Thirty-eight

On Monday we saw a home up in Meadowbrook, a neighborhood we've been considering for a while, that made our heads spin. It was outside our price range, but we made an offer Tuesday anyway. Today, after a lot of wringing of hands, we heard back from the sellers with a counter-offer. We accepted!

There's still inspections, final paperwork, and probably 30 days of more hand wringing. But the biggest hurdle has been cleared: we've found a dream home and have an accepted offer.

Of course, I am presently posting over a hundred photos of the place. Mom, check out those windows and floors! Dad, check out the 6' spaced outlets, modern wiring, and sturdy stairs. Rishi, check out that entertainment space. Megan, check out the massive gardening opportunity. Baba, check out that kitchen! (we'll have to replace the range, it's actually a commercial unit that shouldn't be in there.) Regina, check out those subway tiles!

It's a dream home for us.

Please have positive, house-closing thoughts for us over this month. If all goes well, my fourth-annual Dependence Day BBQ will be at "Thirty-eight." And, just for kicks, we're pretty certain we're going to have our wedding in the back yard!

Goodbye Subaru

Cars are like people and pets. As they get older their flexible parts become less flexible and require expensive maintenance or replacement.

Cars are not like people or pets. They are replaceable themselves, and often the newer models get better gas mileage.

This past winter the great mechanics at Smart Service Subaru predicted that my car would die on a hill or mountain soon if expensive maintenance was not performed. The price of the work was more than what the car was worth. Add to that our thoughts on getting a new car for Quincy, and I was really wondering if I wanted to keep investing in the car.

Well, sure enough, driving around in Normandy Park pushed the eleven year old wagon to the edge of brokenness. The engine temperature spiked a couple times -- the mechanic's prediction of final death throws. The next trip up to Woodinville left us stranded in a place called "Thrasher's Corners." Here's all the photos from my last minutes with her, while we waited for a tow truck to save us. (Jeff, Maggi and Scooter saved Quincy, since the tow truck was not dog-friendly.)

Following the advice given to me by Rishi a while back, I decided to donate the car to charity. There are a couple places you can work with to get the money to any charity you want. I used V-DAC because their website was easy and linked from Goodwill, a charity I had considered supporting recently. I would have used Feed the Children or KEXP or KIVA, but they weren't in the V-DAC database. They get my money anway. Oh, I digress.

So, the car is gone. I don't really miss the Subaru wagon, per se, but I do miss having a hauling car. Rishi and Jamie want me to get a luxury car. Quincy would probably be happiest if I bought her car from her. I want a small, electric pickup -- sadly those don't exist. I am thinking about a used Toyota pickup or, my dad's favorite, a Ford Ranger.

What do you think, internets?

Elsa Hotel

As most of you know, Rishi has been working on a big project the last few months. He's puting together a business plan for a small, boutique, budget hotel in Capitol Hill. The hotel is named "Elsa Hotel." I've been blogging a bit about his experiences so far at www.elsahotel.org. I'll admit, we haven't hit the really juicy stuff yet, but if you're into following Rishi's progress on his dreams, I suggest subscribing.

The most recent update highlights some of his Google SketchUp drawings of some of the rooms. He's super excited to be able to play around with this. It's a great break from grinding out number on water usage and P&L and marketing strategies.

So, check it out! I try to get in a post a week or more; I'm sure as things heat up I'll have more to write about.

www.elsahotel.org

Whidbey Island Dog Parks

The dog parks of Whidbey Island are legendry around these parts. Maybe it’s the crowdedness of in-city parks that drives us all to dream of acreage. I’m always a little hesitant around dog parks, not being a natural dog person, and wide open spaces don’t really add to my comfort. A dog near me is a dog near me – the only thing space might add is a the distance between the dog and its owner. But, so far, at all these dog parks we’ve only run into the sweetest dogs ever. Maybe city owners are just not as careful about socializing their dogs?





We took two trips to the expansive Double Bluff Beach Dog Park. It located in such a way as to point back to Seattle, this two mile stretch of wide, open beach is a dog’s dream. We played some long-fetch with the dog both times. Grete loves the tennis ball more than anything, and flying disk/Hurley action just didn’t cut it. She chased a couple big birds, one of them a heron, but being a city dog she never gets close before they take flight.





At the end of the second day, Quincy and I tested Grete’s desire to swim out to sea. I think she just doesn’t swim. Eventually, we were able to goad her out as far as she could touch; but once the ball was thrown farther than that, it was lost. It was a little sad to see our dog hunting around for anything resembling a tennis ball on the walk back to the car. Maybe this will help her learn?



My new favorite dog park is Patmore Pit, about half way up Whidbey Island, near a huge naval air station outlying field. It’s touted as about 40 acres of wide open space, and it certainly is! There are tress in the middle of the park, and a small agility field fenced off in one corner, but other than that, it’s just wide open, flat, grassy field. Grete fetched like there was no more tomorrow. She jumped, bounced, ran, flew. Man, it was fun. We all had a great time in the sun. The park was nearly empty, too, so we had our pick of the most scenic fetching field. Even when other dogs strolled by, it felt like we were just passing in the Plains. (In the photo below, Grete can barely be seen in the center.)



We didn’t hit up any other dog parks on Whidbey. I don’t know why they have more! With the expansiveness of both, a dog owner can choose between clean dry fetching or dirty beach romping. Either way, on our last day of the trip, Grete was so tired (and I imagine sore) that she wouldn’t run even a tenth of a mile with me in the morning. She was still smiling from the day before!

www.tweenbots.com

I happend upon this little social experiment via rebel:art yesterday. I have to admit, and maybe it was from being in the sun all day, it kinda brought a little tear to my eye. I find it a very reassuring note on humanity -- especially the humans that live in big cities.

From the site: "Tweenbots are human-dependent robots that navigate the city with the help of pedestrians they encounter. Rolling at a constant speed, in a straight line, Tweenbots have a destination displayed on a flag, and rely on people they meet to read this flag and to aim them in the right direction to reach their goal."

Love it.

The Inn at Langley

Last weekend Q and I took the short ferry ride to Whidbey Island to celebrate her birthday. We took Monday and Tuesday off to make a four-day weekend out of it. There are a number of dog-friendly inns and bed and breakfasts on the south end of the island, but since we were in a celebratory mood, we stayed at the best of the best: The Inn at Langley.

The Inn lived up to its reputation as a destination in and of itself. We brought enough cheese for a party of 40, and ate dinners of cheese, wine, Scotch, fruit, bread and crackers in the room all three nights. We took full advantage of the free breakfast, eating more fruit and breakfasty things in the room each morning. The warmer days, we were out on the balcony overlooking Puget Sound. The rainy days, we ate by the fire.

We thought ahead and brought the must-haves for a romatic getaway like this: ample CDs, candles, wine, and reading material. We spent a lot of time sitting on the balcony or soaking in the huge tube (with a view).

Of course, being a trip with Grete, we hit the two biggest and best dog parks. That could be a post in and of itself. Actually, that's a good idea.

We took a day trip up to the top of Whidbey to hike a little around Deception Pass. The park is great, but northern Whidbey is just like North Seattle -- where the south is very beautiful and coutry and folksy, the north is strip malls and six lane roads.

You can check out our favorite few photos here. There's a pile of photos of Quincy and I, and our vistas here. Then, there's, like, 200 photos of Grete jumping and shaking here.

Wall zero, Baba one

My dear grandmother, Baba, fell the other weekend. She probably tripped and smacked her forehead into a concrete wall in her sewing room in the basement. My grandfather, Champ, rushed her to the hospital for a once over. A few scans later they determined that she was spunky, resilient, and mostly uninjured. The next morning she woke up with two black eyes and a nasty bruise on her head. Apparently, that's just where the blood goes.

That concrete wall got me once. I was a little kid and a slipped (probably rushing) down the basement stairs. I don't recall it well, but I don't think I was stoic. I'm guessing I balled my eyes out.

The worst thing, in Baba's opinion, about this fall was that it happened right before Russian (Orthodox) Easter. She wasn't able to go to all the ceremonies and sermons, which is very disappointing. Easter is her favorite holiday.

Champ's birthday just came and went again, as well. I called to wish him well, and in classic Baba, ended up talking with her about her run in with the wall for most of the call.

My coworker remarked that there's just something special about that generation. They seem to take everything in stride. I'm willing to bet generation X (or whatever I am) will not end up being known for its stoic demeanor in the face of adversity.

Rock on, Baba.

House Hunting

It has been nearly six years since I hunted for a new home. Last time, the market was crazy fast. Houses were going for 20% over their value on the same day that they went on the market. Bidding wars knocked me out of six houses before I was lucky enough to land here. I love this house. It has spoiled me for future houses. The doneness of it has no connection to the constant upgrading and remodeling of my childhood home. I spend my weekends in the garden, not in the crawl space.



It all started with this little 1911 house down the street. It's very pretty, it's on the perfect lot, and none of the infrastructure has been up dated in my life time. Wiring, plumbing, sewer, foundation, bones, roof... they're all needing work to support the 21st century.

In order to see the house, we engaged Wendy, Quincy's amazing realtor. She's fantastic. Wendy brings a kind of honest energy to the search that I wouldn't expect from someone working on commission. Yesterday, she drove from Brier to Normandy Beach to show us a few houses.



Before heading to the deep south, we headed back east to a little bump off I90 named Preston. It's 20 miles outside of downtown (8 from Issaquah). The house blew our mind-- beautifully updated in every way. The lot was odd, with a creek running through it and gently sloped in every angle, but the owners have 10 acres and might be interested in changing the boundaries. But, it was far. And, it up a wash-out prone never-plowed road that would be impossible to traverse in the deep winter. Sigh. Back to the city we drove.

Here's what we saw with Wendy:



This updated house held a lot of promise. The back yard was in bad condition, but with a few grand in retaining wall/drainage we could get a big practice field. The neighbors had a huge garden. But, there were invasive weeds everywhere (think blackberries on steroids), it needed a new roof, it was priced for a view (but it didn't have one), and there was an unfinished bathroom off the bedroom.



This house had substantial yardage. There were flowering trees everywhere, and a few 200' cedars (that maybe should be cut down). No view, and the lot was heavily shaded by all those beautiful trees. The basement was recently remodeled, but they split up the space oddly and left us imagining opening it all back up again. For every interesting plus (outside fireplace) there seemed to be a strange minus (tiny entryway/sitting room).



We drove up some really steep hills into Seola Beach, nearly killing my car (so much for never having seen the overheating predicted by the mechanic). This house was pretty, but no usable yard. We started thinking that a view might not be possible with a yard. Then we remembered that views weren't on either of our lists.



Or maybe it was at this house that we remembered the view thing. Who knows, they all blended together. The concrete block house listing at 559k was incredible -- big lot, hideous unmaintained unupdated house, HUGE view. I mean, HUGE view.

Either way, by the end of the day, we drove out of Burien in my overheated Subaru tired and hungry. We made gluten-free pierogi and steamed broccoli. We watched the fantastic movie "Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist" and ate popcorn. Next week, less hunting, more house.