Some awesome things happened this week! First, I paid off my student loans from grad-school instead of buying a replacement van. Not to worry, though. I’ll still buy Adventure Van 2.0. It’s just that my student loans were at 7% interest and I can get a used car loan for 4.4%. By doing this, I’ll save several hundred dollars!
On the Van 2.0 topic, Chris and I drove to Akron on Saturday to look at a 2012 Sprinter that had moderate miles. The body was in great shape. And, it had a “clean CarFax”. Note: Clean CarFax means exactly squat if there are things wrong with the van that have not been repaired! This piece of crap needed at least $5,000 worth of work. The worst of which, the turbo didn’t work. So, it wouldn’t even hit 35 MPH unless it was going downhill. To say that it was in Sprinter’s limp-mode would be an understatement. Even when my old van was in limp-mode, I was still able to get it up to speed.
On the bright side, I got to spend 6 hours with Chris instead of spending $15,000. And, I found half dozen Sprinters in Indianapolis that I will go look at this week sometime. I need to take a day off to do it, though.
I’ve been continuing my woodworking when the weather permits. This week, I sanded and stained/finished the shaving brush stand that I made for my buddy, Trent. I’ll send it out next week.
I also made a phone stand for myself out of one of the blanks that I created for the brush stand. I <3 how the back of the phone stand looks. The entirety of both projects are made with reclaimed pallet wood. I am amazed at how they look.
I’ve been on a bit of a stir-fry kick lately. It started with General Tso’s sauce and then I added some Szechuan sauce to give it some kick. Originally, I was doing chicken, broccoli, and yellow/orange/red peppers. Now, it’s chicken, shrimp, green beans, red/yellow/orange peppers, asparagus, and broccoli.
Endo has a new back-yard toy. It’s not so much new as it is that he just recently decided that he likes to play with it. I had to pump it up once when the plug fell out. When I went inside to get the pump, I found a second exercise ball in the drawer that I had forgotten about. That one was blue. Endo hated it. He popped it within 20 minutes – but only after parking at it for 30 minutes.
On our walk on Wednesday, we noticed that a neighbor still has their Christmas decorations up. And, not just the lights… they have their inflatables still laying out on the lawn.
On that same walk, Endo got in some exercise on the playground equipment at Burroughs Elementary. Frisbee is better.
