Friday, July 15, 2011

The Universe has a singular wit

UPDATE: The Universe has not lost its sense of humor. :( I picked my car up today from the mechanic. They couldn't find anything wrong with the car, any cause for it to refuse to start. They did service my air conditioner and charge the freon, to the tune of $190. The car drove fine to work and home. Here's where the joke returns. I rolled the window down to open the security gate and it won't roll back up again. This same thing happened shortly before the car died. Oh, and the mechanic was kind enough to let me know about the other $400 of work the car needs. I wonder if it's worth spending that much money on a car with over 200k miles on it. Anyone have a spare car lying around? :D

Not sure whether it is the Universe, Karma, or some other cosmic force but no one else enjoys the joke. My life since the last post is the punch line to the joke on me. I know better than to tempt fate. Which is exactly what I did in saying that my life was going alright.

About a week after throwing caution to the wind my carelessness cost me my car. I put the key in my ignition, turn the key, and...nothing. Not even a click to tell me it is trying to start. It did after a couple attempts set off the awful noise that only emits when the battery is dying. Even that stops after a minute when all power is gone. For the first couple of days after that I was able to get a ride to and from work. Then days off in a row. Unfortunately, my schedule recently hasn't matched up with people I can ask. This meant a few days walking in temps above 100 degrees. I've taken the car to be diagnosed (still haven't heard back) and do hope I'll have it back very soon. Even with an anemic air conditioner, it's still preferable to walking. A friend jumped the battery to give it enough juice to save money on a tow. Funny thing is once I got it to the mechanic, went in to tell him what was wrong, and let him check the car it started just fine. He said the battery sounded strong, stronger than it would if the battery were truly drained. This scares me because I have no clue what could cause the battery to act like it had no juice. I'm crossing my fingers it's something simple or at least cheap.

Now I know this isn't quite as scary as what I could be going through, but the treks to work in the middle of the high heat of the day are tiring. To quote a cheesy movie (that I love), "I love my car. I MISS my car!" Hey, at least I'm close enough to work to avoid the bus.

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Trying to streamline

For a long while now, the goal was to update the shop with handy shopping cart software. The problem always came down to figuring out the PHP and creating a database on the web hosting server. Now the server that hosts our site has added shopping cart installation right into the hosting package. The cart is installed and soon adding products and making the store professional will be a snap. This is perfect as there will also be lots of new items coming to The Apothecary; spell kits, handmade jewelry, as well as the basic supplies. Change has been slow. With the new resources, they should come more steadily.