Memorial Weekend

Last weekend Dix and I took a holiday and went to Denver, shopping for cars that are not sold locally. I forced Dix to test drive them since she will be the primary driver. We're looking for something luxurious but fuel efficient so no V8's. Must be Wyoming capable so must have all wheel drive. The first test was a BMW 535 and we fell in love. Next was an Infinity just because we had never looked at one and Dix liked it even better. Then a Lexus. Then an Audi A6 and it was the best yet. Get the trend? We then tried the Beemer again and guess what - it's now the best again!

We stayed at Loews (not Lowe's parking lot). It's an elegant hotel off Colorado Blvd - for $110/night with a $50 food credit. Unfortunately the restaurant had a small kitchen fire so we had to use up the $50 on cereal breakfasts and sandwiches which were actually not bad at all and healthy. Having resisted some very convincing cars salesmen, I let my guard down at Applejack's and bought $430 in wine, beer and spirits. I am stocked for hunting season.

On the way back to the hotel at night I made a terrible maneuver swerving back onto the highway after taking the wrong exit ramp. I was grateful for Dix shouting for me to clear the barrier barrels while I was checking the rear view mirror. I seem to be overconfident on air bags sometimes.

Work is progressing on secondary items to replacing the patio cover. A major hurdle was cleared by jiggling the electric wire through the gas pipe under the driveway, gluing up a "stovepipe" conduit to the garage and filling in the hole. The eyesore garage wall was scraped and puttied with wood filler. Each day more paint would curl and need to be scraped. Finally I turned loose Dix to prime the wall and I followed up with paint just in time to dry before the Memorial Day drizzles. We're flying the flag regardless.

But my biggest accomplishment was ordering a surround sound system for the TV room. Having researched the Internet and haunted all the electronics stores for a year I finally ordered an Onkyo receiver with speakers. The convincing features were a microphone that automatically lets the system calibrate the sound, and a setting that let's the night-time listener play at low volume while keeping the frequency responses balanced. It also has an Ipod dock that I think I may need some day considering how my blog mentor loves his. And it is Sirius ready for listening to my favorite right-wing radio shows. I can hardly wait to hear Mark Levin's rant at 1200 watts!