The Blue Wonder only failed three out of the four emissions tests – not bad for a $300 car. And the nice thing about Washington is that you can buy your way out of emissions – if I do $150 worth of work on the car, it doesn’t have to pass. The tricky part is that I only have 15 days to transfer the title or I start getting fined. And I need an emissions test for title transfer and registration. So I realized that I’d have to transfer the title first, then take care of registration. But I need a Washington drivers license for the title transfer. But that’s actually ok, since the Seattle bars have been giving me a hard time about the fact that I have a rather dubious moustache in my current license.
So yesterday was a two hour wait for a written test, after which I needed to schedule a driving test, which normally takes a few weeks. Luckily a spot opened up for this morning as I was sitting at the scheduling desk, which would have worked out fine except that Craig went biking and took his keys five minutes before I had to leave. So… one panicked last-minute phone call to a nearby friend and I had a loaner car, enabling me to pass a 15-minute driving test, wait three hours (no exaggeration), and then spend 3 minutes having my photo taken. I’m now a Washington resident (so long, income tax)!
Title and registration were taken care of this afternoon and my car is scheduled for emissions repair on Friday, which means that pass or fail, after Monday I will have a car that I can legally (though not skillfully) drive around Seattle.
Continuing my streak of winning free electronics, Craig and I won the CrunchGear Destroy Your Landline contest. Apparently the competition was quite stiff – we were the only entry.
What else did I accomplish last weekend? Let’s see…
Read Harry Potter (6 hours, baby!)
Slept from 9 pm until noon the next day (I feel human again!)
Attended bite of Seattle (mmm… blackened salmon over Caesar salad)
Filmed a clip for Comcast’s Dating on Demand (pretty sure they’ll never be able to air mine)
Blew up a phone for Cruchgear’s Destroy Your Landline Contest (vote for me!)
My friend Alexandra gave me a call on Friday morning. She wanted to know if I’d be her partner for Dell’s Urban Challenge Scavenger Hunt the next day. First prize: a pimped-out laptop.
Well, of course!
Friday had been a pretty awesome day already, and with Harry Potter in my hands I ended up staying up until 5 am, got two hours of sleep and headed downtown with Alexandra to win a laptop!
Only about 20 teams showed up. When we arrived we were assigned one of 8 colors randomly and you only compete against other teams in your color. First of all, that meant we only had to beat two other green teams to win our laptops. And Alexandra realized that it would be a brilliant idea to talk to teams in other colors so we could work together to solve the clues. Good idea. In the end, all but one of the teams we worked with got their laptops.
Awesome day today. One of my best in Seattle so far. Craig and I haven’t any any epic adventures like we used to yet, but today was pretty solid. First, we set up a projector and our bike trainers in the living and biked all through the Bourne Identity. (Gotta see the Bourne Supremacy before the last leg of the trilogy comes out!) Afterwards, Craig decided he hadn’t worked out enough, so we threw on our wetsuits, ran to the end of the street, jumped in the canal and swam to Lake Union. Headed to the Columbia Tower Club (one of the most exclusive members-only clubs in Seattle, top floor of the tallest building in the city) for happy hour followed by dollar appetizers at Maharaja (nine of them!). Harry Potter release party at Barnes and Noble where Craig met a cool girl and I was accosted by Beauty and the Geek fans (the employees had to tell the middle school girls to stop screaming). We got bored before they even handed out the books so we left early for a house party, followed by barhopping downtown, and an afterparty at our place (the Mountain Mansion). And I have 4 hours to sleep now before Dell’s Amazing Race Seattle begins.
Product @ClassDojo. Previously PocketGems VP, Playdom, Tableau. I like technology, product management, design, social psychology, economics, data, and puns.
