Oh, Blue.

Devil's Backbone, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah, July 2008

Ode to Blue

Oh, Blue.

What shall we do?

You've been so good throughout the years

that selling you will bring us tears.

At what point do we pull the plug

and send you off with a final hug?

Viewer poll:

Facts:

1. Blue will fetch us about $2,00 when we sell her.

2. We put nearly $2,500 into her in the last three months.

3. She needs $720 in maintenance, insurance, new plates, etc.

4. She is a 1990 Toyota 4Runner with 180,000 miles.

Do we...

A. Keep Blue. Put in $720 to keep her running for 6 more months until something else breaks. Pro: we have a car. Con: it may break and we are concerned about baby Waggoner in an oldie (but goodie).

B. Sell Blue now. There are no major repairs, only the minor maintenance items that will total $250 (change power steering fluid, etc.).

C. Sell Blue later. We pay $720 now to get her going, and then when she dies, we make a decision to sell her "as is".

Our guilty admission is that we are totally attached to this car. If I had my druthers, we'd keep it just because we like it so much and buy a new car. Truth of the matter, we can't afford a new car. We'd just join Zip Car or suffer quietly without Blue. Our car vision is foggy with emotion. Uggh.

In other news, Andy has gotten rid of nearly all the bricks. They have found new homes in places as predictable as a retaining wall, and as California as a Burning Man display. Yay Burners!

If you have an opinion, we'd love to hear it.

We're back!

Awesome progress on the house!

We're moving forward with one lucky contractor (our first meeting is on Monday), and Andy has gotten rid of most of the bricks. How? With the magic of Craigslist, of course!

We had lot's of bricks in the basement. You can imagine - he took down the entire chimney. Andy had called the Got Junk folks who had quoted him $1,900 to haul away the pile of bricks. We were aghast at that price. So, while we were scheming other ways to get around that hunk of money, Andy brilliantly posted on Craigslist "FREE BRICKS! The bricks are red, old...and did I mention they're FREE?!?!?" Within 10 minutes, no joke, 10 MINUTES, some guy calls Andy and not only wants all the bricks, but offers to pay us $.10 per brick. Really? Did the mention of FREE BRICKS not mean anything to him? Well, being the entrepreneurial duo we are, we accepted his offer and moved forward with the deal. So, instead of paying $1,900 to get them hauled, we were payed $80 for the bricks. Awesome! Of course there is more to take to the dump...rubbble, concrete, linoleum, etc. But we are better off than we started.

I went to the Heath Ceramics factory today in Sausalito with the lovely Melanie and drooled over their showroom. Then, I crawled in the back and gawked at the overstock tile room - realizing we may just be able to afford them after all. We'll see if we can...the budget is getting tight and I am still hung up on that Barberini wallpaper.

More fun news in the personal realm...we went to get another ultrasound yesterday and found out that we're having...drumroll please...a baby girl! All those who plac

ed bets in the boy camp are out of luck (all two of you, that is). Since everyone under the sun (and I mean EVERYONE) sensed that we were going to have a girl, it makes me wonder what indicators lead everyone to be right? What is it about us that screams "these two would be great at playing with My Little Pony and picking out training bras?" Just a question.

Denver Love Fest

This week, Andy and Jessica are traveling to Denver to celebrate the marriage of two of our favorite people - Shira and Trent.
We first met Trent in Atlantic City a couple of years ago at Pop Pop's funeral. Shira and Trent were vacationing in Italy when they got the sad news about Pop Pop. Of course, Shira was hopping on the first plane out of there to be with family. What wasn't expected was that Trent was right there by her side. Though they hadn't been dating for long, his true colors showed through and totally impressed the family. Whadda mensch. That first night, after they had traveled all night and day on planes to make it to Atlantic City, they were forced to bunk up with Andy and me. As we fell asleep laughing (despite the circumstances), we all hoped Trent would stick around a while. Lucky for us, he did.

We are so stoked to celebrate the start of the rest of they lives, and we love them very much.

I (Jessica) arrived in Denver on Monday to play shopkeep at Elyse's shoe boutique in Denver. It's been fun and I would definitely consider owning my own shop one day. The best part of my visit has been hanging out with my neice, Coco. I'd add a picture, but I'm not sure how excited Elyse and Eric would be about that, so out of respect for them, you'll just have to trust me when I say that she is the CUTEST little child. She's about 11 months old, and just giggles when you interact with her in nearly any way. Any little squeeze, hug, or snuggle, and that child throws a smile on her face. What a delight!

Andy and Mitch took down the rest of the chimney on Monday. Yay!!!!! Then, all our stuff got moved out of storage and into the basement on Tuesday. Big thanks to Dad, Mitch, and Andy for doing the hard work. We're still waaaaiiiittttiiiinnngggg on contractors, architecture drawings, everything. It's truly trying our patience. I am so ready to move forward. Ack.

In the meantime, we have the best distraction - a family wedding. We can't hardly wait to see everyone (and I can't wait to see MAX!!). Super fun.

Thanks for keeping up with our progress, and we'll check in again next week!

PS: I was watching the Bachelor Pad on Monday night (I know, I know...) and I noticed that one of the girls was wearing the dress that I plan to wear for Shira's wedding. Just had to share.

Stop and go. Go and stop.

This was a "stop" week. For anyone who's remodeled before, you'll be familiar with the cyclical path of rushing and stopping, panicking then slowing. It's much like going to the airport. You rush rush rush, and then wait.

While we weren't engaging in any exciting demolition, Andy was hard at work preparing all the plans that the contractors, architect, and city permitting office will need to give us the green light. We finally delivered our plans to the contractors and we'll hopefully hear back from them this week on project costs. Once we have our answers there, we'll move forward. Thankfully, the permits for this work are over-the-counter, meaning Andy will be able to walk in and out of the permitting office in one day with permits in hand. The alternative was a three-week headache of plan review which would set us back. Let's hope they still think it is an over-the-counter issue when we returned with the complete application.

In the midst of the house stuff, Jessica came to a collective decision with the Climate Cycle folks to step down as Director. She is very, very sad about the outcome but it's for the best. With the California ride looking like it's going to happen in spring 2012, there is plenty of opportunity to get involved once the timing is right. In the meantime, she'll be looking for work - project work or a more permanent placement. She'll also serve as California liason to keep the groundwork that's been laid alive and active.

The Climate Cycle decision was stressful, the house work is stressful, everything is occurring as stressful...so we needed a fun day. In honor of Pili's birthday (August 8), we decided to head to the beach. Below are some awesome shots that Adam took of Pili and her BFF Alice on Saturday when we went to Maverick's beach near Half Moon Bay.