Reading in the Car

I'm a bit embarrassed to say that we haven't yet changed over our car registration from California to Oregon. I nearly got busted for it when I was pulled over in January for my broken headlight, but the police officer let that part of my violation slide. You'd think that after an event like that I would have rushed out to rectify the situation. Nope.

In the spirit of being productive during my economy-imposed hiatus, I decided that I'd go ahead and take the first step -- having the emissions tested and VIN inspected. I think one of the reasons that I have continued to drag my heels on this issue is that we just paid to have the emissions tested in California in August (in addition for two years of registration fees). California is one of the strictest states as far as environmental quality goes, but Oregon will not accept our test data. But, enough is enough. I need to be an adult about this whole thing and just suck it up. So that's exactly what I'm doing today, sitting in line at Oregon DEQ in order to have my squeaky clean emissions given the thumbs up.

I have to admit, sitting in the car with nothing else to do will be a nice break from the chores I've imposed on myself around the house. I only made it outside briefly yesterday for some fresh air, so hopefully the sun will shine all morning while I'm in the car inspection line. The potential wait will also give me the chance to finish up In Defense of Food so I can move on to The Omnivores' Dilemma and finish another book I started this week. After talking with Jesse on the phone yesterday, I picked up Calvin Trillin's The Tummy Trilogy in search for an essay about a tour through a town in Germany that involved lots of sausage and beer. I haven't yet found the essay he referenced, but as I was flipping through, I found quite a few others that sparked my interest -- one about the Breaux Bridge Crawfish festival in Louisiana, another entitled "Spaghetti Carbonara Day," and a third "Fried-Chicken War." We're a carbonara-loving household, so a day full of the stuff sounds amazing. I'll likely read these essays first and then make my way through the rest of the collection from start to finish. Who knew this great book was sitting on our shelf for ages and I never bothered to pick it up!