Stress and money woes

I'm making slow progress on my papers. I found out one of them is due sooner than I thought - 12 days to go. I also have to prepare a presentation for class this Friday. If I get these two papers done it will almost be a miracle. I'm fairly stressed right now, but I try to just take one day at a time rather than dwell on the things that could overwhelm me. We'll see if I can keep that attitude for the next two weeks.

How did I deal with the stress tonight? I went shopping! Scott is out of town this week, so this is my chance to get Christmas shopping done for him. Plus a good store was having a 50% off sale. I picked a couple of great deals. Thank goodness because I'm going to have to be very careful this month, money-wise.

Just in time for the holidays, I had to shell out $125 for a new battery for my laptop. My battery doesn't even hold charge for 30 minutes anymore. The July issue of the Macworld magazine had instructions for how to go into the Terminal and find the battery info (scroll down in link). There is a new battery utility program that displays the info in a more handy fashion than Terminal (coconut battery 1.3). but it requires OS 10.4, and I have not upgraded. When new, the max capacity of my battery was 4400mAh; now it's only 465! It's been very cumbersome lately to make sure I'm situated so that it's plugged in all the time. I did take my extra power adapter to school so that it's plugged in at all times while there. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to treat the new battery. Do I try to keep it plugged in as much as possible to reduce the number of charge cycles? How often should I let it drain? Apple says batteries should last for 300-500 charge cycles. My current one is on #729! I would say I got good use of it. But what a bad time to expire!

In other money news: I've been needing to get my 60,000 mile service completed on my truck. I did have the money saved specifically for that from last year's tax refund. I am always a stickler for shopping around for the best service prices. This is my first major service since moving to this area, and I don't know the best places to go yet. Unfortunately, this time I did not have time to make all those "who do you recommend?" and "what's your price?" phone calls. Toyota sent out some great coupons last month that expired today. I bit the bullet and took it there, but not before I compared those prices with what I paid last time in Oklahoma. I had a rule that I only go to the dealer for oil changes, not major service, maintenance or otherwise. I went in with confidence today that I was not going to get ripped off. I was not asking for a blanket service package, but rather only the specific items that are truly necessary: coolant, transmission, oil change, lubrication (if needed). I signed on the dotted line saying I agreed to the estimate and verified specifically that the price included ALL parts and labor. Then I took advantage of their convenient shuttle service for a ride to school.

They called me when it was done, and the shuttle picked me up again. I got to the cashier window to pay and was given a figure quite a bit more than we agreed on. First of all, he forgot the coupon discount! It took two reprints to get that fixed, and it was obvious the cashiers were stupidly annoyed. I paid before I checked everything line by line. There were several people in line behind me. Mistake! As I walked out I noticed two services were a total of $30 more than they should have been, again a missed coupon and one was just flat wrong! Then I saw an unexplained supplies fee of nearly $20. So I marched back to the service man's desk and pointed this out. He tried to tell me that he has never sold it for that price before, but I had it written down. He wasn't convinced, but it really did sound like he planned it that way. He instantly responded with a coupon for a free oil change next time. Then I asked about the other and he tried to give me a free tire rotation. Nope - I get that free elsewhere already. He asked me what I wanted and I told him "I want my money!" Then he offered me a free air filter. I didn't want to go deal with the cashier again, so I succumbed. They are things that I will need later, and together it's a tad more than the overpayment. But, I am not a happy customer. I trusted them to get the price right the first time without me having to go over it with a fine tooth comb. They broke that trust. I'll go back for my oil change and air filter, but never anything else again. They will call me in a few days to make sure I'm happy with my service, and I will tell them that I'm glad they made an attempt in giving me the free items, but that no, I'm not happy and then explain just what I wrote about. Simply it's the trust issue. They did give my truck a wash though. Good thing, since we had a crazy rain/windstorm Saturday, and that's the last thing I have time to do right now.

Before I go, I'm happy to announce that I found my new favorite restaurant - it serves Indian food, which is my favorite by far! I hadn't done much to find one here yet, and woila! The Tryggestad's (Erik & Jeanie) were in town this weekend to visit family, and they met me at church on Sunday. We took Jeanie out to eat at this place while Erik interviewed members of the Laotian congregation for the The Christian Chronicle, and I loved it. It's actually a restaurant that serves Chinese and Indian food. I was always hesitant to try the Indian food there. I mean who serves Indian and Chinese?! Then I noticed more Indian people eat there than anyone else. Now I know why. It's really good! I had leftovers today.