Pura Vida!

Andy and I are headed to Costa Rica in just a couple days...a second trip for both, but our first together. We're SO excited to get down to the Osa Peninsula, a place declared "one of the most biologically intense places on Earth" by National Geographic. It is the only place in Costa Rica where you can find all four of the country's species of monkeys and the endangered Scarlet Macaw.

You can see our beach house here.  Monkeys are known to play on the roof...

... and you have to put your fruit away at night or the fruit bats will get into it - there are no windows or screens.  I am determined to see a sloth this trip.  A jaguar would be about the greatest thing ever.

We'll be in the Osa house for a week, and then we're going rafting for a few days in the central part of the country, on the Rio Pacuare.  A couple nights in a jungle lodge, and home in time for Christmas.

We bought ourselves an early Christmas present of a new camera and some awesome lenses.  We are ready to go all spider monkey on the spider monkeys! 

Words don't do tonight justice...

Paint is Great!

I never imagined picking a color could be so stressful...

We started out feeling really confident about a couple strong, medium tone colors from the Miller Historic Collection. We bought samples. We discovered that Easter isn't just for April.



We threw up a little. We got more color wheels. We bought more samples. We agonized. We filled the entire back side of the house with color patches (sadly, no photo of this). The night before I left for Atlanta we picked a color. After the sun went down we wavered - was our new color too light? We discussed. We discussed again as we drove to the airport the next morning pre-dawn. We decided to go with our back-up color which was darker. I left. Andy stayed. The house got painted...

...and it rocks.









Hubert approves (double click to fully appreciate his face...).


Andy takes credit for the main color because he picked it out not knowing it was one of the samples we already had and liked. I'll let him have it - the purple was 100% me.

Now a few finishing touches and the yard...

No going back...

Someone gave notice at work today. Yippee!

Portland Flugtag 2008

Yes indeedy. See the newspaper article here and the video below.

Fliers take plunge at Red Bull Flugtag

Siding Day 3

This is what the house looked like after a full day of de-asbestosing yesterday. The back side still has to be done, along with half of the side closest to the neighbors. I took these this morning on the way out to work, so the light's not very good. You can get an idea though of all the places where the tarpaper will have to be scraped of by hand though, and there are LOTS of nails that will have to be somehow accommodated since we can't get them out. These issues aside, the wood is is good condition so far!







One of the contractors brings his little doggy - I scared it terribly yesterday when I popped my head out of an upstairs window while he was exploring the backyard.



This morning's debris - note the "Danger" printed on all the bags...

Day 2 Siding Update

Andy got a call midday to meet the guy back at the house to go over a few things...

They underestimated the amount of time needed for the job, so they won't be done today and they might not even be done tomorrow. The wood looks pretty good so far except the tar paper isn't wanting to come off, and several of the nails used to hang the asbestos can't be removed without damaging the wood boards. Then there's the high probability of the original paint being lead-based, but we'll save that bit for next week.

Here are a few pictures I took this morning of things other than the siding...

The new fence! We haven't treated it yet, and there is a pattern to the boards that you can't see from this angle, but we're quite pleased with it.


Andy's new raised beds for our veggies. He and his dad built them a couple weeks ago - they really do get sun, I promise.



An idea of the GLUT of blueberries our three bushes produced this year. We've been picking and picking and picking and they just don't end.



My dahlia bush that has probably been crushed by flying siding today...



And last but not least, our "new" front door. We bought this months ago at the Rebuilding Center and it languished in the garage until Andy's dad pulled it out, stripped off several layers of paint, patched up all the odd spots, and painted it for us. I can't wait until it takes it's place on a freshly painted house!

A new window...sort of

Taking off the 1st layer of siding uncovered an original window! We knew it was there technically, but it's nice to see it.

All the bottom pieces of trim are missing from the windows, and they weren't removed very nicely. We suspect they jutted out in a nice ledge and so they had to go when the vinyl was added.

All our hopes are pinned on this little peek:

Who knew...

...we could get so excited over siding?

Andy and I have planned for the past year or so to take off the house's dirty diaper of ugly vinyl siding this summer in conjunction with replacing the fence and adding a deck. Several weeks ago, in a sunny day post-happy hour frenzy, we decided to pull off a chunk of the offensive siding to check out the wood beneath. What we got instead was a nice buzz-kill of asbestos. Lab tests, nail biting, Department of Environmental Quality regulation research, and a couple abatement bids later, and yesterday marked the start of our kind-of-scary journey to a better looking "restored" house.

So, to properly keep track we have:

1 layer baby poop tan vinyl siding
1 layer Styrofoam
1 layer ugly browny-mauve asbestos siding
1 layer tar paper
1 hopefully intact and beautiful, yet a completely crapshoot layer of indeterminate 80 year old (this year!)wood

Let's have some photos!

Day 1 pre-start:











Day 1 end of day:

And then there's...

The other four legged house beast. Carmella aka Puppa aka Ms. Nips. She goes by the "if you've got it, flaunt it" school of thinking as seen below. She's very sweet and very good except when she's being very good at being very bad. She loves her Andy.

Bad blogger!

Someone's doing a great job of updating this thing...

We've had a ridiculous past few months - more renovations to the house, visits from ALL the parents (my mom is actually landing right now, but that counts), my week at camp, TWO new furry friends...

Here are our lovey kits:

Hubert

Neil Young

Stella

And our sweet little alien Wombat who didn't share his plans to return to his mothership so soon. We miss our funny guy.

Smoking Crack is a Bad Idea

And not just for Tatum O'Neal. Andy and I were clearly on some sort of drug this weekend, because this happened.

Election Night in Oregon

We had a good time watching the results of the primary and local elections last night. We happened to also be hosting TND (Tuesday Night Dinner) this week. I'll have to post a couple pictures of the DC inspired dishes.

In the meantime, here is a great blurb from yesterday's newspaper:

Annie Cavil's grandfather couldn't vote because he was a slave. Cavil, 81, didn't think she would vote this year, either, until a nonpartisan volunteer called her at 2 p.m. Monday. She had lost her ballot and the volunteer, Nancy Dorr (hugging her) offered to drive her to the Multnomah County elections office to get a new one. When she received her ballot, another volunteer thanked her for her effort. "Effort?" Cavil responded in tears. "This is not an effort. This is a privilege."

You Said It, Kid

Not for Tots

Please pardon my lapse. I'm way overdue for some serious updates, but first, in the astute words of my husband:



Portland. Fucking. Represents.



Billary and McBush can bite my ass.

Why I fear for the future of Mankind

I found the below comments on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's website in response to a recent statement made by The Southern Baptist Convention regarding global warming.

I know I'm out in the Land of Tree Huggers (and a bit of one myself), but I think anyone could agree that this kind of willful, defiant stupidity is frightening (and I'm trying to hold my tongue here). Is it so hard to live responsibly?

*****
By Seemore
March 10, 2008 1:41 PM
While I believe that everyone should be responsible for keeping of earth as clean and as habitable as possible, I do not buy into the Gobal warming crap. It’s just another ploy by liberal politicians to take money from their constiuants by making either making the less intelligent feel guilty or by passing legislation that takes money out of my pocket. While church members should do their part, it’s political leadership should be ashamed by being duped into following the secular leadership of this country.

By Global Warming Realist
March 10, 2008 2:06 PM
The false alarm being foisted on the inhabitants of Earth by Global Warming Prophets is not just shameful, it is harmful in every way. If I were a religious person I would call it sinful.
That some of the leaders, of all religions and all dominations, have embraced this new faith is proof that being a person of religion does not prevent one from being duped.
Global Warming is indeed faith based. There is no proof. Just a new religion invented false prophets and backed up by gamelike computer programs. In the wake of this new religion, we are being ripped off by a new industry.
The Big Carbon Industry is real. Real but based on false science. However, it might be the safest place to invest your money. I fear it is to late to stop this boondoggle.

By The Truth
March 10, 2008 2:11 PM
I am from a Baptist background. If the Southern Baptist come out with a statement that Global Warming is real then I will no longer call myself baptist. Global Warming is a cult created by Owl Gore to destroy capitalism. I’m guessing there will be a lot of churches drop out of the Southern Baptist convention. To say that man can make a dent in what God created is arrogant. God changes the weather at will. We have nothing to do with it.

How well do you know your Geography?

Here is a fun little time waster. Keep in mind that you have a limited amount of time - illustrated by the color changing bar on each question and the button to take you to the next level. You also have to get a certain number of points on each level to advance to the next...

Traveler IQ Challenge

We're back!

Obviously. I'm only a week late with that statement.

We had a fantastic time in Mexico. We hung out with a great group of people, catching up with Andy's old friends and making new ones. Perfect weather, gorgeous scenery, good food, and a beautiful wedding. While we usually go for small properties when traveling, I have to admit that I was wrong in assuming we wouldn't like our resort-y hotel. The developers did a brilliant job of building it into the hillside - I was actually shocked when we went to the beach on our last morning there and I turned around to see how big it really was.

A couple random observations:

• Attending a wedding after you're married really is different.


• Drinking until the wee hours of the morning with people's parents takes a bit of getting used to.


• When booking international flights to LAX, one should budget plenty of time to clear customs. We had an 1.5 hour layover, but we were running through the airport. It was like a movie.


• Tamarind margaritas kick ass.

I'll post a link to all the photos once I get them organized.