Book Learnin'

So I lived through another week of mind-expanding classes and events. Busy as ever, but mostly doing worthwhile stuff. I particularly like my management class, where each session is spent discussing actual business decisions actually made by actual people in actual companies that I have actually heard of. Wonderful theoretic ideals such as balancing employee and stockholder interests, empowerment, etc. Right after the empowerment discussion where we all individually decided that empowerment is a wonderful thing that we will all implement at our very first opportunity, I read an article in BusinessWeek by Jack Welch explaining how in the real world, empowerment typically doesn't work and shouldn't be attempted. So, I am unlearning just as quickly as I am learning.
Speaking of book learning, I have learned recently that there are far more powerful lessons to be learned in popular literature than could ever be taught in a textbook. Apparently if I will temporarily suspend my manliness and read the teen vampire romance novel Twilight (the cover is 99% Fabio-free, by the way), I will understand women in ways in which I never before thought possible. I guess that's a good idea, although the book should come with some kind of guarantee that I will get my manhood back once I finish reading it. I'll get to it once I have read all of my textbooks cover to cover. Twice.
As a capstone celebration to the end of my income, I will be selling my car tomorrow (hopefully). This, the glorious Altima that I coveted for months and finally purchased. So after six months of that, my best guess is that by next week I will be back in an old Corolla again--probably a white one. While this may be a step backwards in my automotive pilgrimage, at least I know I can get along with a Corolla. I test drove an old Accord today--blech. Can anyone explain why Hondas cost more than Toyotas? Another cosmic mystery that Carl Sagan failed to answer before passing on.