Okay, so I'm officially 20 years old, right? Two long decades. And it was celebrated by a birthday that I won't forget anytime soon. The night before my real b'day day, the parents took me all the way into Nashville, Tennessee, to eat dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory on 2nd Avenue near Broadway.

Afterwards, we walked along the streets of downtown Nashville to take a gander at the nightlife because I wanted to know what Nashville nightlife was like, and it's VERY lively. There are tons of bars in downtown Nashville, and they all have live music at night. And as we walked, we ended up going by the Ryman Auditorium, which has been the home of the Grand Ole Opry for the longest time before it moved to Opry Mills. So I finally got to see a wonderful piece of Nashville history, and not only that, but dad pointed out that there was an "A Prarie Home Companion" truck parked right outside, so I took a picture of that.

Then I suddenly remembered that APHC was having a show THAT NIGHT and that mom wasn't able to get tickets, so I was horribly bummed as we all stood by the front doors of the Ryman. But then dad pulled a Ticketmaster envelope out of his shirt pocket...

...AND IT HAD THREE TICKETS TO A PRARIE HOME COMPANION!!!!!

Oh my god I couldn't even think of anything to say!! And we still had an hour to kill before the start of the show! So dad and I walked around some more of downtown to see Printer's Alley and the Arcade (two historically old sections of Nashville that dad frequented back in the day when he worked for a copier and printer repair shop).

And finally, it came time to go into the Ryman to wait for APHC to start. And while we were waiting, it turns out that our seats were TRIPLE-SOLD! Meaning two other groups of people also had tickets to the two seats that mom and I were sitting in. >< And the ushers ended up taking our stubs and not giving them back either. But we still got to keep our seats, which was good because it was an awesome view of the show.

Garrison Keillor & Fred Newman

Oh it gets better...

BRAD PAISLEY WAS ONE OF THE GUEST STARS!!!!!

And the other guest group, the Sam Bush Band, sang "Wabash Cannonball", one of my all-time favorite bluegrass songs!

Oh the show couldn't have possibly gone any better.

So that was my totally awesome pre-birthday.

Now it's time to start lamenting... I thought I was home free for the summer after my final final, Thursday morning at 10:30AM. I was so bloody fucking close. My car had had a minor breakdown just a couple days before (no huge deal, it's an older car).

But when dad finally got home from work today, it was like Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. I swear it was the K-T meteor impact event when he told me the news.

My car's engine is totally shot. Main drive belt pulley had fallen off the crankshaft no-thanks to a sheared-off keyway (that's what dad and I caught in the driveway when my engine was severely rattling). Caused all the serpentine belts to fall off their pulleys. Two of them are just dangling and the alternator belt is totally AWOL (it's a wonder my car made it home). And apparently... the rattling pulley knocked against the timing belt cover and threw the engine out of time, and the Honda D15A is a zero-tolerance engine. Bent valves and destroyed pistons are highly likely, and the crankshaft would need replacing because of that bloody keyway. In other words, that engine will never run again.

And what's worse is dad started railing about getting me another used car instead of letting me make my own choices about my car. I want to keep that Honda and build it up right. Why? Because I can. People do it all the time with Japanese imports. Why can't I? When I told my dad that's what I wanted to do, he immediately jumped to the expense of it all, thinking I was going to make him pay for it all.

Bull. Fucking. Shit.

Technically, he's right. Yes. Getting another used car would be cheaper. But I don't want to let that Honda go because I know I can do that car up right. I could get another used car maybe to drive while I'm fixing the Honda. I'll agree to that, but I will NOT agree to just junking the Honda entirely. No. No no no no no.

It's my car, dad. I get to choose what I can do with it now.

So it looks like I'm going to have to get a job and work my ass off day and night to save up my money for car repairs. If the gods of car-tuning are reading this journal right now, please give me some sort of blessing. An opportunity to get car parts for crazy cheap. Someone willing to help me for not a lot of money. A job that's not hellish and pays semi-decent. Parents that actually see my point of view. Anything.

*sigh* This summer hasn't even started and it already sucks. -_- I probably won't even get to go to AnthroCon 2009 either unless I can get a week off at whatever job I end up working.