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September 29, 2009

SCEFC Set List (27 Sep 2009)

This is a couple days late, but I wanted to post it anyway. I was the music coordinator this past Sunday again at E-Free, the first time I've coordinated in back-to-back weeks. Alex was in town this weekend to visit for my birthday on Sunday, and we had a really small band this week -- just him (on guitar) and me (on piano)! I'd been looking forward for awhile to leading a worship set with him as a two-man band someday, and it worked out this week because so many other of the musicians were out of town. There was some concern that the sound might be a bit thin musically, but I think it worked well, despite both our voices being a bit raw from the football game Saturday night (Olivia forwarded me some very positive feedback about the music from a comment card too!). It was definitely necessary for us to run through the whole set twice before the service to try to get our voices warmed up. Fortunately our voices help up just well enough to manage singing without our voices cracking. :-)

The sermon text this week was John 3, so there were several songs that fit with the theme of God's love and belief in Jesus' atoning death being the only way attain salvation. That theme should be obvious with the songs that we did.

Prelude: O Praise Him - by David Crowder

Alex suggested we do this one, as a bit more up-tempo of a prelude song, and since there were already several other hymns in the set. With the call to turn our ears and gaze to heaven and to praise Christ the King, it's a good opening/prelude song to set the tone.

Song #1: Nothing but the Blood - by Matt Redman

Jesus' blood is the only thing that can take away our sins. There is nothing else that can stand in our defense before God.

Song #2: Mighty to Save - by Ben Fielding and Reuben Morgan

God had such great compassion on the world, such love for the world, that He sent His one and only Son to save the world. Jesus' resurrection is proof that our penalty has been fully paid and the reason that we can have confidence in our salvation.

Song #3: Before the Throne of God Above - by Charitie Lees Bancroft, Vikki Cook and Shane Barnard

Jesus is our "great High Priest whose name is 'Love'", and He purchased our souls with His blood.

Song #4: How Deep the Father's Love for Us - by Stuart Townsend

As with last week, I wanted to bring the musical volume and intensity down right before the sermon. It's also one of my favorite songs to play and sing. "But this I know with all my heart: His wounds have paid my ransom."

Closing Song #1: In Christ Alone - by Stuart Townsend and Keith Getty

In the first part of John 3, Jesus tells Nicodemus that we must be born again by the Spirit in order to attain salvation, and that there is no other way. It is through Christ alone that we are saved.

Closing Song #2: Shine, Jesus, Shine - by Graham Kendrick

This song fits perfectly with John 3:19-21. The light, Jesus, has come into the world. From verse 21: "But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God."

It sure was a treat to lead worship with my best friend on my birthday!

Posted by Jared at 11:47 PM | Comments (0)

September 28, 2009

Birthday Visit to the Whitehouse

Last year Penn State declared a Whitehouse for the home game vs Illinois on 27 Sep (my birthday), but I didn't go because my PSU friends Chris & Amber were getting married over in Toledo (Happy 1st Anniversary to them!). This year when Penn State declared another Whitehouse for the home game vs Iowa on 26 Sep, I was excited that I was getting a second chance to be able to enjoy a game like that, this time the night before my birthday.

Alex decided to drive down from Michigan for the weekend to celebrate my birthday, so I was trying to find a ticket for him for quite some time. Fortunately I was eventually able to secure a ticket for him in the student section. I was thrilled to find a student ticket for him, because if I didn't, I wouldn't have gone to the game without Alex. I would've sold my ticket and then hoped a scalper outside the stadium would've been selling a pair of non-student tickets for a "reasonable" price. Considering the magnitude of the game, however, the likelihood of finding reasonably priced scalped tickets was going to be slim, so I was really glad we didn't have to mess with any of that and that I wouldn't have to risk not getting into the game.

Some of the meteo grad students drove up to the tailgate lots at about 9am to set up and go to ESPN College GameDay, which originated from Penn State this weekend. Alex & I both decided that was simply way too early to go start tailgating for an 8pm kickoff. Tailgating can be fun and all, but we also wanted to do at least something else too.

One of the main "other" things I really wanted to do was go for a run with Alex, so at around 10am we went for a pretty good run - about 5.5 miles!! And I only had to stop once for a short walking break, around the 4-mile mark! My previous longest run was 4.1 miles back on Monday last week, but I had to stop twice during that. It was wonderful to be able to go running with Alex, and he helped me quicken my pace a little bit (especially early on, though I undoubtedly slowed his normal pace), and to keep running several times when I felt like stopping -- I'd mention while we were running that on past runs I'd frequently stop along a particular stretch or hill that we were on, and he'd say, "Not today!". Also, my shin splints, which had really been bothering me on my runs over the past few weeks, didn't bother me at all after Saturday's run. Hooray!

By the time we drove up to the tailgate around 1:30 or 2pm, the rain had already begun, and would last all afternoon and evening, until well into the night actually. It was very, very wet, but fortunately there were a couple tents with tarp walls set up, to keep some areas reasonably dry. (Walter & I went out and bought the tarps and some other stuff that week because we knew it'd probably be a wet day, and that was a very good investment.) We still had a great time up there though, grilling some Louie's brats I brought, playing as a team in a few games (unbeaten in two games of pong, 1-1 at washer toss during a short break in the rain), and hanging out with the meteo crew.

It was clear by mid-week that it was going to be chilly and rainy for the game, so I got long-sleeve white Penn State shirts for Alex & I, as well as clear Penn State ponchos. And boy did we need the ponchos! I didn't want to risk my camera's well-being at the stadium in the rain, so I didn't bring it in with me. I was kinda bummed about that, because I was looking forward to getting some good pictures of the Whitehouse. Oh well. We wanted to beat the lines at the student gate, so we got there around 6:15. The tradeoff for not having to wait in line at all was that we had to sit out in the rain in the stadium for a bit longer, but an extra hour in the rain really didn't make any difference; we were still wet and cold, but it was neat to watch the stadium slowly fill up with white under the lights. The rain really didn't dampen enthusiasm for the game, and the student section was quite raucous. During the pregame when they were playing a bunch of music in the stadium, I sent a text message to my friend Blair from E-Free (who works as a sound engineer in Beaver Stadium during football games) to tell him that Alex & I requested the song "I've Gotta Feeling" by Black-Eyed Peas. I don't know if they already planned on playing it or not, but about 20 minutes before kickoff they played it! That was pretty cool.

This was Alex's first-ever football game of any sort that he'd ever been to, so this was a pretty fantastic atmosphere for a first-ever football game. :-) He got to see pretty much everything too, including the delirium and excitement of PSU fans on their first offensive play (a 79-yard touchdown pass), a clock-eating methodical drive (20 plays, 10+ minutes, all for PSU to settle for a field goal), to the noisy intensity of the fans urging on our defense, to unusual scoring (a safety for Iowa in the 2nd quarter to trim PSU's lead to 10-2), and utter silence and disbelief (when Iowa blocked a punt and returned it for a touchdown to pull ahead 11-10 in the 4th quarter). He got to see pretty much everything except a Penn State win, as Iowa scored 16 unanswered points in the 4th quarter to win 21-10. Our defense played heroically, but got no support from the offense after the 1st quarter. Penn State's offensive line was atrocious after the 1st quarter, which led to a poor night for QB Daryll Clark and RB Evan Royster. As JoePa said, "we got licked." Iowa absolutely outplayed Penn State in just about every facet of the game in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th quarters. It was disappointing and frustrating to watch. Penn State's loss aside, Alex & I both enjoyed the game and the experience (which may have been enhanced by the all-game non-stop rain and cold in some twisted way, haha). After standing in the rain and cheering our voices somewhat hoarse for several hours (and after a 5.5 mile run in the morning), we were very ready to get off our feet and go to bed following the game.

Our voices were still in pretty rough shape Sunday morning at church. Fortunately we got there early enough to run through the whole set twice, so we could loosen up our voices a little bit. Even though my voice was/is kind of scratchy when I talked, it was good enough to lead singing this morning on some of the songs, even if it was an octave lower than I'd normally sing in some spots. I'll write more about the set in a separate post, but it was awesome to play with Alex again, and to have the opportunity to lead with just us two up there. After church we met up with David D & Isaac at Prospector's for lunch. Mmmmmm, ribs and wings all in one meal... :-) Alex left for Ann Arbor in mid-afternoon to get back for Monday classes and whatnot, but not before giving me a colorful "Bible book" tie as a birthday present. I look forward to wearing it, thanks Alex!

Thanks to everyone for all the birthday messages and wishes, too! I appreciate it! Man, I'm starting to feel old now that I'm 26 though... :-)

Posted by Jared at 12:29 AM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2009

SCEFC Set List (20 Sep 2009)

I'm the music team coordinator this week at the E-Free Church. This month the church started a sermon series on the Gospel of John, spending the last two weeks on John 1, and this week the sermon is on John 2 and entitled "Out with the Old." There aren't exactly a bunch of songs written about Jesus turning water into wine. With it being Jesus' first public miracle, however, I decided to go with a theme in the main set of the greatness of God, His control over nature, and praising God for that. This week the personnel is me on piano, Lance on drums, Mike on bass/vocals and Sue on vocals. At rehearsal tonight we were able to do quite a bit with dynamics, despite only having piano, drums and bass.

Prelude: Great Is the Lord - by Michael W. Smith & Deborah D. Smith

I thought this would be a good tone-setter for the rest of the service, singing about how great God is and how He is worthy of our praise.

Song #1: God of Wonders - by Marc Byrd & Steve Hindalong

Not only is Jesus the Creator-God of the "big" things like stars and galaxies, but He also made and controls the "small" things like molecules and chemical processes. To suspend the normal laws of nature and make wine in an instant is yet another demonstration of His ultimate power over His creation.

Song #2: Beautiful One - Tim Hughes

Jesus is both wonderful and powerful, with His merciful death for us on the cross and displaying His mighty works for us all to see.

Song #3: I Exalt Thee - by Pete Sanchez, Jr.

A God as great as ours deserves to be exalted by us, the crown jewels of His creation. After the previous two big, loud songs, this one starts to bring it down a notch.

Song #4: I Love You, Lord - by Laurie Klein

I think this song works really great coming after the previous one. I decided to close the main set with a quieter, more contemplative song as we move to the sermon. The last time we sing through this I plan to have it be a capella.

Closing Song: He Knows My Name - by Tommy Walker

I chose to end the service with this song to go along with the last part of John 2, which talks about how Jesus knows what is in man. While the passage seems to be casting that in a negative light (that He didn't feel the need to defend or explain Himself because he knows what is in man), I decided to go with this song anyway, which talks about God knowing everything about us in a positive light. That the Creator of the universe knows and cares about us is an amazing thing, and something we can take comfort in.

Posted by Jared at 10:18 PM | Comments (0)

September 13, 2009

My Two-Week Summer - Part 3: On the Go

In the six days that I was theoretically at home in Cumberland, I was somewhat surprised when I realized that I was only home for two meals (not counting breakfast). Yep, that's right, just two. And one of them was when Alex & I arrived on Tuesday the 18th for dinner. So where was I?

On Wednesday the 19th I had lunch with my younger brother Jake in Rice Lake, between my visits to the DMV to transfer the title on the Taurus to my name. Yeah, I had to make two trips because I didn't realize the first time that the DMV didn't accept credit cards. Argh. And then that evening I went to Bible study at Word of Life Church in Taylors Falls, Minnesota, with my parents.

There was a little excitement that afternoon too, in the form of multiple tornado warnings for Barron County. There were also confirmed touchdowns in downtown Minneapolis and in northeastern St Croix County in west-central Wisconsin. It was rather strange and unexpected that there were tornadoes at all that day, because it was cool and cloudy all day long. The TV meteorologists were all saying that they'd never seen tornadoes form from such a weather setup before. Interestingly, the Minneapolis tornado struck the Convention Center, where the ELCA denomination was meeting to debate whether practicing homosexuals could be installed as pastors. Was the tornado a coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, but John Piper, a preacher from Minneapolis who I respect a lot, made an argument for why he thinks it wasn't a coincidence.

On Thursday the 20th I drove over to Paynesville, Minnesota, to visit my sister-in-law Eve, my niece Gabriella and my nephew Mathias. I met them out there right after lunch because they were spending a few days at a lake cabin that belonged to Eve's grandpa. Her sister Kate and Kate's kids were there too. I got to play a little bit of a card game called tens with Gabriella & Mathias, and then Eve & Kate taught me how to play Sequence. I was only able to be out there for about 3-4 hours, but it was really good to spend some time with them again, if only for an afternoon.

That evening I drove back to White Bear Lake, Minnesota, to have dinner with my friends Scott & Katie. Mmmm, never-ending pasta bowl at Olive Garden with a good bottle of wine... It was cool to catch up with them, and to hang out with Scott the rest of the evening, hearing about his recent travels to China and everything, over some more beer and wine. I spent the night there, wisely. :-)

I got back to Cumberland after lunch on Friday the 21st, because I did some shopping while I was in the Twin Cities, including getting a tape adapter and car charger for my iPod, so that I could listen to music on the long drive back to PA (the Taurus doesn't have a CD player). Also, while I was at the JC Penney at Rosedale, a whole rack of Brett Favre purple Vikings jerseys arrived -- "Favre jerseys, coming through!" was the announcement from the clerk wheeling the rack into the sports apparel section, with a couple customers in tow. You can bet I took a cell phone picture of the purple Favre jerseys and sent it to my friend Mike in Green Bay. ;-) To be honest though, it's still so weird (and a bit wrong) to see Favre in the purple horned helmet and jersey, after he spent so many years as a Packer.

I actually had supper at home on Friday night -- my second and final meal at home -- before going over to my brother Nathan & Laura's place in Rice Lake to play some Settlers of Catan: Cities and Knights. I didn't fare well at all, but it was still fun to play and to see them again. I always make sure to reserve at least one night to play games with Nathan & Laura when I'm home for a visit. :-)

On Saturday the 22nd I rode with my parents up to the North Shore (the Minnesota shoreline along Lake Superior). It was an absolutely spectacular day up there, not a cloud in the sky, just a light breeze and temps in the low 60s. They mainly took me up there to look at a few properties they've been checking out up around Lutsen. They have a dream of someday moving up to the North Shore, having a house on Lake Superior. There were some nice properties up there too, but it's hard not to be taken with pretty much anywhere along the North Shore:

We decided to spend the night at a place called Thomsonite Beach, about 5 miles south of Grand Marais. We met up with my uncle Gary from Grand Marais too (my aunt Kathy had to work), got some beer and a couple of pizzas from Sven & Ole's Pizza in Grand Marais (we got an "Uffda Za" [supreme] and a "Shicken and Vild Rice Za" [with plenty of other veggie toppings too] -- both were delicious!), and brought them back to Thomsonite Beach for a nice picnic out on the cliffs above Lake Superior. It was a bit cool but an absolutely gorgeous evening. As night fell we built a fire out there too, and just had a great time. And I have to say, I don't think I've ever seen Jupiter reflect so brightly or so beautifully in a lake before, shimmering all the way to the horizon. I also got to see the aurora borealis for about five minutes too!! It was a patch of pale white shimmering light, and quickly dove below the tree line (it was also about 40 degrees away from a brilliant Milky Way -- hooray for no light pollution!). While it was far from spectacular and very brief, it was still really cool to see the northern lights. It was an enjoyable evening.

We lingered up on the North Shore for awhile on the morning of Sunday the 23rd, and it was another beautiful day up there. It was quite enjoyable to spend so much time by Lake Superior, it was a great way to spend a weekend. :-)

After grabbing lunch at Culver's in Superior (always try to get to a Culver's at least once when I'm back in Wisconsin!), my parents dropped me off at the movie theater in Rice Lake just as the movie "District Nine" was starting, which I watched with my brothers Nathan & Jake (also went out to dinner with them after the movie). I was pretty impressed with the quality of "District Nine." It's not a movie for kids or a movie to watch if you're a bit squeamish, but it was a quality film. Given the movie's themes of racism, I also thought the setting for the movie was perfect too, in Johannesburg. I also liked that Peter Jackson continued his pattern of casting previously-unknown (or little-known) actors in leading roles, so that you're not thinking of previous roles that actor did. The acting in the movie was also very good all-around. I give it two thumbs up.

Monday the 24th was my last day in Cumberland, but it was only a partial day. I drove up to Spooner to have lunch with my friend Brooke from high school. It'd been two and a half years since I'd seen her last (at her wedding, in fact), so it was good to catch up. Then I packed up my stuff and drove down to the Twin Cities to go to a Twins-Orioles game with Alex. Alex's younger half-brother and some of Alex's cousins came along to the game too. It was the only home game the Twins had while I was home, so I really wanted to go because it was the last time I'd be able to see a Twins game in the Metrodome. It'll be really strange in future years not to see the Twins play in the Metrodome, but I can't say that I'm sad to see them leave it for an open-air stadium. Baseball is meant to be played outdoors, and it'll be wonderful not to have a teflon roof overhead on a fine summer evening. I try to make it to a Twins game at least once a year, and I really hope I can get to a game next year at Target Field. I might have to wait a year or two though, depending on the demand for tickets. While last year was the first year in quite some time that I didn't make it to a Twins game, this was the first Twins game that Alex went to in more than a decade. At least it was a fun last game in the Metrodome for us, and we were able to see a 2-1 Twins victory. After the game Alex & I stayed up really late, playing a dozen or so games of Sequence, haha. Good times, good times. It was fun to spend time doing nothing but relaxing before starting the drive back to PA.

For whatever reason(s) though, I didn't actually get any sleep. I hate it when insomnia strikes. Especially the night before a 6-hour drive. I did seriously consider not striking out for Chicago, but in the end I decided to go for it, because I thought it was a good thing to make it back to Penn State for my second day of class. A couple hours after I left Alex's place I seriously started to reconsider the wisdom of my decision. In hindsight I should've either stayed at Alex's another day, or driven up to Cumberland for another day, to get some sleep before doing a long drive. As it was, I made a few extra stops along the way, including at a rest stop north of Madison to doze for about half an hour, but eventually I did make it to my friends Ryan & Sarah's place in suburban Chicago safely. Good thing too, because otherwise I wouldn't have been able to be their first guest since they moved there, or have some fantastic Chicago-style pizza (complete with a wheel of sausage and cheese right above the deep-dish crust, and the tomato sauce on top), or play a competitive game of Catan: Cities and Knights (which Sarah won). I got a great night's sleep though, so while I was of course tired on my 11-hour drive back to State College, at least I wasn't as dead-tired as my drive from the Twin Cities to Chicago...

And that's basically my vacation in an anti-nutshell. If only I had known ahead of time that the second day of NWP class would consist entirely of stuff I've done many times before (download, compile and run a test case for WRF), I definitely would've stayed home an extra couple days, so that my break wouldn't have been so rushed. And then maybe I would've been able to go to the Minnesota State Fair for a day and eat a bunch of deep-fried _____ on a stick. Oh well. It was still a good break and a good summer, even if it was very, very short. Next year I had better have longer than a two-week summer!

Posted by Jared at 03:57 PM | Comments (1)

September 06, 2009

My Two-Week Summer - Part 2: Music Men

And now for part 2 of my posts about my too-short summer. As I mentioned in my last post, the plan was for Alex to come down to State College for a visit, and that then I'd ride back with him all the way to Wisconsin. I'd originally hoped that he'd be able to make it a bit earlier, but he wasn't able to get here until late afternoon on the 15th, just in time for a bite to eat before worship band rehearsal at the E-Free church. It was a jam-packed couple of days with Alex here. Right after rehearsal we stopped by the Toms' place, as Ryan & Sarah were in town visiting because Sarah graduated with her PhD. Then after being there for a little bit we went to the Hollemans to say hi to my former roommate Tim, who'd flown in for the day for his PhD graduation as well. It was great to see both of them again.

Church on Sunday morning the 16th was great, and the worship set was a lot of fun to play with Alex and everyone else. There were a couple songs where we were switching back and forth between instruments, me between piano and keyboard and Alex between electric guitar and piano, but because we had a full band we were able to keep everything going seamlessly without any breaks between the songs. We got some good feedback about the music and the song choices too. :-)

After grabbing some lunch we went up to the Creamery because it was such a nice day and everything. It was almost too nice, because we kind of lost track of time a little bit. You see, the E-Free church was having a baptism service at someone's house at 3pm that afternoon. We were primarily going to go because Kerrie was getting baptized. Back when I thought I'd be going back to Wisconsin right after comps, Kerrie was rather disappointed that I wouldn't be around for her baptism, but once plans changed, she was really glad I could be there. Anyway, Alex & I didn't get out to that person's house until about 3:15. I didn't know how promptly the service would be starting, but it was just beginning when we got there. If we had gotten there 10 minutes later we would've missed Kerrie's baptism, and I would've felt terribly about that--especially since I was mentioned rather prominently in her testimony. Yeah, it would not have been good had I been late and missed that. In any case, it was really cool that Kerrie got baptized and that I was able to be there to see it. :-) It was fun to swim a bit and play catch with Alex for awhile afterward too. Then after PSCG Bible study, David D came over to my apartment to hang out a bit and have a drink with Alex & me. And on our way home from Bible study, we swung by Sue's house (a woman from the worship team at E-Free)--she made cookies for Alex & I to enjoy on our two-day drive! That was so nice and so unexpected! So it was another busy day, but another very fun day.

Monday morning was a bit stressful, as I was frantically trying to pack for vacation and to get everything out of my Mazda so that we could go sell it. Definitely should've gotten all the crap unloaded from the Mazda before the weekend, then maybe we would've had time to go for a run together or something, but oh well. In the end we got all that taken care of, went onto campus to have lunch with Eugene, got Alex a Penn State hat to balance the Michigan hat he'd recently bought (haha), and then made sure to get an oil change and a bunch of other maintenance done on Alex's car before we set out on the trip. It was a good drive, and we spent Monday night at Valpo. We were able to stay in the dorms there for free, because Alex knows the head resident and most students hadn't moved in yet, but a couple of Alex's friends were there. Interesting how I'm 25 and I keep spending occasional nights in college dorm rooms, haha.

On Tuesday morning the 18th before we left Valparaiso we decided to climb up to the roof of the Chapel of the Resurrection, the largest on-campus chapel in the world. We'd originally hoped to climb up there back in May when I visited, but someone was practicing the organ, so we wouldn't have been able to do it without anyone noticing. But this time there wasn't anyone in the chapel, so we were able to set up the ladder, go up the other ladder, and crawl through the catwalk to one of the skylights. We didn't actually go out onto the roof at all, and didn't stick around up there very long, for fear of a Valpo campus security guy driving by and happening to spot us up there. But it was still pretty cool, and something neither Alex nor I (obviously) had ever done before. After the roof-climbing, we both enjoyed playing a few songs on the Steinway up in the balcony. A pianist can't ever turn down a chance to play on a Steinway, after all. ;-)

Alex playing and singing "He Who Began a Good Work in You"

After that we hit the road again, a bit before lunch. We got to Cumberland in time for dinner, and my Dad took us out on their new Ranger for a tour of some of the trails around our property. I hadn't even been on some of those trails either, so that was pretty cool. It was kind of sad to see the lake as low as it was though. Hopefully next spring it'll come back up. After dinner Alex continued on to his family's home in Mahtomedi, MN (only 80 miles from my family's house, which is why it's so nice for us to carpool back to MN/WI when possible), and I stayed with my family to spend some time with them. It was good to be home again.

Well, that's all for now, until the third (and probably final) installment of my vacation recap, which will be loaded with pictures from a trip up to Minnesota's North Shore with my parents!

Posted by Jared at 04:30 PM | Comments (0)

September 02, 2009

My Two-Week Summer - Part 1: Car Drama

You might think that I forgot a noun after "summer," a noun such as "vacation." But no, I had only two weeks of "summer" thanks to my comps not being done until 7 Aug, and classes starting the week of 24 Aug. As a result I didn't blog very much during mid or late August because I had to squeeze in every bit of fun that I could into that short window. So my next few posts will be a recap of my post-comps August.

Back in early summer I thought I'd be heading back to Wisconsin right after comps. A little wrench got thrown into those plans in mid-July when I found out that my car, my 1991 Mazda 626 GT, was no longer safe to drive on the highway. I got my oil changed at Valvoline, and the guy who changed my oil informed me that the undercarriage of my car was rusting badly, and that I should probably try to get a different vehicle within a year. Hmmm...

A couple days later I took it to my mechanic here in State College, whom I trust and is really honest, for a second opinion. He said the same thing, that I should get a different car in a year, but he gave a more serious warning: he said that my frame and everything was rusting out so badly, and that the pieces that connect the frame to the body were either rusting off or had already rusted off, that if I were to hit a big pothole at freeway speeds, there was a chance my car might just crumple in the middle. Yikes! He told me that my car was basically still safe to drive as long as I didn't get into an accident, but if I did have an accident, it wouldn't be good. So with that knowledge I decided that it'd be a really bad idea to drive a thousand miles back to Wisconsin. I figured I could still drive around town fairly safely though, since if I got into a low-speed accident it probably wouldn't be too bad. And my mechanic also said that I could get $25 for the Mazda if I took it to a junkyard, but that he'd also be willing to buy it from me for $25. That also took a load off my mind, knowing that I didn't have to mess with selling it on Craigslist or anything like that.

Fortunately, at about that same time, my parents bought a new 2009 Ford Edge, and they were looking to downsize and get rid of their 1997 Ford Taurus. So my parents decided to give that to me. Sweet! Saved me the trouble of having to try to find a "new" car on my own, which I was especially glad about as I was preparing for comps and had enough to worry about. Now all I had to do was figure out a way to get back to Wisconsin so that I could pick it up and drive it back to Pennsylvania.

Enter Alex. It turned out that it'd work out for him to come down from northern Michigan to State College once he finished his duties up at UMBS, and that then I'd be able to get a ride back to Wisconsin with him. Suh-weet!! He came down to to State College on the 15th of August, and then on the morning 17th we took care of unloading all the crap from my Mazda (a couple days earlier I'd already removed my stereo deck), and then driving it over to the mechanic to sell it. For $25. It was a good car, and served me well. When I first started driving it in early 2001, it had a mere 167,000 miles. And by the time that I sold it a couple weeks ago it had 232,165 miles. It lived a good life. And just like I figured all along would happen, it rusted out before the engine gave out.

So my "new" Taurus is a major upgrade. It's rust-free currently, and had a shade over 199,000 miles when I put the title in my name. Oh, and all the windows and doors work, and the air conditioning works too! It had a cassette deck though, and it'd be too much work to swap that out for my MP3 CD stereo deck that I bought for the Mazda back in 2005, so I just bought a cassette adapter so that I could hook up my iPod. So with that, I'm now all set with my vehicle situation for the rest of my time at Penn State, hopefully.

Anyway, more about my time with Alex and then my time in Wisconsin & Minnesota in upcoming posts. I figure breaking it up into smaller posts would be a nice change from one super-massive post, for a change. :-)

Posted by Jared at 11:03 PM | Comments (2)