A happy Friday belly-rub.

It's Friday. At last. Even a shortened week seems too long sometimes. Such beautiful weather and being tied to my desk putting docs together for reporting can make one slightly bitter. It's been sort of a weird week, kind of surreal in its making, I guess. It seems fitting after having such a nice holiday weekend of car buying, and scoring a gorgeous log headboard for our bedroom, and spending really great, quality time with my husband that the week following would be full of family and friend drama, and all around weirdness. One friend's marriage is falling apart and I get these cryptic messages from her but she never calls me back, trouble is brewing in the grandma department and certain family members are already circling like vultures on the wing, my sisters are sniping at each other, and Satan's (aka my mother) birthday is on Monday, so I can be sure expect lots of martyrdom and victimhood there too. At times like these I want to hop into the Pri-Pri and just drive north and not look back.

I guess I just want comforting things this weekend. To organize our crazy house for one; OMG, it's insane. We packed most of my sister's stuff up so we have most of the guest-room back again, but now we have to move out a piece of furniture, move a shelf, and reorganize all my crafts that are scattered all over the house. I want to paint too, but I don't see it happening easily. AND, the cobwebs... OMG, the bloody cobwebs, my arch-enemy. I cannot keep up with them, they appear almost as soon as I've torn them down. I never hated spiders before; until now. It's going to be a busy weekend. But at least it's the weekend. ::sighs:: I like the weekend.

On the Prius front, things are amazing. After the weekend of driving about in the new baby car, I finally was able to guage the benefits of the mileage on Tuesday. I snapped this picture with my phone of the little display that Priuses (Prii) have that shows your realtime consumption, averages and such. This lovely display shows what I averaged for miles per gallon for the 35 mile trip into town to work. It was only slightly less for going back up the mountain; 48.9 mpg on the way home, and that also included some less-than-economic driving on my part, being an aggressive, impatient sort on the road sometimes.

I only had to fill up yesterday since we bought the car, and it cost $23 and we'd already gone almost 400 miles; and there was still a bit left in the tank. The little green things are 50watt hours of energy recharged to the battery (energy by which a 50 W bulb illuminates for an hour). A lot of people have told me; "Well, you're saving all this fuel, but what about the cost of recharging the battery?" What they don't understand is that the Prius charges itself; when it's running on motor alone, it's charging its battery, there's no plug-in or such. It just trades back and forth between both energy sources as it goes along.

I noticed when we were buying it that the little paper on the window had a higher number for city mpg than highway. It didn't make much sense until I started driving it. You get a lot more 'performance' out of the motor when you are actually gnarled up in traffic. The Prius will run more on battery then, and save you more fuel, so you actually get way better mileage when you're slowed by lights and such. Highway is mostly motor-driven, except when you lift your coasting; that's all pure charge. It's a delicate dance, but you can see it on the little consumption display as you go along. Naturally, you eat up more fuel when you accelerate out of a stop and when you go up hills; but with this guy, you are also stocking up energy in your battery when you do that. It's a good trade.

I am hopelessly in love with the Prius, I dare say. I adore my Jeep and always will, but the stark economical difference, not to mention the wide practical differences between one and the other makes me appreciate the Prius all the more. These practical things come with owning any normal car; like air-conditioning for one... The smooth, gliding feeling on the road, the quiet inside the cabin... I love Jeepie Jeep, but it's nice to know that if I'm all dressed up and in makeup in the middle of a sweltering summer, I don't have to drive with open windows because if I didn't I would feel like I was sitting in a turkish steambath on the surface of the sun. Open windows of course means my hair is instantly frizzed out into a sunburst around my face, and the heat causes me suspire my makeup off (eyeliner melting around my eyes into a racoony mask)--all this simply to get to our destination. It gets old arriving at nice events and such looking like I was run over by a semi.

Anyway it's time to stop rambling for today, I hope you all have a lovely weekend.