Car, Insurance, and the Dark Night

What a friggin' day.  As planned, got up to my friend's area to meet her husband, Mike, at 8:00.  Left the car at J & L Automotive and went back to his place.  Mike busied himself with various chores while I read the paper and so on.
In a few hours, the guy called and confirmed what I knew in my heart: The car isn't worth fixing.  I thanked Mike and drove home; had my carrot/orange mix for lunch, then left to pick up a new referral at the doctor's.
Went from there to meet my friend at the Ocean County Aging Office, or some damn thing.  We were with "Claudia," the Medicare and supplemental health insurance interpreter for more than an hour.  All I know is, I'm pretty sure going to take a big hit--more than two thou more than I pay now.  This on top of the fact that I have to buy a car.
However, I'm not going to stew over it; I'm more or less numb and, boy, when I was outside, that was literally true.  I'll survive the financial news and will slog on.
The bright side is that I got a darling Thanksgiving card--original, of course--made by my sweet daughter-in-law in Tokyo.  It's from her, my son, and adorable, fourteen-months-and-ten-days-old Mr. K.  Talk about being thankful--!
WIDER:  I just got a tiresome blanket e-mail from Dayle F., urging recipients to buy at Sears because that store--hardly known for its benign treatment of employees--is maintaining the salary and benefits of employees "serving" in "our military."  Good grief, is there any idiocy which the populace won't swallow?  Or any smarmy, "patriotic" nonsense that won't make them gag? The message even mentions that it's "amazing how long the war has lasted," seemingly without a single urge to examine more closely the reasons for its longevity.  What garbage and when I get something like this, I truly despair.  We are well into the dark night and it's getting darker all the time.