Basilica

Last night, I met up with Arturo for happy hour drinks near his work. My bus route took me through downtown Minneapolis. I haven't been downtown in a while and on my trip through I noticed many changes since I worked there. It is nice that the train goes downtown now, but I was a bit sad to see that there are so many vacant restaurant and retail spaces. On the other side of downtown, I got off the bus near this iconic Minneapolis building, The Basilica of St. Mary. Arturo says he has seen the building enough times that it has lost its effect on him, but I still find it to be an amazingly impressive and solid building.

New (Used) Car!

After nearly 9 years, it is finally time for my lovely 1997 Nissan Sentra GXE (aka Edward) to retire.

We went car shopping on Saturday just planning on doing some test drives. We wanted to see how the online reviews we had been reading matched up with the real world cars. By the end of the long day, we drove this baby home.

(photo from the dealership's ad)

Edward and I have been together just slightly longer than Paul and I have been together. Paul and I shared him for all of our time in Boston and after. Edward drove us on the move to Boston and on the move back, on many road trips, on errands and on the occasional joy ride. Paul and I both felt attached to our little blue engine that could and a little sentimental about letting him go. But, we both admitted that it was time.

a little side by side shot

How did we know it was time? Well, I posted about the most recent trouble a little over a week ago. But, even before that, we had seen the writing on the wall for Edward. Here are a few examples:

Proof The First - The Animal Admitting Hole
On this camping trip, after the bear visited us at our campsite, we decided to sleep in the car. During that restless night, I awoke to scratching sounds. I couldn't figure out what it was but I figured out the sounds were coming from the trunk. The next morning, I inspected the trunk and found that the wheel well for the spare tire had a rusted out hole big enough to admit small creatures. The sound I heard was these creatures feasting on the food we were keeping in the trunk so as to avoid feeding the bears.

Proof The Second: Body in the Trunk
Over the years I have noticed an increasing, yet sporadic water problem in the trunk. Sometimes after it rained, I would find a soggy trunk (and trunk contents). I'd tried to figure out the source of the leak myself, but couldn't identify where it was getting in. Once, I even brought it to the mechanic to have it fixed. My technique for figuring out the leak was to take note of where the wet things in my trunk were located and then to try to match that up with possible sources. His technique was much more interesting. He grabbed a flashlight, climbed inside my trunk, shut himself in and had someone douse the car with a water hose. Despite risking a claustrophobic attack, he could not identify the source of the leak either. So, from that point on, anything that was in my trunk was fair game for getting soaked.

Proof The Third: Hello/Goodbye
The cd/radio in the car has been getting progressively worse over the last year and a half. It has gotten to the point where it can perform a slew of tricks.
Included in its repertoire of tricks are the following:
1. ceasing to play music, but instead running alternate "Hello", "Goodbye", "Hello", "Goodbye" messages across the screen
2. ceasing to play music, but instead repeatedly ejecting the CD
3. playing music, yet simultaneously incorporating a hideous squealing noise

There are others, but let's just leave it at that so that Edward can maintain his last shred of dignity.

I am especially grateful for Edward's last great act of kindness to us. He netted us a trade-in value that was twice what I had hoped for. Thanks, Edward! We hope he finds new life with some high school kid.

Paul and I are now happy to have a brand new used car, a 2005 Toyota Matrix (personalized name pending). Feel free to leave Matrix/Trinity comments below ;)

Part of the reason we bought our car so quickly was that we found the right car at the right price at a dealership that has a 3 day return policy. These days afforded us time to take the dogs for a ride to see how they like their hatchback space.

We got to test the cargo space with a trip to my Dad's house for a giant tomato cage and a trip to Menards for gardening supplies.

And, lastly we got the car inspected by our mechanic. He gave it the thumbs up, so now we can drive places again without the fear of a car on the verge of busting. It is such a relief! And, truth be told, I didn't really want to knit that emergency knitting project anyway!

Project 365: Mission Accomplished

Hello there, Blog Reader.

If you have been reading my blog at all during the last year you have probably seen my Project 365 posts. And, if you check in regularly, you may have noticed that since I finished it last weekend, I have been fairly quiet. I think I needed a little blogging vacation after the past 365 days of obligatory blogging. Throughout the past week I have been thinking about what the project meant to me and how I will go forward from here. To keep this from being the longest blog post ever, I will recap the experience mostly through bullet points. Even then, it is a long one, so you might want to get a cup of tea.

My rules were (posted on Day 1):

• Project 365 = 1 photo posted for each of the next 365 days
• All photos will be taken by me
• I will try to post daily, but at worst, will only fall a few days behind real time
  
• My camera is my new best friend
• I am excited to see where this project takes me (and you!)

What I thought I would get out of it:

• inspiration and motivation for regularly posting on my blog
• increase my competency with my camera
• 365 photos
• fun
  

What I learned in the process:

• some days are kind of uninteresting but if you try, you can usually find at least one remarkable thing each day
• i value having a photographic journal and having recorded the stories that go with those photos
• my camera hates low light
• camera flashes have very limited use/natural light is my best friend
• it is a lot more fun to take pictures in the spring/fall/summer than in the winter in MN
  
• i feel uncomfortable taking pictures of people without their permission
• i favor taking pictures of things over people, yet i love pictures of people
  
• i like to photograph food (and make it and talk about it and write about it and grow it...)
  
• 365 days is a lot of days
• the last 2 months of the project went by really slowly and most days of the last month i really felt obligated to finish the project, rather than enjoying the project
  
• sometimes it felt like a chore while other times it was a lot of fun
• the project gave me an excuse to take pictures at odd times or places
• a lot happens in a year

Damn, I am proud that I did it! I got what I had anticipated out of the project and then some. I followed all of the rules I set for myself, even on the days were it was a total chore. Like this day, which I think was my worst photo. I was not in the mood that day and was trying so hard to just find something to take a picture of. I eventually gave up and just posted this photo:

No doubt there were times where I did not want to take pictures or post, but the rewards were definitely worth it. I don't know about you, but the rules I set for myself are for my own good. If I had started to let myself make excuses, chances are that I would have skipped a day and then another day and then another day, which would have diminished the impact of this project. And, sometimes having to find a photo stretched my creativity, like on this day:

Making it a habit to always have my camera with me was essential in the success of this project. Having it on hand provided me with some great opportunities for photos that I might not have been able to capture otherwise. Like this day:

and this day:

Now that I am used to carrying my camera with me everywhere, when I left it at home for a few days this week, I felt a little bit naked. And, I missed it!

So, what does this mean for the blog now that the project is officially over? Well, for one, it means you won't be forced to see awful photos like that first one in this post! The project definitely served its purpose of inspiring me to post regularly and I expect that influence to continue. I really enjoyed the small amount of explanation that came with most of my images. The images and the stories are like my own personal scrapbook.

One of the most important opportunities this blog affords me is a venue to share the important things in my life with you, Reader. Be those things the simple joys or the major events, I enjoy putting them here and connecting with others through my posts.

I suspect that there are a good amount of you who have never commented, so I would like to invite you to do so. Of course, you do not need to feel obligated, but please do feel welcomed. And, for those of you that have commented, please keep it up! I love to get feedback from what I throw out there.

With that said, I am interested to hear anything you might have to say about this project. Have you done anything like this? If so, would you share a link/your thoughts about the experience?

And, lastly, a big thank you! Thank you for spending some of your time here on TrinKnitty.

Book Club, Sunburst and Mock Duck

I finished off a busy weekend with a lovely book club gathering at Ngon Vietnamese Bistro tonight. We read The Things They Carried, so eating at a Vietnamese restaurant tied in nicely with the book. Ngon Bistro carries only Minnesota-made beers on their beer list, so I had plenty of interesting local beers to chose from. I tried the Sunburst Ale from Flat Earth Brewery and it was delicious. I ate the Mock Duck entree and that was delicious, too. I love having a fun book club meeting AND getting to eat at a new, great restaurant at the same time.

Hopeful Repotting

I have learned a lesson. The hard way. My vermicompost is some seriously potent compost! I tried to top off two of my potted plants with it and it ended up killing what were otherwise healthy succulents. This evening I attempted to salvage them by repotting them. I took a cutting that looked somewhat healthy and put it in fresh soil. I am not sure if it will take, but I had very little to lose.