tales of tahoe

SO, a couple weeks ago, a friend called me friday morning and said..."we booked a room in the lodge at sugarbowl for tonight and tomorrow, and won't be able to make it.  would you like to take it?"

and i said, "of course! that would be great!"

unfortunately, dave was working on a project, and could not go; but suggested that i enjoy myself and go.  so i did....for the most part.

on the way there, just past auborn, i encountered a 20 mile backup due to an 8 car pile-up.  i sat on the highway for 2.5 hours, without moving.  i left the house at 2:30pm; by the time the accident cleared, it was 9pm.

by this time, it was snowing quite heavily, and i began to be a little concerned about the chain control check-point.  luckily i bought chains on the way there, but had NO idea had to put them on.  i am from florida.  i'd never even seen chains in my life!!

 good thing: there were men you could pay $30 and they'd do it for you.  bad thing: i didn't realize i needed to do that BEFORE the check point.  so, the po-po made me exit the highway, drive back 2 miles (which had taken me 2 hours to get through), get back on the highway, and then go through the chain line again!!  at this point i called dave and cried.  by the time i got through chain-control, it was 12:30am.

now with chains on, and only able to go 30mph max, and with another 30+ miles to go, i finally made it to the exit i wanted around 1:30am.  and unfortunately from here, google maps gave me the wrong directions. sigh.  i had no idea where i was going.  thank goodness for a pg&e guy working late who gave me directions after hollering at him out the window.

i finally made it to the lodge at 2am.  yeah!!  i hadn't eaten in 12 hours, or tinkled in 6 hours.  i was truly grateful that i didn't have to pull over on the side of the road, alone, and improvise!

The next day, i was both wired and exhausted; however, the skiing was awesome! 

the snow was amazing! and everything was beautiful!

i had a great time!

now i just had to make it home...

and being the silly florida girl that i am, i thought i could handle the chain removal myself. ha.

so, 20 minutes after leaving sugarbowl, i find myself on the side of highway 80, with the chains caught over the axle behind the two front wheels; laying under my car on the muddy, snowy, road alone and, well, lots of other emotions.

so, not ashamed to ask (or beg) for help, i flagged down a random blue tahoe in hopes that someone could or even would help.  fortunately for me, what must have been the 3 nephites, stepped out of the tahoe, took off my tires, removed the chains, and sent me on my way.  and from there, i was home in no time...though very gross and dirty.

moral of the story:  it's okay to go alone, just do it in a truck!!

the handyman can

i am always complaining about the sliding doors in our house.  the reason: they don't actually slide.  it's like pushing a brick wall out of the way.

so the other day i came home from work to the smell of paint thinner in the garage.  when i opened the door to go inside, i was greeted with this:

dave had managed to take the entire door out and fix the problem.  of course moxie assisted.

now the door slides like it's on air...it's WONDERFUL!

one down, two to go.  how nice to have a handyman around.

moxie's obsession

for whatever reason, moxie has always loved the laptop; as such, she has developed amazing talents when it comes to utilizing the laptop. 

after sending any unintended or random emails, she enjoys pressing buttons to perform functions that i dare say even the finest of silicon valley's tech gurus could not accomplish if they so wanted.

after such hard work, moxie often takes pleasure in a quality nap with the laptop.

if one of her humans would like to use the laptop, she makes sure that we are well chaperoned.

moxie is a very good dog, and always looks forward to conference on the laptop.

she even enjoys the laptop's company when it's not on.

and finally, just to show that she is not limited to an electronic medium; moxie is also a fan of tolkien.

the kitchen: the saga's outcome

sorry it took so long to post an update--what's a couple years here and there?  so, here are updated pictures of the kitchen for those of you who haven't seen them (apologies for those who have).

More joys of home ownership

Our story so far. . . .

In November 2007, we looked under the kitchen sink and noticed that there was water coming through the sheetrock. It turns out the drainage line had ruptured and water had been seeping out for some time. We initially thought it was a minor problem—we just needed to fix the break and dry it out. Turns out that water had run into the walls and under all of our cabinets and the hardwood floors. Long story short, we had to tear out the entire kitchen. Opening the walls exposed framing and wiring that stunned/horrified the city inspector. Though only some of the framing had water damage, nearly all of the framing had to be taken out because it was so bad. After about a week of work, Candace called to tell me that there was a new disaster: in reframing and re-plumbing, our sewer drain from the kitchen snapped off in the hands of the workers. We had to cut a trench into the slab to go back to a section of pipe that was good. We also had to replace a major conduit into the electrical box because the old conduit was not nearly what it should have been.

Sorry that this has basically turned into a home renovation blog. Just to mix it up, we do have a new dog….

This is the "framing" that was holding up the corner of the house.




















The offending pipe...

A-town v. Ducky's

It's so much easier to write posts when things are going wrong. The bathroom plumbing situation is (hopefully) taken care of and the contractors have been finished for a couple of weeks. Their departure hit home that we finally own a home: before it had felt more like an apartment with contractors and subs coming and going all the time. We even lost our last roommate a week ago. After about a month of visiting, Trey (my parents' dog) packed up his bags and took the long drive to Utah with my mom.

My parents sold their house in about a week and did remarkably well given they bought the house about 18 months prior and we are in a housing "downturn." My mom ending up closing things out on this end (with a little help from her progeny) and only hit one bump in the road: she left her planner at Ducky's Car Wash in San Carlos after having my dad's old car detailed for sale. She left Ducky's around 6:15 (15 minutes after it closed) and returned around 6:20-6:25 when she realized she had left her planner. No one was around when she returned. The planner had ~$400 cash, credit cards, checks, driver's license, etc. Candace and I arrived shortly after and looked in the windows, but the planner was not on the counter. My mom left a message that night and called early the next morning. The manager immediately went on the defensive and also lied about a worker's schedule. My mom went to Ducky's where she talked to the employee who had been working the night prior and the manager. After the employee threatened to call the police on my mom (yes, you read that right) for accusing the employee of stealing the planner (a crime I'm not familiar with), my mom called the police and had them come to Ducky's. The San Carlos police were not very helpful.

Late that night, my mom got a call from Barbara, a neighbor who lives in San Carlos, saying that the Atherton police had found her planner. The Atherton police had stopped a car near our old house with two men who said they had found the planner by the Albertson's (across the street from Ducky's) and were returning it (sans cash and some gift cards.) The officer took the planner, but couldn't contact my mom because her driver's license wasn't up-to-date. The only number they could find was from a check that Barbara had written my mom.

Props to the Atherton police; they solve crimes for current and former residents whether the crime occurred in Atherton or not. A-town!

"Mom!", or The Heiress and the Heirless

Paris Hilton and I had something in common today: when things fell apart, we called for our moms. The only difference is that my mom took care of business and dropped some fools (and I didn't throw a hissy fit.)



We continued to war with Able Home Inspection (I'm using the name to try to warn off any would-be customers) to pay to so that both of our tubs and our shower didn't leak. Song, the Japanese plumber who came out, found a number of problems, including on the hall tub that Able's guys supposedly fixed. His bill was upwards of $900 and included problems with a jacuzzi motor power switch. Ralph from Able told us that we were on the hook for half the bill since the switch was electrical, not plumbing.

Angry and irritated as I drove to work, I called my mom, our realtor on the deal, and sent her to do battle. Despite stonewalling by Able, she got a copy of Song's proposal and reviewed each item on it with Song (I have no idea how she did this over the phone since his English is very limited.) Verdict: ALL of it was related to leaking, including the switch. My mom called Ralph back, and despite his efforts to weasel out, got him to agree to pay in full. . . before I was done with lunch.

Ralph's last throes of denial were saying that we couldn't find an inspection company in the state that would guarantee everything we were getting them to cover--well, they weren't stupid enough to mess with my mom.

Song should come tomorrow to fix all of the leaks. Knock on water-damaged wood, that will be the last of it.

Thanks, Mom! We couldn't have done it without you.


(Oh, and congrats Paris for making our blog--I never thought you'd make it on here. Since you've got some time to think in jail, your koan for the day is Don Henley's lyrical lament: "This year notoriety got all confused with fame.")