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running ropes through the cab
Saturday, April 12 2008
At some point today Gretchen left for New Hampshire to attend the funeral of the father of a friend. After she was gone, I went to Lowes to get some lumber for projects. For transportation purposes, the most challenging of the lumber pieces I got were four by eight foot sheets of quarter inch particle board (which I will use to cover the exposed styrofoam insulation on my homebrew solar panel). I'd managed to transport plywood successfully in the past by strapping it to the roof, so this time I was confident I could do it. Given enough time to tie things down, I don't think there's anything that can be moved with a pickup truck that I can't move with the Honda Civic hatchback. My car lacks good places to attach ropes, so I end up having to run ropes through the cab, and since the ropes pass through open windows, this means the doors are roped shut. I have to get the dogs into the car before I can execute this step, and I have to loosen these ropes before the dogs can get out again. It also means I have to climb in through the window of the car in order to to drive it.
As I was lashing the lumber down to the roof of my car in front of Lowes, a somewhat plump woman came up and marveled at the audacity of my hauling effort. She went on to complain that her husband hadn't thought of this technique when she had a chair to move. In such situations I always wonder what people think of the music I'm playing, which in this case was a familiar genre but an unknown song. The band was Midlake and the song was "Head Home."
Driving on US-209 with a load of particle board on the roof, I was careful not to exceed 45 miles per hour. Being an empathetic driver, when I was on the two-lane part of 209 I would occasionally go over to the shoulder to let the accumulation of cars behind me get past.
Normally when Gretchen takes off for an overnight, I like to spend the time drink malt liquor or wine and watching teevee. Today was no different, although there was precious little for me to watch in the Tivo. Luckily, though, I had the first season of The Wire in DVD form, and I watched the first disc. It's amazing how little of it I'd remembered from when I'd originally watched it broadcast on HBO back in 2002.
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