moving sucks… (weekend recap)
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.
My foot…
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...
Busy Busy
So amazingly enough, life with a baby has created a time crunch of sorts... So I will attempt to recap things... I will be random, forgive me...
this weekend rebecca took mason to the burbs with her and they went to get paper for the birth announcements. They done chose good stuff. I went out the garage with dylan to hang out and work on cars. In typical Dylan/Bryan fashion, we spent more time driving around and eating then working, but it was a nice break none the less. We got work done on the rabbit, I cleaned out the Honda, reseated the stereo, and finally got the CD changer magazine out (rebecca hasn't seen those CDs in a long time). Then we picked up Sarah and went back to our house.
We hung out a bit, then Dylan and I went to pickup Robs as well as Mr. Salsa and Thai. We all hung out at the house for a bit, it was nice. We ate at the table. It was cool. In hindsight, it is really funny. Like we haven't ever had that many people over and eaten at the table. I think we should have more things like that. Not even dinner parties, but just people over and then we eat. Perhaps we could throw in a game of some kind as well. I love Cranium. That could rule. I may be on to something here. I need a card table or something though if we are going to play around the couch. or a coffee table. hmmmmmmmmm....
We also sold the Honda to Dylan for Sarah's folks, so that car is no longer in our arsenal.
Sunday we stayed in for the most part. I ran a few errands. I installed the timer control for the front porch light. It is pretty neat. It occupies the place where the switch was and it is fully programmable as well as has a full look up table for sunrise/sunsets. I have it set to on at sunset and off at sunrise. It is pretty cool.
Monday I installed the projector to the wall and set that up. I forgot how nice it is to have a huge TV and video games. I played some Burnout-Takedown until Rebecca got annoyed. It was dope. The xbox mod chips come this week too, and I picked up a 160gb HD for it. Micheal and I are going to mod them up and I am all over installing xbox media center on mine. It will make watching all the tv and videos I have on the computer way easier. It will be nice. And I love tinkering with things.
We also stopped by the wabansia house and saw the kittens. Damn kittens are cool. They are so playful and entertaining. Michael needs to take more pictures. Michael's dad built this incredible cat castle. it is insane. HUGE! totally cool, although it makes them look kinda dorky, but that is certainly ok with me. It would actually get bonus points in my book!
Mason is doing great, check his blog for more updates. He is still eating and sleeping and pooping, but he is awake more now than ever. He is also a bit fussier, not such that we can't get him to be quiet, but it is still kinda annoying. He still grunts and groans as he tries to move around and use his muscles and whatnot. It is funny. But you can tell his vision is improving and he can focus better, which is neat. His dexterity is also improved, as he now actually will hold onto things, like a blanket, etc. It is cute.
I am sure there are other things that have happened, but I forget things.
Tonight we are going over to Robyn's to see the new place, have dinner, hangout, etc. It is gonna rule. Mason will get to see a new place and new cats.
Ah friends…
Chad was in town today for all of ... 12 hours or something... He had a zefer reunion thing last night... we were all able to grab breakfast this AM though... me, chad, bob, lisa, bob's brother Joe, and fellow Ex-zefer jeff. It was nice to see everyone again. It was a nice group. It is nice to see old friends and hang out. Then I drove Chad to the airport and we chatted. He is a good guy. We differ on a few points, but overall, a great guy.
We ate at Flying Saucer, on California south of Division. It was really good. Way Veggie. Rebecca and I will need to go back.
I drove the jetta around all morning and to the airport and shit. It is a fun car, and I will be happy when I have it all done. I enjoy driving it. I will enjoy it more when I fix the things that are broken, but man, it is a fun little car.
The weather is super nice. I turned off the AC and opened all the windows. Cosby is thrilled. I set up all the accounts and bill pay stuff at washington mutual's site. Now I gotta go get working on the basement. I need that floor done so we feel more moved in.
It will be nice...