Thursday, June 26, 2008

Obsessing

Anyone who knows me well knows that once I get an idea in my head, I obsess about it.
Lately, that obsessions has been this:

Yep, I am fully and completely fixated on the idea of getting a scooter. I've been going over all of the advantages, and disadvantages, that would come with scooter ownership. I've been contemplating what color scooter would best suit me, all kinds of things along those lines.
This is what I've brainstormed so far....

Advantages:
1. If I used the scooter ONLY for my daily commute (home to work to school to home) I would save at least $100 per month in fuel costs.
2. Insurance would be super cheap, approximately only $30 per month, and my car insurance would go down since I would be putting less miles on it.
3. Parking - parking permits at school for a car is $40 for the semester. Its only $15 for a motorcycle.
4. Parking, part deux - parking for motorcycles at school is RIGHT OUTSIDE the building that most of my classes are in. For the cars, its a bit of a walk. Yep. general laziness is a factor for me.
5. Commute - I imagine that I would be able to reduce my commute time on a scooter. While I may have to sit through a couple of light changes in my car because of congestion, in a scooter I would be able to lane share and pass by all of the sad cars sitting there waiting to inch forward and cut straight to the front of the line.

Disadvantages:
1. The elements - in the scorching Sacramento summers, I would be without air conditioning and in the cold I'd be without heat. No, I wouldn't ride in the rain, I don't have a death wish. A friend of mine who has a scooter says that she uses it roughly nine months out of the year, the other three months she solely uses her car due to the cold, rain, and winds.
2. Crazy ass drivers who don't pay attention - I would definitely be vulnerable to them.
3. Music - scooters don't have radios! How would I sing in traffic?
4. Purse - would it fit in the little storage area under the seat or would I need to start using a backpack? If I use a backpack would my back get all sweaty? Ew.

Simultaneous advantages and disadvantages:
1. Smoking - can't exactly smoke while riding a scooter. This would be anxiety provoking initially, but would certainly help me to cut back on the amount I smoke.
2. Cell phone - can't really chat on my phone while riding a scooter either. But then again, you're not exactly supposed to talk on the phone while driving a car either, are you? And if you can't talk on the phone you can't text either. Yep, I do text and drive. I am a horrible horrible citizen.
3. Coffee - can't drink coffee on a scooter. Bad for my coffee addiction, good for helping me to cut back. I drink A LOT of coffee. Too much, in fact.
4. Shopping - wouldn't really be able to do any heavy duty shopping on a scooter, but that would certainly be good for my budget, wouldn't it?

Now, for color. Part of me is tempted to go with some kind of super girly pink... but should it be a pastel pink, or a hot pink? Or should I go with a flashy red? Or maybe a classic black, or silver. But, maybe I should go with something bright so that I'm more noticeable in traffic. I am leaning towards the pastel pink, but maybe thats only because I saw a super cute brown backpack with pink flowers a week or two ago. Yes, I am considering how I would accesorize when contemplating what color to get.
Heres the full color options.... I'm not going to assume that the swatches on that page are really true to color, just that they give a basic idea - they just look rather generic on that page.

Thoughts? Any opinions on color? Any more ideas of advantages or disadvantages?

The biggest drawback... I'm not quite sure how I'll finance it at this time. I have a another big expense I'm facing in the near future - a new laptop. Mine is dead dead dead and I do have to prioritize a laptop over a scooter at this point since I'm going back to school. Both cost about the same, $1,500, and I don't really have that kind of cash lying around (see all of my traveling this past year). And if I'm going to discuss large purchases that I don't have the funding for, theres also lasik eye surgery.. I am sick of my glasses and can't wear contacts for long periods of time. Any suggestions of how I can make about $10,000 quickly, and legally, that doesn't involve a pyramid, trapezoid, or anything like that? Whats the Super Lotto jackpot up to these days?

OH, another thing I get kind of obsessive over? Blogging about innocuous things while I should be writing an essay thats due in just a little over 15 hours.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Exhausted

School is simply exhausting me. My typical day has me leaving the house at 7am to go to work, racing from work to school, in class until about 9:30, getting home close to 10:00, then figuring out dinner for Grandma and myself, and by the time I take care of any homework and studying, I'm not getting to bed until about 2 am. Yes, I am exhausted. No, I have no clue how I'm doing all of this aside from catching up on my sleep on the weekend - Friday nights I'm tending to get about 12 hours of sleep or so.

Of course, with work and school occupying all of my time, I'm not getting anything done in the way of knitting, crochet, crafts, or photography. This sucks because I have a lot to get done in all of those fields.
1 - One friend is expecting and due in about.... oh, 3 weeks. Number of projects I've completed for the little one.... 0.
2 - Another friend is expecting but not due for several months. I have plenty of projects in mind for this little one but have yet to start a single one - I figure that I've got plenty of time. Of course, I'll keep saying that I have plenty of time and the next thing I know it will be just a couple of weeks from the due date and I'll be screwed.... again.
3 - My neighbors daughter (whom I grew up with) just had her little one two days ago. I've done nothing.
4 - I've got all kinds of ideas of items I could put up on Etsy, but have done nothing.
5 - I have another photo show next Saturday (yep, one week from today) thats of photos from my recent trip to London. While I have gone through all of the photos from the trip and selected the ones that MIGHT be show-worthy, I still have to go through those and narrow them down to the ones I'll actually have in the show and do any photoshop corrections if necessary, then print them and what not.

Yes, I have plenty to do this next week before the show - in addition to all of that, I have a paper to write for my composition class. FUN!!!

Meanwhile, gas prices here in Sacramento are averaging $4.50 a gallon. Yes, I know thats still cheap in comparison to what gas prices are in Europe, but Europe also has better public transportation than what we have here in Sacramento. Unfortunately with my work and school schedule, public transportation is not an option for me - at least not with the system that we currently have here in Sacramento.
I am considering one thing to reduce fuel use and to save money, this:




but I'm not sure about the color. I'm thinking maybe something more like this:



or possibly this:



Of course, my grandma is dead set against the idea of me getting a scooter. My mom and dad would like to see me get something that has a little more power. Something like this:


I don't know about the motorcycle... motorcycles are rather butch, and scooters are so much CUTER.

Earlier, I mentioned Etsy. I love that site. So many creative types, all of their creations out there, its absolutely inspiring to see so many beautiful things. I recently found this awesome quilt


I wish I could afford it. Unfortunately, its just a wee bit out of my price range, but is definitely inspiring for making something similar myself.