So if you're lonely

The plan was to do my homework, but I am mysteriously sleepy.  I'm going to blame taco bell, I don't know how that could have been a good idea.  I'm going to try to tell a linear story, we'll see how this goes:

A few weeks ago, I realized I needed to give myself a budget.  I had gotten a raise at the MTC, and I was falling into the habit of spending money because I could.  Zappos sent me a free vip membership, so I bought some shoes.  Threadless kept telling me about these great deals, so I bought several T-shirts.  Spencer (my cousin) tipped me off to a super cheap bike on KSL, so I bought it.  My computer broke, on account of being dropped, so I had to pay two of my friends gas money to drive me up to Salt Lake twice over the course of two days in order to have it fixed at the apple store.  Not withstanding having bought lots of really great things at really good prices, I realized I needed to control myself a little.

Then, I was checking ksl for scooters as I often did, and I the scooter I've been waiting for all this time.  It was a tiny bit more than I was hoping to pay (I wanted to pay around $450) but it was perfect.  And then the weather became perfect, and on a bit of a whim, I called the guy, and bought it.  Having never driven a scooter before, and not having a helmet, driving it home at night was one of the more nerve wracking experiences in recent history, but I didn't die, so that was a huge success.

The second day of owning a scooter was a bit of a trial of my scooter faith.  I realized I had to get it registered and  insured and deal with all these absurd laws and taxes and things that just don't exist for bikes.  Then I went to start it and I couldn't get it to start.  I tried with the kick start for about 20 minutes, and finally got it, and then turned it off to run in for my stuff, and then when I came back i couldn't get it to work for an hour or so.  I finally got a friend to jump start it, so that I could drive it to the inspection place so that I could get it registered, I got there and they failed it for the tire tread, and informed me that I needed a new tire.  I had already read that these people were a little over zealous in their problem finding and a little slothful in their problem fixing, so I kindly rejected their offer to fix the tire for $80.   Once again, I couldn't get it started, so I had to ask them to jump it, which they graciously did for free.  It was a beautiful day though, and driving my scooter home was basically amazing.  That day I was talking to my friend about it and he told me of a magical place that would pass scooter inspections in all but the most serious cases.  I had hope.

The next day I set off for the Sinclair on Center st.  Miraculously, my scooter kickstarted on the third try, and I drove it all the way there without any problems, then I left it running for about half an hour while they took care of everything, so as to recharge the battery.  And it passed, with flying colors.  I drove it back home, and bought some helmets, so that I would could stop tearing up (from the wind) and stop worrying about dying (from the road).  The next day was sunday, and after our weekly brunch I went to show a couple of the girls my scooter.  This was a big step in scooter ownership.  I tried to start it, but it didn't work, but then the kick start worked relatively easily, and it was lots of fun to give them rides around the parking lot.  I resisted the powerful urge to drive the scooter to church, and around town in the afternoon, since I still lacked license, registration, and a helmet.

Anyway, to wrap up: after the initial rocky start, it's been a dream.  I managed to take care of my license, registration, and insurance today, and my helmets are in the mail.  I had no idea how absurdly fun owning a scooter would be, it's totally worth the money I've spent,

Which brings us back to the budget.  Having been wholly unsuccessful in creating a budget, my new budget is that I'm not allowed to buy anything unnecessary during the month of march.  We'll see how much money I have when march ends, and then I might continue it through april.  We found a really good deal on summer rent though ($65 a month) so I'll catch up pretty quickly.

So that's the saga of how I spent way more money than I should have in the space of about a week, I'll put some pictures up once I take them.   That was supposed to happen today, but it got dark before I got around to it.  If you find yourself considering buying a scooter, my only advice is to do it quickly.  My main regret is that I didn't buy a scooter last year at this time when I was considering it; so much time wasted.