Evidence of Ransom's influence: blogging about cars

I have long said that I won't trade in my trusty Honda Civic for any car that gets less 50 mpg city. It hasn't seemed like an unreasonable goal, so I've been waiting patiently, occasionally cringing when I only get 28 mpg on a tank. In my view, fuel economy, reliability, the two major requirements for a vehicle. Other things factor in, but most of them fall into the "nice to have" category.

Ransom sees things a bit differently than I do. Although I tend to drive faster, he accelerates faster, corners faster, and employs the heel-toe downshift at every opportunity. His major requirements, therefore, have to do with performance, chassis design, and how good the engine sounds. We've often wondered whether the car exists that we could happily share.

Enter the Mini Cooper D. The Mini Cooper D reportedly gets 50mpg around town and 67mpg on the freeway. 67! But it also produces a lot of torque at low revs, and this means something good to Jesse. So of all the cars in the world, this may be the one that we could potentially agree to share. If it was available in the US. Sadly, it's not.

It sounds like BMW won't bring the Mini D to the US until the emissions system will pass muster in all 50 states. I hope they do it! Of course, then I'll have to figure out whether I want to take out a car loan, so I guess it's good that I don't have to think about it just yet.

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A whole lot of stuff at once

I finally managed to get the photos off my point and shoot camera today. I have clearly not managed to download photos since I was in Ethiopia last March, and it's been fun looking back over the last six months. I have chosen one photo from most shooting locations to give you a high-level synopsis of what I've been doing over the last six months.

As mentioned, I went to Ethiopia.

Photo taken: March 25, 2008

For Crystal's birthday, we went to The Edgefield for the night. Jesse brought his fez.

Photo taken: April 25, 2008

Jesse and I tried out the beer at Hopworks.

Photo taken: May 3, 2008

We hosted our 2nd annual Bicycle Maintenance Day.

Photo taken: May 4, 2008

I finished knitting a scarf and made Theo try it on.

Photo taken: May 10, 2008

We met up with my mom's side of the family in Kennewick.

Photo taken: June 7, 2008

We tried on Crystal's sunglasses.

Photo taken: June 10, 2008

We met up with my dad's side of the family in Seattle.

Photo taken: August 12, 2008

At John and Jessica's wedding, we marveled at the giant pan of paella. It was as tasty as it looks!

Photo taken: August 16, 2008

Kenna, my mom, and I played with bows and arrows.

Photo taken: August 24, 2008

Jesse and I bailed out the basement after the washing machine failed to stop filling for three or four hours.

Photo taken: August 30, 2008

I tore down the wood paneling in the stairwell and found cowboy wallpaper.

Photo taken: September 1, 2008

Some kids and I went to Cori and Jeff's wedding. It was beautiful out at Silver Falls. Surprisingly so.

Photo taken: September 13, 2008

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Tie breaker

I just took a quiz entitled, "What should you be doing for a living?" I had to answer a tie breaker question, so of course I made sure to answer it both ways. The quiz came up with Cowboy Outlaw or Drug Lord.

I'm leaning a bit toward Cowboy Outlaw, but what do you think? Which would suit me better?

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