that place and never seems to have any of the other girls cover for her that much. It rather sucks, I think, but that's the way it goes.

She took the application I'd filled out for the I/S job at her work when she returned, which helped because that way I didn't have to run down there in addition to the other things I was going to need to do in the afternoon. As she was leaving, there was a Charter truck out in front of the house. I waited for him to head down the road before checking, but there was still no connection. He seemed to be stopping at several different utility poles, though, so I guess the problem was a bit more widespread than just us, and he was trying to find where the problem lay. In any case, I finally headed out into the world at about a quarter to four.

I drove down 377 to Argyle and then took 407 over to Flower Mound. I was looking for the Washington Mutual Bank which I knew to be on 407, called Justin Road as you go through the city of Flower Mound. Unfortunately, they had a bunch of construction going on and that part of the town is made up of a lot of strip-mall type development, so I didn't really see it anywhere from the road. I finally pulled over at a RaceTrac gas station and went into the store to see if anyone knew where the damned bank was located. A guy who worked there told me the address that the gas station was, so I knew it was just a few blocks away and now I also knew that I was looking on the correct side of the street for it. He wasn't sure if it was back the way I came or further on, though, so I opted to go further on.

It was the wrong choice. I wound up driving through the north end of Flower Mound until I got to the Lewisville city limit. Knowing that I'd obviously gone a little further than I wanted, I turned back around and headed back past the RaceTrac, then started keeping my eyes peeled for the WaMu sign that I knew would be there. I pulled off into a shopping center with a number that looked close, but it was too soon. So I continued to the next shopping center, but that one's number was too high. So I drove back through the shopping center parking lots and finally found the bank, with very little in the way of signage, sort of sequestered away behind a gas station in the corner of a strip mall. I was kind of glad that I was actually closing the account, because I'd hate to have to find that bank again.

The tellers there were quite nice, though. I was greeted by three of them as I went through the door, probably because there was no one else there and it looked like there hadn't been for a while. When I told them that I was there to close my account, I was informed that it was "No Closing Accounts Tuesday." The lady who helped me, who happened to be both the closest and the cutest, was actually very helpful, though. She told me that they were actually looking at putting a branch here in Denton, but that doesn't really help me for the time being. Maybe if they follow through with that, I'll rejoin their bank. For now, though, I have to head off to some other financial institution. In addition to my money, she gave me her card and told me to have someone from my new bank call her if they had any problems with the cashier's check or anything like that. That was quite nice of her and beyond the call of duty, I think.

With my cash in my wallet, and knowing that I was out of rum at the house, I headed back toward a liquor store I'd seen on the hunt for the bank. Unfortunately, I found that the building was for lease and they had apparently just not removed the sign from the strip mall's collection of placards. That was sort of a bummer. I resumed my journey vaguely in the direction of home.

I stopped at another little strip mall because I remembered that I needed to buy some envelopes to ship some stuff off to Mom and a few other places. There was an Office Depot, which was really empty considering the size of the store. I thought it might be closed, but it wasn't. There just weren't any people shopping there. I guess the office types must do their business shopping earlier in the day or something. I found a couple of padded envelopes, and I also picked up a spindle of blank CDs that were on sale for about half price. I have a couple of spindles in my storage unit, but I have no idea when I'm going to be able to dig back there far enough to get either them or my DVD recorder out of the mess. When I paid, the girl asked if I had one of their rewards cards. I didn't, but I filled out the little form and got my card before I left. I doubt I'll use it much, but what the hell. It's free...

I continued back the way I'd come, heading toward the tiny little town of Corral City. I think that city was basically established primarily for the purpose of having a liquor store. In any case, I got there with no problem, picked out a bottle of rum for my very own, and headed back out on the road. I was thinking about taking the back roads back, but I figured I might as well get a little more used to driving on the freeways. It didn't look like 35W was all that busy anyway, so that's the route I took.

It wasn't all that jammed, which was nice. I made a nice smooth ride up to University and then headed back into Denton. I stopped at the Kroger shopping center, because there were a few stores there that I wanted to have a closer look at. One was the Denton Thrift. I wandered through that store for a little while, but didn't really find too much that absolutely grabbed my attention. They did have kind of an interesting selection of records, which I may have to go back and browse through later, and they also had some nice art prints, frames, vases and such at pretty reasonable prices, especially when compared to buying them at the downtown "antique" stores, which usually seem to me to be pretty much junk stores for the hoi polloi. In any case, I'll probably go back once I get myself set up a little better in my own place and such. For now, though, I just kept my money in my wallet.

I also went down to the JoAnn store that's down at the far end of the shopping center. My girlfriend told me that it's a tiny one, and she was pretty accurate about that. Even the old one I used to go to in Medford was about twice the size of the store here, but they do have a full selection of embroidery floss and a decent selection of cross stitch fabric and accessories. And they're a lot closer than Hobby Lobby and Michael's, so I may just wind up doing a fair amount of my little craft shopping there. Again, though, for now I just left my money in my wallet and headed toward home.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. I got home, unloaded my little purchases, and checked my e-mail. Surprisingly, I already had a little welcome message from Office Depot's rewards program. I guess they must have been bored there at the store and put all my info into the computer already, which is kind of cool. I went downstairs and watched some hockey. The girlfriend came home and watched it with me. After the games were over, we headed upstairs and retired for the night.