April 1 weekend – Friday night Jeff Freedman came by for
dinner and to hang out. I made chicken
Alfredo and garlic bread from Safeway and we stuffed ourselves on the rich
food. Then we talked about this and that
late into the evening. We hadn’t hung
out with Jeff in some time and it was nice to catch up and generally gab.
Saturday was to be a rallycross but it was postponed until
April 30 because of the weather. We
generally don’t reschedule events due to weather but this particular site doesn’t
allow us to run if the ground is muddy.
The forecast called for lots of rain and the sky-gods delivered and thus
the event was moved. It was cold and meh
outside so we elected to stay in as we had plenty of leftovers from previous
days. Not much was accomplished and we
were ok with that. Susan watched a lot
of Unsolved Mysteries on Amazon and I played video games.
Sunday we slept in which was nice. Our only solid plan was to have lunch with
John and Karen at Texas Roadhouse. We made
our way out early to do some quick shopping at Wal-Mart beforehand and arrived at
the restaurant early. Lunch was tasty
and we spent a couple of hours talking before we parted to go our separate
ways. We came home to a Sophie who had
made a big mess in her kennel. After helping
Susan clean up I spent a few minutes working on the RS. The passenger headlight was out and new bulbs
had arrived the day before. While I was
messing with the bulbs I saw a wire that looked like a ground which was not
connected to anything on the passenger side.
Upon attaching said wire to a grounding point I found that the headlight
on that side miraculously worked. Now we
have an extra set of bulbs for when we need them. To celebrate my success we decided to hang
with the pugs for the remainder of the evening.
Twas a good way to finish off the weekend.
April 8 weekend – Friday night had me finally doing our
taxes. I hate taxes and we owed this
year. Such is I suppose. Susan convinced me to go to the zoo on
Saturday. She has been watching a
certain pregnant giraffe for the past several weeks and wanted to see the local
baby giraffe that happened to born on her birthday. We got up earlyish for a Saturday and, after
taking care of the pugs, picked up bagels and coffee from Bruegger’s Bagels on
our way up to the Denver Zoo. It may
have behooved us to drink our coffee in café as I spilled on myself at least
twice soon after we left. Upon our
arrival at the zoo we found that it was already busy and the closest available
parking spot was pretty far away (almost closer to the museum than the
zoo). While we did see most every animal
in the zoo the highlights included: Susan feeding a giraffe, a baby gorilla,
tiny monkeys, little striped mongooses, and the hippo which was massive and not
looking much like the person-killers they are purported to be. The giraffe feeding line was long but
proceeded quickly which was nice. The
baby giraffe was also pretty darn cute.
As we were about to leave Susan realized we hadn’t seen the otters so we
headed back out to the far side of the zoo and found that only one otter was
about and it wasn’t very interesting.
Perhaps it’s all the dinosaur movies we’ve seen but the larger birds are
a bit scarier than I remember them being when I was a kid. The most prevalent animal around was the
Canadian geese who were in just about every exhibit without nets overhead. They milled around the patrons as well and
were well-behaved which surprised both of us.
Perhaps all the hissing geese we usually encounter just need to go to
the zoo to relax. We left in the early
afternoon tired but happy with our experience.
On our way to our car we discovered that our far parking spot wasn’t too
bad after all as there were dozens of cars pacing those leaving the zoo to
swoop in on their freshly vacated spots.
We stopped at the Black Eyed Pea for a late lunch on our way home and I
discovered their pot roast is actually on the right side of fantastic. We were originally going to do some shopping
but elected to go home and relax our achy feet instead. I convinced Susan to cook dinner and the food
she made was quite tasty.
On Sunday we went to an open house at the Douglas County
dispatch down in Castle Rock. Susan
asked me to go the night before and I hesitantly agreed. It turned out to be an interesting visit. We were shown the equipment and software they
use when on the job and they answered a bunch of questions we had. It all looked pretty slick and
intuitive. After the interesting stuff
we met a part time EMT who went over some of the basics of CPR. On our way out a couple of the dispatchers
mentioned that they were hiring. I said
I wouldn’t be able to handle the stress which is the truth. We both agreed it was a cool and worthwhile
trip. After we left we headed up to the
Southwest Plaza area where we ate at Firehouse Subs for the first time. Not too shabby and we’ll probably eat there
again at some point in the future. Then
we performed our usual shopping at Costco and Wal-Mart before heading
home. Once there I used mass airflow
sensor cleaner to clean the mass airflow sensor on the evo. The mass air flow sensor has been causing a
check engine light to be on for the last year or so which is fine (it has zero
impact on the car’s performance) except we can’t pass emissions with a check
engine light on. I cleared the code and
we’re hoping the light stays out long enough to get through its check. A new mass airflow sensor for the evo is $500
(the evo did end up passing emissions later in the week despite the check engine
light being on). Then we hung out with
the pugs and watched the boob tube while we played on our computers. Dinner was Costco ribs which Susan
prepared. Another great weekend in the
books!
Sophie is continuing to have a tough time. She’s almost incontinent now and has seizures
a few times a day. Susan has been adding
chicken to her food bowl to try to get her to eat but she ends up primarily
just ingesting the chicken before turning up her tiny nose at the rest of the
food. Susan is going to reach out to the
vet and see if Sophie can get on a different seizure medicine than the one she
was on before that had her so incapacitated.
April 12 – We made the difficult decision to euthanize
Sophie on Tuesday morning. The house
feels empty despite Tweetie and Bella still being there. Sophie demanded so much of our hearts and now
we’re left with this immense hole in our lives.
It was so strange not having her begging for pets on the couch or
cuddled against my back in bed that night.
We miss her terribly.
April 15 weekend – Friday night I spent some time in the
garage rearranging tall stacks of tires before Susan ordered pizza from Dominos
(our first time getting delivery) and we started a new puzzle at the kitchen
table. Saturday we woke up and I made
green chili for breakfast. It was yummy
and I also brewed up a pot of coffee we enjoyed before I convinced Susan we
should take Bella on a walk. The weather
has been absolutely beautiful this spring and Saturday was no exception. Our walk was a short one as Bella is out of
shape (our fault) and we had to carry her multiple times. We did see some pet ducks one of the houses bordering
the greenbelt has. The one that rushed
to the edge of the fence to see us and Bella had a tuft of feathers on top of
its head. I wish we had some treat for
it as I imagine it’s used to getting things from passersby. I had grand plans to clean up and organize
the garage further but decided that we’d done enough for the day so we watched
Breaking Bad and did more puzzle work before I made dinner that evening.
On Sunday we went to an early matinee showing of Beauty and
the Beast at our AMC 24. Susan had
reserved us seats the night before and the movie was set to start at 9:30. We rolled in a bit late which was fine as the
previews and whatnot lasted until 10:00.
It was Susan’s plan that we’d avoid crowds as it was Easter Sunday and a
lot of folks would be in church in the morning.
I believe this worked but the movie’s popularity (even a month after it debuted)
and possibly others having the same thought meant the theatre was mostly
full. It was all good as the few
children in attendance (no surprise there were a few) were mostly quiet and the
leather reclining chairs were comfy.
Plus the movie was quite good and we both enjoyed it immensely. We were going to go to Costco to do our usual
shopping but found it was closed so instead got Susan lunch at Larksburger (I
ate a big breakfast before we left) before we went home to veg the afternoon
and evening away.
Week of April 17th – This was a wild week for
us. Susan and I have been talking about
moving to or building a home that fit better with our lifestyle for some time. With no children, our racing, and our
penchant for buying and owning lots of cars living in boilerplate suburbia has
been a square-peg-round-hole situation for the past several years. On Monday Susan found two homes that could
possibly meet our preferences. That evening
we started getting excited about one in particular and on Tuesday I called the
listing agent and scheduled a showing that evening. The home has a great location close to town
and also sits on almost an acre of land.
This was a unique combination as the home is relatively small (1,500
square feet) but there has a 25x40’ four-car garage. There was also a chicken coup replete with
chickens on the land along with a grey horse Susan got to pet (he/she lives in
a carport). We were very interested and made
an offer below their asking price (a bit unheard of in the Denver area housing
market at this time). Of course all we
have talked about that night and every night (and day) since has been the
house. The sellers countered (as
expected) and we accepted their counter.
We’ve already started the ball rolling on financing and the home
inspection is scheduled for the next Monday followed soon by the
appraisal.
April 22 weekend – Saturday was painting day with Susan and
Kari. Once again our location was set to
be Karen and John’s up in Conifer and it began with me preparing a taco-bar
lunch. It came out well and after we
were full and the dishes cleared Susan laid down paper and set up the
easels. The night before Susan asked
what we were painting and I replied “castles”.
Susan and Kari were not interested in painting castles and thus decided
an owl was more what they had in mind.
Thus I painted castles and Susan and Kari painted an owl based on a
picture Susan found online from a painting class. Left to our own devices we fretted over our
canvases while listening to John and Karen watch NASCAR in the living
room. Our efforts took us a couple of
hours and turned out well. Susan and
Kari’s owls came out cute and my castles look as strange as I was hoping they
would. After exhausting ourselves with
our art (not really) we gabbed before eating a dessert of brownies and whip
cream. We finally ventured home around
7:00 to feed Bella and Tweetie and layabout for the remainder of the
evening.
On Sunday morning we awoke early (to us on a Sunday) and met
Jeff at Village Inn for breakfast at 9:00.
Besides the coffee which was strangely bad (the first pot was horrid so
Jeff requested another be made which was much better) the food/drink was
good. We talked about this and that and
spent much of our time on real estate.
It was a nice time. At the end we
decided to meet at the junk yard down by our house to look for this and
that. This particular yard has mostly
late model cars which distinguishes itself from all of the others in
Denver. We zipped home and picked up
some tools which I dropped in a 5-gallon bucket and went to the yard. Jeff was already there and we set to looking
for coil on plugs from Toyota Corollas for Jeff’s Miata, sprayer nozzles from
Mazda Tributes for Susan’s Miata, and a camber bolt for my WRX. In the end we found everything we were
looking plus I pulled a brake caliper and bracket off a 1997 Subaru Impreza to
replace the one on our 1997 Subaru Impreza we’re trying to sell. Full on success we went our separate ways. Once home Susan installed her new spray nozzles
and I started pulling apart the Impreza’s brakes. After a surprisingly short amount of time I
had the car back together with a new bracket and we were test driving it around
the neighborhood. We found the belts
were quite squeaky so after a quick tightening our automotive work was
finished. Or so we thought.
Jeff finished wiring up his new setup (he ended up pulling
the coil on plugs from a Prius which evidently worked too) and wanted to test
drive down to our house and hang out. We
were already in our lazy clothes and redressed once he arrived. He pulled his spark plugs and, after
declaring them unworthy, we drove him to O’reilly’s for new ones. Once we were back he found they only had
given him three (one was missing in his box of four) so we went back to
O’reilly’s to pick up another spark plug.
Before this we pulled the spark plugs out of Tia and decided to replace
them as well (why not, right?). After
arriving home after our second trip to the auto parts store and installing the
new plugs we discovered one of Tia’s brake tail lights was out. Unwilling to make an additional trip to the
store I elected we wrap up our afternoon of car maintenance. Jeff took off and after we fed the pugs we
descended on our kitchen table to work on puzzles for the next few hours. Assuming things keep moving forward regarding
the new home this may have been our last relaxing weekend for the next few
months and we both agreed it was a good one.
April 29 weekend – The last weekend in April was snowy. As it was beginning to really come down on
Friday we received and accepted an invite to come over to Kari and Alvin’s home
for dinner (we were on our way home from checking out a storage unit close to
the new house). Alvin made steak on
their grill to virtual perfection for the main course which was accompanied by
sides of potato and macaroni salad as well as some steamed green beans. We brought Cabo in case we wanted to play but
spent the evening discussing the housing market and our thoughts on how we
should handle our situations. Susan and
me with buying another house and renting our current one and Alvin and Kari on
building on their land and deciding whether to rent or sell their current home. Poor old Dandi is still around (Kari’s yellow
lab). Her face is mostly white now and
getting around looks tough. Dandi and
Tweetie are virtually the same age.
Their new pooch Ringo is still 100% puppy though their efforts to train
him look to be paying off. We left late
and found the snow was really coming down hard on our way home. We also found the headlights on the RS to be lacking. More accurately they are directed up and away
from the ground which was incredibly unhelpful in navigating the virtually
blinding snow. We did get home without
incident and spent the remainder of the evening with Tweetie and Bella. Susan and I did go outside to knock snow off
the branches of our lone tree and had some success. There was only one high branch that snapped
off and almost landed on me.
We woke up Saturday to more snow and another broken
branch. These late spring snows are
always heavy and this one was no exception.
We resigned ourselves to not leaving the house and split our time between
the couch and beginning the “purge” of our things in preparation for packing to
move. As there will be no studio in our
new home I organized and took pictures of some of the equipment to post it for
sale on craigslist. Susan spent much of
her time in her spare room accumulating donatable things in bags and deciding
what she wants to keep. I cooked a
couple of times throughout the day which was alright. The day was a mix of laziness and
productivity which somehow came out ok in the end.
Sunday the majority of the snow melted. This was the day of the rescheduled
rallycross but the terrible weather had it pushed out again, probably until
June. I cleaned off the RS in the
morning and we ventured out to drop off some donations at Arc and do some
shopping. We swung by Lowes, Home Depot,
and Best Buy to look at appliances before finally going to Costco. On the way home we also stopped at Safeway to
get some veggies. Susan guilted me into
taking her to lunch at JPs which was alright.
The place was empty for much of the time we spent there (around
12:30-1:30) and we enjoyed the quiet. We
were afforded a view of a bright and snowy landscape outside that I couldn’t
help but stare at from time to time and which blinded me so much I could barely
see the food on my plate. Once we were
home I cleared off all the other cars to aid in the snow-melt and we spent the
remainder of the day on the couch or packing up more donations.
Tweetie is having a rough go of pooping lately. It began some time ago and we switched her
food to a senior dog food in hopes it would help. At first it seemed to be just the solution
she needed but now she’s degraded to a messy place. We’re hoping our vet can recommend something
to help her out as this is no fun for her or us.
