Our New Hooptie

Sorry to leave you guys hanging. We really are alive and well, just busier than all get out. Here's a rundown of the past week or so.

Mike is fine. Thank you all for your concern (lots of e-mails and such). His neck was fine the day after my last post. Go figure.

The Corolla really is totalled. *sniff sniff** I've had that car since it's infancy and must admit that a few sad moments came about as I was cleaning her out. She's been good and faithful, but it's off to a chop shop and a scrap yard now. They will tow her away in a day or two. I wonder if it's like being an organ donor...one trashed car saves 28 other cars or something. That's how I'll think of it I suppose.

Insurance shelled out a whopping $3,600 for her. (Ouch). We decided to shop for a vehicle within that price range because...well...we pretty much had to. The world of car payments is not something we are willing or able to do. This brings us to our new hooptie. We had a choice to make: spend all of our money on a car and pray like mad that nothing was wrong with it, or spend less money on a car that has a few issues that we know we can have fixed. We opted for the latter. After 3 days of driving to Nashville and back, we decided to buy a '93 Volvo. The seller was desperate...she had to sell it within 4 or 5 days. She was extremely honest (as evidenced by her listing in the below link) and willing to negotiate. She took $2,000 for it and I am going into the shop tomorrow morning to get an inspection on everything. Even if we have to spend $1,000 on repairs and maintenance, I'm still happy. I still think we got a great deal, even with some of the things we're looking at fixing.

Anyway, I'm lazy and haven't taken my own pictures. Here's a link to our new baby: http://nashville.craigslist.org/car/186968270.html . We found it on Craigslist (which is very cool and handy by the way).

Now, on to other stuff. It's so stinkin' muggy out here right now. We're stuck somewhere between a heat wave and a thunderstorm. I can tell it's pretty bad because my eyeglasses sometimes fog up when I go outside.

Andrew starts Mother's Day Out at the end of August. It's sort of like pre-school, but is on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9am-2:30pm. Let's just hope that he learns how to P-O-O-P in the potty before August 29th. Nothing like a little pressure for dear old mom.

Starting this week, I'll be watching our neighbors' 3 kids on Weds and Thurs from 3-6pm. They're 5, 7, and 9 or so and fairly self-sufficient. Anyway, keeping them here will cover Andrew's tuition costs plus some.

Mom and Bill are coming in for a visit. They arrive on Wednesday and will be here for about 10 days. Hopefully the humidity doesn't melt them. It's tough on us and we're used to it. Well, we're as used to it as California natives can be that is.

That's about it for tonight. I'm exhausted.