2011 Camry Hybrid

I bought a new car. An actual new car, not just a new-to-me car. I’ve always bought used ones in the past because it seemed to make better financial sense to buy a car that is about 2 years old, as long as it doesn’t have an unreasonable amount of miles on it. I did look at used ones, but then Toyota in a rare move offered 0% financing on a new 2011 Camry. The cost difference of the Hybrid over the non-Hybrid is not as big as it was when I first looked at them a few years ago, and as much as I drive–at least 97 miles a day during the week–I’ll make that difference up in gas savings quickly.

I love the car. Love it. Love. It has enough room to comfortably fit Mac in the front with the kids in the back. It is a very comfortable ride. Leather seats for easy cleaning of whatever the kids will do to the backseats and my inevitable coffee spill because there is no spill proof cup that is MellyStu strength spill proof. I’ve even been able to test the seat warmers/heater due to snow and the air conditioner when it hit 91 last weekend all in the span of a week.

I finally have a Bluetooth connection and USB jack for my phone. It makes it even more convient to use it for music. I have steering wheel controls to answer and hang up the phone, plus audio commands for phone, audio and nav. However, the kids think the pull down armrest/cup holders in the back seat is the true work of engineering genius of our car.

My gas mileage calculated to 35.46 at my last fill-up. I’ve already saved $53.83 dollars in gas costs compared to what I was driving, and I’ve only had it one week. I got a little giddy the two times we’ve driven on Mass with it, watching it switch to battery only during slow stop and go traffic and the mpg gauge top out at 42mpg.

Here are a few photos. She still hasn’t received a name. I’m working on that.

Ada Valentine

Even though I dread having to get to the community building by 9:00am because I am not now and never have been a morning person, I’m really enjoying Saturdays with Ada. She has pre-ballet from 9:00-9:40am at the community building downtown. Afterwards, we head to Mass. We alternate going to The Dusty Bookshelf and The Toy Store, both places she really likes. Sometimes I have to give the the talk about how she needs to learn to do things that other people like to get her into a store that I want to browse without hearing her gripe.

Today, she started to complain a little as I told her we were going to The Bay Leaf, but it stopped after she saw the stuffed animals and the aprons her size. Then we played the “what does this do” game until I got tired of it. This was the week to visit The Dusty Bookshelf. She wanted to eat at the noodle place again for lunch, mainly because she remembered that there was chocolate milk there.

One of my actual errands that I wanted to do was to take my wedding ring into Marks Jewelers. I’ve had problems with it, and I’m not very happy with the jeweler where it was purchased. It is white gold which means to have it that nice shiny silver, it has rhodium plating. This plating is suppose to last 1-3 years, but mine doesn’t even last a year. The bad part about this isn’t just the inconvenience or the yucky pale gold my ring turns when it wears off. It turns out that they included nickel in the alloy that makes the gold underneath white gold. So when the plating wears off, my finger starts breaking out in a torturous itchy rash and until I take it in to get re-plated, I cannot wear my wedding ring.

While it isn’t a law that they tell you that there is nickel in their alloys, it is common courtesy to do so for people –say like me–who have a nickel allergy. The original jeweler didn’t give us this courtesy. And the wrap-around ring had to be remade because it broke and it was not done well and they welded the two rings together before I even got to see it and they don’t line up in the front or back. I don’t particularly like the attitude of the employees either.

I’m pricing the cost of having the ring–which is a custom design, so we can’t just reorder one–made in a different metal by a jeweler that knows what they are doing and aren’t a**hats. Doing this will be expensive. Really expensive. I’m really torn because I’m not a big jewelry person, mainly because until I graduated from college I couldn’t afford much jewelry that didn’t make me break out, get infections (as was the case for earrings) or turn my skin black or green after one day of wearing it. I just got tired of dealing and eventually just didn’t wear much jewelry. Now, I don’t care. The only pieces that I ever see that excite me are usually made in a metal that I cannot wear. My wedding ring is my only piece of expensive jewelry that I do care about. It is the only piece that feels like an investment. It is something that I would like to pass down. So, I’m torn. There are so many other things I could use that money for, and jewelry is never on the top of that list, but my wedding ring is different. And I’m leaning towards Marks because it is a Lawrence business, and I talked to the person who would actually be doing the work making my ring in town. And they have a good reputation, so I know that they will do it correctly. My choices right now are between platinum or palladium. Palladium is what is used in white gold alloys for people who have nickel allergies since palladium allergies are more rare. The guy I talked to today said that if I choose palladium, he would loan me a ring to wear for awhile to make sure I don’t have a reaction to it. Fixing this ring is the only significant amount of money I would ever want to spend on any piece of jewelry for the rest of my life^*. My brain keeps going back to all the other things that I would instantly use that money for if it were any jewelry other than my wedding ring. I’d rather spend multiple thousands of dollars on glass.

The photo with this post is part of the Valentine’s photos I took of the kids. Ada had a hard time holding her head still, and I had a hard time directing her to get a good shot, so I don’t think any of the hair ones came out that great. I liked this one due to the eyes. Ada really does have anime eyes.

*Until they come out with my holographic PDA ring with built in sonic screwdriver. However by that time, I’ll be so old, I won’t be able to figure out how to use it.

The food tonight was really, really good. They brought the food out while describing the menu, so you could see the cuts of meat which was cool. The lobster was still alive so I couldn’t eat any because I had already given it a name before it left the table. My salmon was already dead and cut in a fillet so I could eat that. They also brought out the veges. I totally did not need to see the asparagus until it was grilled with the balsamic glaze. Really. The potato wasn’t interesting either. I had four glasses of champagne two were made into a cocktail with pomegranate liquor, grand marnier and peach bitters. Those four glasses are the reason you are getting this very rare camwhore shot. In between my crabcake appetizer and our main meal, they replaced all of our silverware and brushed off our table. Really, I want service like that all of the time. I’m going to try to teach Ada how to do that. We had a Grand Marnier soufflé for dessert.

More pictures:
–My new boots that are badly in need of a skirt

–Stripy pants and part of a new shirt — a little tiny part of the top of the shirt.

–Another camwhore shot — don’t give me a camera when I’m drunk! (The rest of them aren’t on flickr)

–The dress that I wanted to get Ada but Mac would have killed me because it cost $84.

–The coat that Ada doesn’t need because she has two –three counting her snow suit

–Ada going down the slide really, really slowly. Oh, the hair? Static electricity.

–Our last day at the park until spring.

Forgive the drunken typo-s. I’m not rereading this post. I need to go to bed.

I unpacked my new lens from its box. After I put the lens on my camera, I looked in the box and this is what I saw. At least it kept Ada occupied enough to not even try to touch my camera or any lenses during my exchange.

Notice all the yellow? About a year ago, when Ada first started taking toys from one place to another and either banged them together or lined them up on the floor, she used to pick out all the yellow pieces of one of her toy sets, crawl into the kitchen and line them up. I’d pick them up, mix them back up with the other colors, and she would do it again with just the yellow.

This past visit with her new PT, she wanted to see how high Ada could stack blocks. She preformed well above her desired number. Then she brought out more colors of blocks for Ada to stack, but what impressed the PT was that Ada separated them by color.

The other day, I took Ada with me to the grocery store. With orange striped socks, black converses and pigtails, we headed out. When we go, I make my lists on paper instead of on my Treo because Ada likes to take the pen and cross off items as we get them. On this trip, she took my wallet out of my bag, dropped it on the ground, yelled “oohhhhhh nooooooo” and when I bent down to pick it up, she laughed really hard. I handed it back to her, and she did it again. We ended up repeating this through half of our trip because it was the most beautiful laugh and not only did I enjoy hearing it, but it also made other shoppers smile. When we left the store, I ran through the lot, completing at least 3 donuts–which caused another fit of laughing– before we got to the car.

Today, you see, is my beautiful daughter’s 2nd birthday. Today, I took a day off from work. For her present, we are going to go outside and play, go shopping, throw wallets, do donuts with shopping carts in parking lots. Anything that produces that wonderful laugh. I’m going to let her drink all of my ice water even though she has her own glass sitting right by mine. We will feast on bananas and cheese. Today, we will all march through the house singing the Imperial March instead of walking. We will have nothing but Jack’s Big Music Show on tv and we will all clap and sing with her.

Happy Birthday to my beautiful daughter, Ada! Today’s very good feeling.