Things that will make you think I'm weird

I found this information written by my mother (actually, the last bit is in my handwriting) in  a notepad as I was sorting through some papers today:

Sat 8/9

Tumwater 7:25 am

102627

Missoula 8/10 6:35

103189

Gillette, Wy 8/11 6:35

103810

Albert Lea 8/12 6:35

104513

What does it all mean? Well, when I moved to Madison, WI, to begin graduate school (1997), my mom drove across the country with me in my "new" Honda Civic (my first car... my parents paid the down payment on the loan for it as my college graduation present) then flew back to WA on her own. I say "new" because it was 10 years old and had >99000 miles on it when I got it in June, 1997. We left from Tumwater, WA, where my parents were living and where I had spent two months living that summer. It took us most of 4 days to do the drive, doing ~10-11 hours a day, and the above records the time and place and current mileage on my car as we set out each morning. If you know your geography, you'll notice that we avoided staying in S. Dakota, preferring to spend the night either side of it. We did stop at the corn palace in SD though and, years later, a roommate of mine visited SD and reported back that it wasn't as bad as I assumed. So, sorry SD. I shipped nothing to myself when I moved... everything I took to Wisconsin was in that car, though I didn't pack it above the height of the rear window. My mother was allowed one small suitcase :-) And my bicycle was on a rack on the back. I have a print photo of it somewhere and I'll scan it when I find it. Since I didn't have a place to live in Madison yet, we drove around for a couple of days with the car still fully packed while looking at places to rent (we stayed in a hotel). Finally, I rented a room in a privately-owned house and the owner allowed me to unpack everything into her garage and leave it there while my mother and I headed up to Wausau to visit our relatives there. I sold that Honda Civic for $750 (it was over 17 years old and had about 130000 miles on it, if I remember correctly) the week I moved to San Diego--decided it wasn't worth another drive across the country, particularly since I started in my new lab only 3 days (Fri-Sun) after leaving my old lab. The day I left Madison, it was 1F there (and 75F in San Diego) and the Honda's trunk was frozen shut so I had to put my suitcases in the back seat when Jesse drove me to the airport. A couple days later, the new owner took possession of it. That car served me well. It got almost 40 miles to the gallon on the highway (33 in the city in Madison's winter... 37 in the city when the weather was milder).

Okay, that wasn't so weird, but this is :-)

It's my left hand photographed yesterday morning. I took it to record the state of my poor nails... on my index finger, my nail is almost fully grown out from when I cut through it on Christmas Eve as I was slicing an onion (it took me a couple of days to realize I had cut through the nail... I wondered why it was so sore and why it was bleeding so much!). Last weekend, when I was rearranging the couch cushions, I bent back my pinkie nail, leaving  a nice bruise and forcing me to cut it off below where it overhangs my finger. I managed to scrape most of the dried blood out of it a couple of days ago, so you can't really see that (particularly not because it is out of focus). Then, yesterday morning, I bent back my middle finger nail while making my bed (my nails were soft from the shower I just had). So now it is all bruised. That will teach me for letting my finger nails get long.