I whole-heartedly delved into Mr. W’s little boy hobby yesterday. The three of us (Mr. W, his bro and I) started XBox 360’s “Marvel Ultimate Alliance” at 7:30p and turned it off at…uh…2am. Our characters went from Level 1 to 12. The guys plan on finishing the game before bro goes home next weekend. Yikes! It’s like high school Nintendo addiction all over again! I enjoyed playing the character of X-Men’s Storm, except she seems to be a weak combat fighter. She’s just cool cuz she can fly so she gets across the screen quickly. I can’t seem to aim her lightning bolt attacks very well, so after half an hour or so of being Halle Berry, I played the rest of the game as X-Men’s Wolverine. Now that’s a boy who can jump right into the heart of action and slash some enemies up! Playing Wolverine scratches an itch that road rage creates. How awesome it would be if I could leap over my car, yank some asshole driver out of his Corolla and do a double hook punch into his chest with metal blade claws. GARGH! After going to bed I dreamt the game for another 6 hours.

Speaking of cars, I brought the Lexus in for its 5,000 mile first service today. It was complimentary and the invoice didn’t state how much things would have cost had they charged me, but the people in front of me in the checkout line had this conversation with a young-looking, rather air-headish receptionist/desk worker:
Lexus desk worker: *handing over invoice* That’ll be [some price, I wasn’t listening yet] please.
Lexus owner’s boyfriend: That’s an expensive oil change!
Lexus desk worker: *defensively* Oh, they do much more than just an oil change. This is the car’s first major-major service. *looking at invoice* Oh, they gave you a great deal on the brakes!
Lexus owner: *dubiously* They did?
Desk worker: Yeah! They’re normally $400, and here they charged you $432.
Owner’s boyfriend: *looking at invoice, correcting desk worker* $332.
Desk worker: *not realizing she’d misspoken* Yeah. Here they charged you $332 for one, and $340 for the other one.
Owner: But you said they’re normally $400?
Desk worker: They’re normally $400 each, so $800 total.

This is just for BRAKES, and not even including labor charges and whatever other service they did? Holy CRAP. I’m gonna try not to brake. Ever.

When I first walked in to pick up my car, I had to wait like 15 minutes for the receptionist/desk worker who was having THIS conversation with an Asian guy:
Desk worker: *typing away on the computer* I’m not seeing your name come up. Lemme try something else…no, that didn’t work, either. You said Robert Sang, right?
Robert Sang, apparently: Yes.
Desk worker: *typing and deleting sporadically* Is it spelled C-H-U-N-G?
Robert Sang: No, it’s S-A-N-G.
Desk worker: Oh, then I was way off. Haha. *typing some more* S-U-N-G.
Robert Sang: No, S-A-N-G.
Desk worker: Oh, I’m sorry. *typing some more* It’s still not coming up. I wonder why it’s not coming up. Oh wait, there’s an S-U. *looking up at him* Is it Su?
Robert Sang: No, it’s Sang.
Desk worker: How about S-H-U? There’s a Robert Shu in here…?
Robert Sang: *looking confused* No…
Me: Look, his last name is not negotiable, okay?!
Desk worker: Oh, HERE it is! Robert Sang!
Me: *leaping over the desk, stabbing her with my extended Wolverine claws* Rawr!

I’m just kidding, I didn’t participate in this conversation. I just waited impatiently through 15 minutes of this crap while I looked as patient as possible (which wasn’t very patient).

Oh, and another thing. It’s part of Lexus service that when you bring your car in, they wash it for you before returning it to you. For free. This is the last time I’m gonna let them do that. My painstakingly Zainoed car has spider fabric scratches all over it!!! Waaaah!!! I can actually see the wipe strokes. How dirty were their rags?! I know they go through a lot of cars, especially on a Saturday late morning. It also wasn’t spotlessly clean; there are slight waterspots on my hood and smudgy dirty areas on the lower panels of my car. *sigh* If it weren’t gonna be in the 20s Fahrenheit tomorrow, I’d Zaino Z5 Swirl-Remover it. Oh yeah. Now that my car’s clean, I can more clearly see the scratches on my hood that the wooden spool left. There’s even an area where the paint’s so chipped that there are strings of rag fibers caught in its roughness. *siiiiiiiigh*