Day After Yesterday

Airfare has been booked… Roughly $1,000 for the 3 of us to fly to oakland… add in a couple hundred for the rental car, and that is one of our 2 summer trips this year. We will be staying with Caroline for a week in the Arcata area of northern California. I am excited, it should be a great trip. Ocean, nice weather, nice area… etc… Should be a super nice trip… We are also going to Seattle in early September to hang out with Rebecca’s brother who lives out there…

So Rebecca, her brother Jon and I went to the movies last night. We saw Nacho Libre and it was funny. It wasn’t AWESOME or anything, but I was amused. If you like jack black, you’ll enjoy it.

It was funny cause we actually hired a BABYSITTER! How old are we. A coworkers daughter came over and watch mason. Mind you, she got there after mason was already asleep, so it wasn’t that she had to do much aside from hang out and make sure the house didn’t burn down. It is just odd to think I have to hire a babysitter. Funny shit.

My toe hurts. I cut it a while ago, like over a month ago if not 2 months, and it is beginning to not feel right. The skin was kind rough, like it was flaky or something, I dunno. But today it is annoying as my other toe rubs against it when I walk. I guess I should find a doctor. Weird.

So this weekend is over… Friday night we walked over to Pacific Cafe and had sushi, it was nice… saturday was the ACCCC autox at maywood, which went quite well. I drive, just ran the event. Just under 50 cars, 14 runs each, done by 3:45pm. Not bad. Although there was this annoying kid that was both creeping me out AND driving me nuts. It was awesome. He just kept talking. I won’t bother writing the whole thing out…

After the autox, I got home, washed the car (it was filthy). I like it clean. And it is so easy to do… it just looks so much better. Mental note: wash the car more than once every 6 weeks.

Then I drove over to meet Rebecca and Caroline at Yitca’s house. Yitca’s baby Ellie (sp?) is 3 weeks older than Mason, but she is like little super developed baby. She started walking last week (so at 8.5 months). She talks (mommy, daddy, shoe, etc). She waves, etc. Crazy. But good for her. It is weird cause you can’t help but to compare your own kid to other kids… and it is such a weird macro view of time at this point. You need to relax, and let some kids walk before others. In 2 years, you won’t care what month your kid walked. In 10 years, you won’t even remember how long it took. But now, in the 6-12 month range, it seems to be SO important. It is not indicative of anything in the future. Got to remember to leave the charts and graphs alone, and focus on the baby. He’ll figure it out on his own in due time.

Sunday got up, picked up dylan, and we met scott and kieran at the old shop. Loaded up a ten foot uhaul box truck (that had NO brakes, likely due to the fact that it had no brake FLUID. We filled it up and it improved. A little) and moved a bunch of stuff to the new garage. Then we swapped the old truck for a slightly better truck and made another trip. The new shop is nice. We cleared out the little room in the basement and loaded a bunch of our stuff in it. Having storage in the basement rules. Once we get everything cleaned up, organized, put away, etc, the new shop is gonna rule. RULE. ROOL. I am excited, but since I am still sick of moving, I don’t care about it. For now. Also big plus: MUCH closer to Mr. Salsa, so I will get to eat there more often.

Cali is still at the old shop, and I am hoping we can get her running soon so I can drive her to the new shop. We still have some stuff there, but it is all small stuff that can either fit in a car, or is required to finish Cali up.

Rebecca’s brother was over when I got home and we hung out and chatted and shit… when I first started dating Rebecca, we didn’t get along SUPER well, but I think we have both figured it out and now we can chat about this and that tech shit, it is pretty nice. So we hung out a bit, then I drove him to the metra station to catch the last train to glen ellyn… and man, was it pouring. I forgot how the tires on the camry aren’t awesome in the rain (Bridgestone Potenza RE92)… but they were better then taking Audrey, which is on Rs still. That would have been hydoplane city.

So overall, things I learned. I hate moving. I forget that sometimes. I also didn’t get to spend enough time with Mason, which sucked, I want to hangout with him more. Having a clean car is nice, wash it more often. Kids develop at different paces, and that is not a problem, no need to compare yourself to every kid on the block. Rebecca’s brother is cooler than I had realized.

Friday is here … and I am excited, but I have such a busy weekend that its importance is dulled. I have an autox tomorrow that I don’t think I will drive in. I may, but I don’t think I will… the car isn’t feeling perfect, and I don’t want to break it. I will likely put one or 2 runs in just to get a time on the board so I can atleast get SOME points… I would still like to remain competitive for the season in the points standing.

So Rebecca and I are planning on going for a walk this evening… which will be nice, I feel like I don’t exercise at all. I did walk to work most of the day’s last week…

Then we are hanging out doing something saturday night… and on Sunday we are moving all the crap from the old garage to the new garage. It will suck, but it will be really nice to have the new garage up and running… I would rather go there than the old one in skokie. So THAT day will suck.

Then a full week of work, then (hopefully) a 4 day weekend for the 4th. that will be nice.

Friday is here … and I am excited, but I have such a busy weekend that its importance is dulled. I have an autox tomorrow that I don’t think I will drive in. I may, but I don’t think I will… the car isn’t feeling perfect, and I don’t want to break it. I will likely put one or 2 runs in just to get a time on the board so I can atleast get SOME points… I would still like to remain competitive for the season in the points standing.

So Rebecca and I are planning on going for a walk this evening… which will be nice, I feel like I don’t exercise at all. I did walk to work most of the day’s last week…

Then we are hanging out doing something saturday night… and on Sunday we are moving all the crap from the old garage to the new garage. It will suck, but it will be really nice to have the new garage up and running… I would rather go there than the old one in skokie. So THAT day will suck.

Then a full week of work, then (hopefully) a 4 day weekend for the 4th. that will be nice.

So I am back at work today, feeling a bit better, but far from perfect. I think I need to run to CVS and grab some more sudafed knock offs and kleenex. Plus I got a check from Kieran and I am getting one from another project on saturday, so I actually have a bit of cash (and this friday is payday!).

Rebecca is feeling a bit better too, although she isn’t thrilled that I am going to the garage again tonight to work on the jetta… but the jetta is SO close… check the jetta blog for more on that.

So back to work… feeling ok, but not awesome. This is going to be a long weekend, autox on saturday, and moving the garage on sunday. Ugh. I am really hoping that the july 1-4th weekend comes together and I have time to relax.

Oh, and I am an idiot and left the interior light on in the Audi last night, and since I got home late, I parked down the block… so I had to go to the car, realize the battery was low, go back home, get the camry and jumper cables, go BACK to the audi, jump it, put the camry back, etc… it was a great way to start the morning… but I did get into the office right before the rain hit though, so it wasn’t all bad…

It seems we are always busy… so what is new? I’ll do it in some list method…

• Mason is doing great. He is smiling lots, has begun laughing on his own, and is eating like there is no tomorrow, so I would imagine another growth spurt soon.

• I got my new glasses. I don’t have any pictures come to think of it, but they are nice. I am totally used to them now. They are dope. I picked them up on friday, 6/2. The place was nice, urban eyecare on milwuakee. Close, insurance covered them, and I like the glasses. Can’t beat that.

• Gardening… so we planted some flowers. And by we, I don’t mean me. Rebecca and her folks did the plant buying and the planting. The backyard looks great. I think we are going to do some new sod. I need to read up on what is involved, time windows, etc. I REALLY want to build an in ground sprinkler system, but everyone tells me it is over kill. Which it is. But I still want to build it.

• Outings… we went to the Chicago Botanical Gardens with Lisa, we have gone out the burbs a few times, hung out with Robyn a few times… been busy, but nothing too awesome too report…

• I am still not drinking pop… well, I have had like 4 cans in the last month…

• We worked on the house a bit… I may have mentioned it, but we did a bunch of touch up, I laid peel and stick vinyl tile in the laundry room, hung new lights in the basement hallway, hung some more shelves in the den, hung the projector screen in the den, bought the chair rail for mason’s room, painted clouds in mason’s room, etc… Slowly but surely…

• The jetta is getting close to done… the list of things to do is pretty small, and I am getting excited. Check the Cali The Jetta blog for more on the progress. Once I can drive that, the Audi goes to Al’s at Chicago Performance and Tuning for the A/C repair. THAT will be nice too.

• Been doing some more side work, which is nice money, I like money. I haven’t gotten paid on much of it yet, but we are getting there.

• Rebecca and I both got sick, and it sucks. On Sunday AM we both wokeup commenting that our throats felt weird. Well, now it is wednesday and I am home sick. I am feeling a bit better, but rebecca is still moving along. I stayed home to babysit and recover so rebecca could get some sleep. Being sick sucks, especially when both of us get sick at the same time.

• Autox on saturday, and we are planning on moving all the shit to the new garage on sunday. Busy Busy.

• I hacked one of the tivos. I am still playing with it, so it is not 100% awesome yet, but progress is being made. It is cool.

I think that is all for now… I think. I will try to be more current with my posts, I swear.

I need to have more time that I focus on updating this blog…

over the weekend we worked on house stuff. We touched up some walls, put up shelves, put in a the hardwood stair nose, did yard work and some gardening. Rebecca’s parents came down and helped. We got stuff done.

Laundry room… cleaned cosby’s box and the washer/dryer, put down primer and then vinyl tiles. I still need to put up some more shelves, find a plumber to install a laundry sink, and I would like to put in some baseboards. Then that room would be done and I could get some more stuff put away in there.

Den… I managed to break some furniture while hanging up the screen for the projector. I also hung some more of the shelves and got the pottery put up. I need to get my mom to sew some velcro to my rung from india so I can hang that. Then hang up the elephants and clean up some more. Put in the last of the quarter round and see if that rug will work and that room will be done. I MAY want to add a small coffee table and I WOULD like a bigger screen… we’ll see.

Main floor… Rebecca’s folks worked on the touchup of the yellow paint. I installed that stair nose on the steps and hooked up the icemaker in the refrigerator. I also secured the dishwasher and put in that piece of trim there. We got more red paint, so we still need to touch up the red around there. We are looking at new drawer pulls for the kitchen, I think that would be a nice touch.

Upstairs… we trimmed the doors in mason’s room and the bathroom, touched up some of the trim.

So we still need to finish the basement bathroom, put up the light in the basement hall way, fix the ceiling fan in the bedroom, find some artwork hanging thing for the hall VW ads, etc.

The list goes on. BUT it was a VERY productive weekend, and I am feeling very good about it all. Oh, and we cleaned and took pics of the appliances, so I need to get those listed. I am eager to get that stuff out and perhaps get a car IN. That would be nice.

Rebecca and I took Mason on a walk…

here is our route.

It was pretty nice.

So independent of each other, Rebecca and I each fell down the stairs this weekend. I hurt my heel, rebecca has a bruise on her backside. My foot still hurts, although only when I put weight on my heel, thus I have been putting weight on the ball of my foot, so now my calf muscles hurt. Great. Rebecca has recovered much better.

Aside from that… On saturday morning I went and picked up a stroller frame and a car seat base from a someone via craigslist. Those were both over 1/2 off retail and that means I can have a base in my car too and we have a smaller stroller that the infant carrier will go into. That was a good deal.

We went out to walker brothers pancake house on saturday for dinner then hung out at my parents. Sunday we went to costco in the AM and amongst other things, we bought frozen strawberries! score. But we also bought a a 9 DVD set of baby einstein movies. We bought then not sure of the price… it was $90. That is a deal considering they are $15 each, but I wasn’t sold. When we got home I got on ebay and ended up scoring a 19 DVD set for $78 shipped. So no one should ever buy us a baby einstein DVD.

Anyway… then we met my parents for lunch in Greektown, which was nice. We decided we should then run up to the garage in skokie to get the roof rack basket that we are lending to caroline for the road trip to california that they are going on. Up to the garage and back in to the city.

When we got home, I had got an email back from some dude I emailed off craigslist about some lexus rims he was selling. So I called him back and locked the deal down. So then we drove up to wildwood, got the rims, then drove back to chicago. They are the 16 inch rims off the non sport IS300 rims.

$175 for them with tires, although 1/2 the tires are crap. but that is ok, we have the tires that were on the car that have 1 more season left on them. So I will mount those up and then I don’t have to pull the snow tires off the steelies. Nice.

Then we grabbed Mr. Salsa and went over to Bob and Lisa’s to watch the sopranos and hang out.

Overall it was a nice weekend, and I got a number of things for a cheap price. I love buying things used…