“Make Me a Bicycle, Clown!”
June 27, 2011From Wedding Crashers:
Kid: I want a bicycle.
Vince Vaughn: Listen, a bicycle is going to take a lot of balloons and frankly, Uncle Jeremy is a bit tired. How about I make you something else?
Kid: I just want a bicycle!
Vince Vaughn: Why… why are you yelling at me?
Kid: Make me a bicycle, clown!
Vince Vaughn: Listen, a bicycle is going to take a lot of balloons and frankly, Uncle Jeremy is a bit tired. How about I make you something else?
Kid: I just want a bicycle!
Vince Vaughn: Why… why are you yelling at me?
Kid: Make me a bicycle, clown!
I’ve been riding my bicycle a bit lately as I try to recover from the broken vertebra and surgery, and every time I am riding I have been laughing about this quote from Wedding Crashers (no jokes please) for some reason. This was topped last week when I was riding, and wound up with a clown next to me at a stop light driving a Prius. I won’t even get into the fact that I was sorely disappointed to see only 1 clown in the car, or that it wasn’t an old Mini Cooper or anything like that, or that it wasn’t our neighbor and friend Rudy who does indeed dress like a clown for Shriners; I pondered where a clown was going at 3:30 on a Tuesday, but figured it wouldn’t be appropriate to ask…and I wasn’t sure if asking where a clown was headed was violating the first rule of clownism and being discrete…who knows, it’s a whole new world I’m not familiar with.
We had a pretty solid weekend, and just like Lauren echoed the other day we’ve been enjoying the quiet time allotted to us by a calm schedule and the ability to just get little stuff done around the house. I’m still somewhat limited on what I can do and it pretty much stops at driving the riding mower around some days; but we’re really enjoying the house stuff and doing what little (and inexpensive) things we can to make it even homier. Hanging pictures, getting stuff organized, starting to discuss building a deck in the back; all quality things that add immense benefits to our immediate lives.
We’d love to do more with the house and do some remodeling, but we’re still dealing with bills related to The Crash and all the medical stuff that goes on with it. I have not even calculated what we have spent in the past 13 months out of pocket with everything, and I have not asked for a tally from The Good Guys because I think it would make me sick to my stomach even more so than I already am whenever I have to write a check related to everything. Not exactly how we expected to be blowing through cash in the first year of marriage, but it’s kept us grounded in terms of what we “need” versus what we “want”, and has reminded us that the little stuff we do that doesn’t cost a whole lot is sometimes just as fulfilling as dropping cash on something major.
We got to see Rockville and his girlfriend JP on Saturday, toured the Beer Tasting downtown, left when it got overcrowded and found a table at the local beer garden to enjoy the beautiful day. Law School came through on coming up for air for a couple hours last night and we got dinner with her and a friend in Broad Ripple; at a new favorite place of ours that is quickly gaining a following in the community.
It’s a pretty low-key week ahead for us, hopefully making some progress with insurance regarding the lightning strike and getting some electronics replaced that were ruined, getting ready for the holiday weekend, and hanging out grilling with decent weather. I’ve had electricians, general contractors, garage guys, an insurance adjustor, and I don’t even know who else at our house in the past week. I’m ready to get my routine back. The garage door opener got replaced yesterday which was mentally satisfying being the first item to get replaced that got killed in the strike. If you’re in Indy I highly recommend Precision Door out of Fishers; they did an awesome job and the service tech Geoff assigned to us was the most professional guy I’ve come across in a long time in any field, so I’m giving a huge thank you to him as he made my life a bit less stressful since this fiasco began. I’m currently waiting to hear the next step of the process from Nationwide regarding the replacement of everything else; so we’ll continue to wait…
If you’ve emailed me and I have not gotten back to you, it’s because of all what the past week has been. I’ve been working from an iPhone or work computer mostly, and that’s been an absolute “treat” in my productivity. Trying to get back on the grid now but don’t want to pay out of pocket for stuff until I know what to expect from insurance.
Cheers
-th