Here Comes the Sun

Every time my buddy Kent eats a grape, he smiles and says, 'I'm solar powered!'

He eats a lot of grapes.

At work, our solar panels are going up. There's about 2 acres behind the building at second floor-level almost covered in panels. Here's a good shot.

It's a good-sized array back there, and on the roof. We'll be 100% off the grid in summer (lotsa sun) and about 60% in low-sun Winter.

This past long weekend was Turkeyday weekend. Of course, we kicked the week off right by killing our washing machine. It's about 12 years old and the motor went up. I've been lucky enough to figure out how to fix a bunch of other stuff in the house and I figured out that it was the motor.

Problem is, the motor is the most expensive part of the whole machine. Add that to the cost of a few other parts that I found out it needs (broken stuff) and we were just below a new washer. AND couple that with the current state of durable goods sales (ie: washers) and there were some SUPER cheap options out there. We got new washer/dryer for the cost of a new washer AND they are the super-efficient NEW Energy Star models. Susan wanted front-loading washer 'cuz they are trendy now or something so that's what we got.

We went to William's birthday party at the bounce zone or whatever. You know the place: inflatable stuff everywhere. Kids go NUTS for these things. And the kids went nuts. As did the wife... Pizza, cake and ice cream finished off the event and William got what every little boy wants: something related to Spiderman, Superman or Batman...

Almost forgot to mention the annual Turkeyday ride at Patapsco. About 80 or so miscreants showed up for this annual event. The 8am Hot Lap was quick. Mr Eatough and other local super-fast boys showed up and kept the first hour very fast (for me, not for them). We got back to the parking lot for the rest of the ride at 9am and the photo op... I survived.

Send good thoughts over to Jonathan at Family Bikes. He and Sarah have had a rough week so stop by, email him or whatever to let him know we are thinking about them...