To Whom It May Concern

So I Ended Up Buying A Car, And Other Things

So, as winter approached, I knew I needed a vehicle as a daily driver that would make it through the snow. Obviously the SRT-4 was not going to do that...


Commemorative SRT-10 Viper, SRT-4 Neon, and SRT-10 Ram, none good in snow. As much as I wish I owned all three, I only own the one in the middle.

...so it will remain parked. I searched craigslist thoroughly for a good month and found a 2000 Dodge Neon SE, listed for 2500 dollars. This particular Neon has a 2.0 liter 4 cylinder motor, very basic, very thrifty, but it was a little rough, and had 105,000 miles on it. It was owned by a nice young couple with two daughters, it was also smoked in, which never makes me very happy.

I offered them 2000 cash for the vehicle and they agreed to the sale. I spent about a few days doing some sanding and repairing, put a new driver's side mirror on the car, cleaned the vehicle inside and out (still the smoke smell exists, YUCK!), and repainted a few areas to finish it up. On the interior I glued a few things back in place, and took the seats completely out of the car and washed them with a hot water hose. The back seat must have had about a gallon of pop spilled into it over the years because brown water just poured and poured out of it endlessly, until finally after about 10 minutes it cleared up.



So now the car is reasonably fresh inside, for lack of a better word, I don't know that you can ever entirely get rid of that faint musty smoke smell but I'll continue to work with it. I don't much care for FeBreeze because despite their claim that it doesn't 'mask' odors, the smell of FeBreeze gets mighty overpowering after awhile. I do have a vanilla Glade candle just sitting in one of the cupholders. Problem is, in December in Nebraska, the temperature being around 20 to 40 most of the time doesn't really allow something like a candle to really make a car smell nice, especially when it's not being lit (as that would likely be a tad bit unsafe, right?).

In other news, yes, we did purchase a house.



Roughly 2200 square feet furnished, another 1000 unfurnished in the basement. I forgot how much I just LOVE moving. I don't think I need to put anything into italics for sarcasm do I? I'd like to say things went smoothly working with the bank but he made a very jackass'ish mistake and it cost us a lot of money, but if interest rates continue to go down, we will likely refinance and work with the same bank, hoping that they will do the morally right thing and waive some of the financing costs. Yah, not likely right? We'll see, if nothing else I am VERY tenacious.

So, now I find out all the lovely things that cost money when you own a house. Of course you have to mow your lawn (lawnmower, push type, 6 hp, 100 bucks off craigslist), you have to scoop your snow (snow shovel, 20 dollars, Home Depot), and among other things, a true kick in the balls was finding out just how much window coverings cost. So I'm gradually putting up shades, trying to go with what belly likes. So far I would imagine I'm about 10% done, I have the living room completed, the master bedroom, and the master bathroom. That was probably 300 dollars, maybe a little more. So I'm probably still looking at anywhere from 2500 to 3000 more to get all the rest done. Yes, I'll be doing this a little at a time, that is for sure.

I don't want it to sound like this is some horrible disappointment though, ultimately it is quite satisfying to pull into my own driveway at night, walk into my house, be as loud as I want to be (as long as lil' n is awake still) and not have to worry about the idiot neighbors making a ton of noise upstairs or downstairs. We do however already have some strange noises in the house, that I hope I can attribute to being on a hilltop and having wind blowing around, and not a possum or racoon living in the attic, or Beetlejuice up there somewhere (although, I think he'd be a lot of fun to hang out with).

So, the little girl has a lot of space to run around in now. This is a picture from this past summer when we went to see Grandma and Grandpa G in Wisconsin...



She seems to really enjoy the house a lot, so much so that I had to purchase a bunch of childproofing drawer locks, following an unfortunate dishwasher tab ingestion moment... oh so easy to install right? NOT AT ALL, takes about a freaking half hour per drawer. You drill, you screw the pieces in, they are not right, you remeasure, you bend the locking tabs, you redrill, repeat, until hair falls out, screaming profanity commences, and finally they work, barely.

Little n' is 15 months old now, and continues to discover new things. She is walking, or running, all over the place now. She likes to dance, clap, high five, strut, no idea where she got that from, strutting for her is walking along moving her head forward and back like she's cool or something, and come to find out yesterday that she has just learned how to open doors. These are doorknobs, people, nothing special, and she has figured out how to work them. I could understand that if these were the doorknobs with the handles, but no, just round simple doorknobs that a normal 15 month old would not know how to use. But, she is my daughter, so normalcy may be out the window, in a good way I guess. Still though, seeing her in the bathroom with the entire roll of toilet paper on the floor, and a shit eating grin on her face, well, it is hard to be angry with her, so being impressed that she somehow got that door open is enough, for now. I'm sure spankings will commence for such actions soon enough.

Anyways, that is enough for now. You have some pictures, you have explanations, and I have to get up early in the morning because, no matter what the temperature, no matter what the weather, I run three days a week in the morning at work. And you thought the postal service was dedicated. I have to run because I don't want to become a fat ass soldier, something that really irks me when I see it. But alas, that is for another time, trust me though, I have plenty to say about certain things the army is doing these days.