Archive for April, 2010

Taurus

Thursday, April 15th, 2010


Here’s LRN4’s new car as it appeared in the garage this very evening. Still looks perfect – way to take care of it, LRN4! Part of my famous Machinery series. Great Art courtesy of the exclusive iPhone-cam.

Greetings from the train! I missed a couple of days there – busy again. There was Massive Meeting Tuesday and . . . ummm . . . wacked out Wednesday. Or something like that. Spent the evening chatting with LRN4 instead of blogging. Or exercising, for that matter.

Fine day. It was sunny and warm out in Sunnyvale and I hear it was the same here in Lardville. We’re not expect any more rain until Monday, I believe. Can’t complain.

I may have mentioned LRN2 and LRN4’s upcoming trip to San Diego, Mesa, and Las Vegas to visit her sister, LRN3, and her other sister, in that order. They’re basically spending the last half of May on the road. Since the last weekend of their visit will be the Memorial Day weekend, I’m flying down to Vegas to join them for a couple of days and then drive home together. Couldn’t get a cheap flight on Friday or Saturday, so I’m going on Sunday for about $63 bucks. We’ll stay for Monday and come home Tuesday. I’m looking forward to the trip.

Speaking of trips, LRN4 is going to Salt Lake to see her brother and father the week after next. Staying Monday to Monday, as that was when the cheap flights were available. She’s looking forward to that trip too.

Let’s see – what else is going on? The Suburban’s check engine light came on again on Sunday when I drove kind of fast over the driveway curb at church. Sigh. I got out my new OBD II diagnostic tool last night and plugged it in. It told me there was a small leak in the sealed fuel venting system. I assumed the gas cap was a bit loose, so I reinstalled it and reset the light. Let’s hope it works. And that I remember to drive a bit more slowly over bouncy driveways.

LRN1’s officially in the mission field! He left the Guatemala City MTC Tuesday and headed over to the Guatemala City North mission home. We have no idea where his first area is, but hope to hear soon. Exciting! Check out his new address over there on the right. Write! Or use dearelder.com for fast, free pouch mail like I do.

Well, the battery on this thing is quite low and we’re just a few minutes from Lardville, so it’s time to quit. I’ll leave my Loyal Readers with this exciting job opportunity: rabbit whisperer!

See you tomorrow.

Eagle brunch

Monday, April 12th, 2010


Here’s LRN2 at the Eagle brunch the other Saturday. Congrats again, LRN2! It was a very nice – although quite expensive – breakfast. Great Art courtesy of the exclusive iPhone-cam.

The weekend’s over! Pretty decent one. LRN12 had her monthly sleepover with us this weekend – it was fun having her here. She’s still working on sleeping all night long, but she did pretty well. On a very positive note, she has started taking naps! Really! So there’s that.

The other big news is that LRN4, LRN12, and I went to Tracy to look at cars. True to my form, I ended up buying one. We got a 2010 Ford Taurus Limited with almost all the available options. It has automatic headlights, automatic high beams, automatic windshield wipers, adaptive cruise control, heated and air conditioned front seats, heated back seats, rear window sunshade, blind spot car detection, rear and side backup radar, Sync with navigation system that includes full phone and iPod integration, a big hard drive that rips CDs for you and stores them, a DVD player (front only, so it only plays when you’re parked – not sure how useful that will be, but it’s there!), and voice control for all of them, keyless entry and engine start (you just keep the “key” in your pocket and push the start button), selectable-color interior mood lighting, HID headlights, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Strangely, it has no sunroof. Also no backup camera or all-wheel drive (we didn’t want the latter). Also no SHO, but I probably shouldn’t have spent that kind of money on it anyway.

So we like it a whole lot. And it cost a whole lot, but that’s only money, isn’t it? We haven’t technically gotten the word that LRN4’s old car is totaled, so we don’t technically have the money from it yet, which is a bit of a worry item, but I’m pretty sure it will happen in the next few days. In any case, I don’t think we want to keep that car, even if it’s repaired. It’s just a question of when the money will come in. And how much there will be. And how badly LRN4 will wring my neck if it isn’t totaled. Gulp.

We all think the car looks really cool. Strangely, it’s quite tall and chunky (muscular-looking, to put it a bit better) and has very small windows. So LRN4’s a bit uncomfortable driving it right now. Hopefully, she’ll get comfortable with it very soon. The trunk lid is chest-high!

And the tires are huge.

Anyway, I’m happy with the car (link note: our car look exactly like the one they tested – same color inside and out and same options!) and looking forward to excellent service from it for years to come. At the price, it had better give excellent service for years to come.

Let’s see, what else has been going on? Well . . . it rained. Yesterday and today. It’s supposed to be dry for the next five days. Things have greened up quite nicely over the last couple of months of pretty heavy and regular rain. In fact, the mountains are already starting to go post-green (read: brown). Which is a shame – they look absolutely velvety in the spring. And then ruggedly brown the rest of the year.

Anyway. Had a lot of meetings on Sunday – I was home only for a few hours during the day. Started at 7:00 in the morning and finished at 9:00 in the evening. Great day of rest, no?

Greetings from the train, by the way. I finished my indexing pretty quickly this evening and still had some battery power available, so I thought I might as well blog. I’ve been listening to a couple of podcasts from the church called “Everything Creative.” I may have mentioned it before – I really like it. The original premise was that they would interview an interesting creative person one week and then that person would interview a different creative person the following week, and so on. It seems to have morphed into a single (professional-quality) interviewer, which isn’t a bad thing The original idea seemed to have run its course after a couple of months. Anyway, I heard from the guy who maintains the Tabernacle and Conference Center organs. Along with a bunch of other, smaller organs, a couple of harpsichords, and about 70 pianos. It was especially fascinating to hear about the history of the Tabernacle organ. Or organs, to put it more correctly – they’ve replaced it at least a few times in the past hundred years or so. Anyway, it was really interesting. Now they’re interviewing some Creative Dancers. Interesting in an odd way.

Time to quit. I’ll leave you with this surprising food-related good news: eat more chocolate!

See you tomorrow.

Cabo blogger

Thursday, April 8th, 2010


Here are LRN4 and me in Cabo. I took a lot of pictures in Cabo. Great Art courtesy of a kind stranger. Who fortunately didn’t run away with my camera.

Pretty good day. LRN4’s still quite sore around the neck and shoulders, but otherwise showing minimal ill effects from yesterday’s unfortunate incident. No word yet on the final state of her car. I expect we won’t find out until next week. We might find a little time to do some car shopping on Saturday. Maybe not. LRN12 will be with us, so it might get a bit busy.

Otherwise a normal day. Worked like a dog (ate, slept, scratched, and used the bathroom) and came home.

LRN4’s working the phones right now, planning an upcoming road trip for LRN2 and her. They’re going to see her sister in San Diego, LRN3 in Mesa, and her other sister in Las Vegas. Spending the last 10 days or so of May. It ought to be fun, and I’m only sorry I can’t go with them. I’m simply out of vacation. Sigh. I do hope she has a new car by then. We ought to be able to work that out, I believe.

Speaking of working the phones, I’ve gotten robocalls during dinner the last two days for some idiot sheriff or something who must be running for office – I don’t stick around long enough to be sure. My bottom line – he just lost my vote, even if I would have otherwise liked him. Grrr.

So I’ll leave you with this shocking food violence news: meat repossession!

See you tomorrow.

Cabo church

Wednesday, April 7th, 2010


Here’s the interior of the old church in Cabo. The dog was an unexpected guest and actually did something quite rude on the floor before our guide shooed him out the door. Most unexpected. Not to mention unseemly.

Need to stay kind of brief tonight. LRN4 and I have spent the evening researching new cars, so it’s a bit late. Yes, it looks like we may be getting rid of her trusty old Sable. I’m very sad to report that she was in a most unfortunate accident early this morning. She’s sore around the neck, but otherwise fine. A young man in a old beat up primer-gray Buick made a left turn into her – not in front of her, into her – forcing her into another car. Both sides of the front of her car are damaged, with the left-side damage much more heavy than on the right. The left front wheel is all skewampus, leading one to believe that very expensive internal damage was probably done. It’ll be towed up to Sacramento tomorrow and a claims adjuster will give us a verdict within a couple of days after that. We expect it will be totaled.

This is very sad. We had hoped to have the Sable last two more years, after which we would give it to LRN1 and LRN4 would get her new car. Looks like that plan is probably gone.

Anyway, we’re looking at the Ford Taurus (I would really love an SHO, which is too darn much money but massively cool), the Ford Fusion, the Ford Edge (LRN4 loves the seats and it’s pretty cool), the Ford F150 (also way too much money, but it’s affordable because it would replace both the Sable and the Suburban and become my car – I’m not entirely sure about this option, but it would also solve the Suburban falling-apart problem), and the Mini Cooper S. After we get the Sable verdict, we need to go do some serious shopping. Probably.

And it’s bedtime already and there’s nothing else to report. So I’ll leave you with this outstanding employment opportunity: monkey cop.

See you tomorrow.

Cabo beach

Tuesday, April 6th, 2010


Here’s the beach at Cabo. Not a bad place to visit. Lots of Americans and touristy stuff, but still not bad.

Normal day. At least it didn’t rain. No more rain until next Sunday, according to my beloved iPhone. Worked, ate, and commuted. Nothing to report.

Oh, I did do some more indexing on the train. It’s a great way to pass the time. Also listened to some Car Talk radio shows. Not a bad way to spend the trip.

Netflix sent us Some Like it Hot, one of my favorite old movies. We’re watching it now and enjoying it greatly. “Buttermilk!”

We got two very entertaining emails from Austin, our nephew on a mission in Africa. He was very descriptive. Turns out Mozambique is a bit buggy, hot, humid, and dirty. But the people are wonderful and he’s having a great, if a bit rugged, time. I’m looking forward to hearing from LRN1 tomorrow. One more week in the MTC for him!

Speaking of which, I owe him a letter. So I had better quit here and get writing. I’ll leave you with this shocking food violence news: sausage man attack!

See you tomorrow.