12 April 2010
Today my wife told me that my son has expressed interest in going hunting for dinosaur fossils in Utah. I looked online, and I presume he means this place called U-Dig Fossils. Yeah, so…a trip to Utah. That’s something I never thought I’d do. Not sure how we’d afford something like that, what with the plane fare, hotel room, and even the admission fee to the dig site. U-Dig offers free admission to visitors under 7 years old, so that’s good.
Their webpage offers detailed descriptions of trilobite species, which leads me to conclude there are not a whole lot of pachycephalosaurus skulls out there.
Despite the price – and the location – I guess I should just be glad my kid wants to dig for dinosaurs in Utah rather than visit Disneyworld. ‘Cause, man, that place is expensive. Also, they have princesses there. Princesses!
13 April 2010
Today marks the end of an era: After 6 years, 1 month and 10 days, we are no longer the owners of a Volkswagen. The old blue Jetta (affectionately named “Winnie” by the previous owners, but rarely referred to as such by us) was finally pulled into port this evening – complete with its broken muffler, bad shocks and struts, malfunctioning blinker, and cracked windshield (all problems that developed this year alone).
We originally purchased the Jetta from the original owners back in 2004. Owning it for 73+ months means that we paid <$100 a month for it, which is kind of a goal we have for ourselves. Even the interest we paid on the loan was minimal: we had the car paid off within 5 months of purchase. In the 6 years since we first took the car home, we managed to slightly more than double the miles, bringing it from 81,000 to 165,000.
Though the Jetta marks the 6th car I’ve gotten rid of, it’s actually only the second time I’ve sold a still-functioning vehicle. Four of the other five cars I owned were no longer operative, and had to be towed to their final resting grounds. Only one car, an Oldsmobile Cutlass, was sold with the capability of being driven away.
We drove off with our new Saturn today. I hope it was a good purchase. So far, I like the car. The muffler was quite, the miles were lower, and we were given a good deal thanks to the dealers being good friends with Jennifer’s family.
Incidentally, owning that Saturn means that still – having owned eight vehicles in my life – I’ve never owned more than one of any make of car. I’ve owned one each of the following: Chrysler, Oldsmobile, Buick, Hyundai, Chevy, Toyota, VW, Saturn. This hasn’t been done on purpose, honestly. In fact, we even test drove a few cars that would’ve meant repeat performances…but it was not meant to be. One more interesting tidbit: the Saturn is the first vehicle from this millennium that I’ve owned.
As we’d owned the Jetta since before he was born, Owen was understandably rattled that we had to say farewell to our Jetta. I let him close the last door on it as he said goodbye. He seemed very nervous about all the tiny little differences between the Jetta and the new car, though he did seem pleased that the new one is named after a planet.