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Someone knocked on our door tonight for a free window audit from Statewide Windows. In addition to the free audit we get a $25 gasoline card. Sounds like a good deal to me since I spend nothing, get someone to tell me about energy efficiency, and they give me $25 in free gas. The company looks reputable online, so we’ll see how it turns out when they come to do the audit. I’ll update here.

Update October 22nd, 2005. A sales lady named Cindy came to the house and measured our windows and gave us a presentation on windows. The UniFrame window that only Statewide sells was very impressive in the demo, blocking a ton of heat (supposedly R10 value), and being very well made. We have a window in our downstairs bedroom that is too small to make code since it’s a slider, which only allows half the window opening to be used as an egress and the whole opening just barely would be big enough for code. We wanted to replace that anyway, but Cindy told us our upstairs bedrooms weren’t big enough for code. So we got price quotes to replace all those windows and expand our downstairs bathroom window. The quote looked really, really good, so Kim and I talked about it and decided to just get it done, especially since they offer a “success discount” of 11% if you place your order that night. However, she messed up her math. The quote ended up being about 70% more than the original. We were exhausted at this point as we had been talking windows for 4 hours and just wanted to go to bed so we agreed to the price knowing that we had three days to cancel the contract, so we just signed it and went to bed.

The next morning I measured the upstairs windows and found that they were just barely code. One of them had an opening that was just over 5.7 sq feet and the other was less than 5.7, but was on the ground floor and more than 5 sq ft. This code mistake and lack of knowledge, combined with the higher price that changed on us gave us a bad feeling and we decided to cancel the order. Kim called and said that we wanted to cancel and Cindy said okay, but didn’t bother to tell us that we had to send a notice of cancellation in by certified mail. It’s a good thing I read that before the date that I needed to make the decision.

Overall it seems like Statewide has a good product and is a good company, but the make a decision now sales tactics and pricing raising math errors were enough to make us reconsider doing business. Perhaps in the future after we’ve done some more research we’d consider statewide, but I have a feeling that their prices may be a little higher than I’m willing to spend.

Update October 25th, 2005 Despite calling Cindy twice to say that we wanted to cancel, faxing in a copy of the request to cancel, and sending a certified letter yesterday (which to be fair I doubt they’ve received until today), someone from Statewide today stopped by and put their sign in our yard and wants to setup a time to do the precision measuring of the windows. I’m hoping this is just a mistake in the paperwork and not another pushy business tactic.

Update November 1st, 2005 My money was all refunded no problem. I’m planning to shop around and get some more bids before I go any further with this project. I don’t know enough to make a good decision yet.

Even though I was fasting, I had a lot of fun this weekend for my birthday. Friday night I went over to Stephanie’s place after not having seen her for about 10 months. It was nice to catch up and hang out with friends. Betsy, Jacob, Jesse and Deborah were all there. Kim was hanging out with Bridgid so didn’t come. We talked and they drank and ate a birthday cake that I only got to taste since it was the let down day of the fast.

Saturday I mostly relaxed and read some. I didn’t know what Kim had planned, but just before dark she drove me, Violet and Bridgid out to a corn maze and pumpkin field north of Seattle. It was a blast! Jake and Kimmy met us there. We all picked pumpkins, and as it got dark we headed into the corn maze. It was a huge 5 acre maze with the goal in the center. It was really, really muddy too. My two complaints about the maze were that there were a lot of places that people had pushed down the corn where there wasn’t supposed to be a path, and the goal of the maze didn’t have anything cool there. It was just a big open space. There wasn’t even a light. After the end of the maze though was a haunted section. I’ve never been in a haunted house with Kim before and definitely wasn’t prepared to. She freaks out! In a really fun way, but wow, she scared me more than anything in the maze. At one point an extremely tall scarecrow jumped down off it’s perch and started after us and Kim jumped up and wrapped both arms and legs around me and started screaming! Poor Violet realized after we got out of the maze that she had lost her phone, but fortunately she got it back the very next day.

Today I slept late, relaxed, did some work around the house, and went to see Grizzly Man since it had finally come to the Crest. Good film. It’s one to make you think. Now I’m not tired but feeling very hungry. I can’t wait to eat tomorrow…

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When I tell people that I’m fasting on my birthday weekend they look at me like I’ve said something sacriligious. “What about drinking and cake?” they say. I’m happy to pass that up to feel healthier. Besides, I had plenty of cake and pie last weekend and I eat pretty much every day, so I won’t miss it a for few days – much. (more…)

I used another one of my coupons from the awesome Chinook Book for a 2 for 1 massage at the Ayurvedic Health and Massage Center, which is really just one guy named Andy Warren. I haven’t had a professional massage in forever, but boy does it do me good. He does kind of a Swedish – Ayurvedic style massage, which is relaxing and seems to go by too fast, but what massage doesn’t? I think I prefer a deeper and less gentle style, but I’ll have to get one professionally to find out. I know that I like it when Kim walks on my back, so I imagine that it would be hard to get too deep a massage without wearing out the masseuse’s hands.

Kim’s also getting an Ayurvedic consultation since she’s become interested in that since we went to Kripalu. She’s also been reading some books by Deepak Chopra. It bothers me to hear it called a science, but it certainly is a way of life that’s been around for a while and I’m sure is a healthier lifestyle than most Americans practice today.

October is a busy month for birthdays in the family. Kim and I drove back to Spokane on Saturday morning to go to a birthday bash for Dave, Grandma, Dad and me, as well as celebrating Dave and Sue’s anniversary. As has become the norm for long car trips, Kim and I listened to an audio book the whole way to the drive didn’t seem too long. We listened to “The Secret Life of Bees”. Haven’t finished it yet.

We arrived at Grandma’s and I setup an old computer for her so that she could start using email. It’s setup to use NetZero, so we’ll see if the free internet service is worthwhile for doing just email. I also showed her my blog so hopefully she’ll be reading this soon.

The party was at Dave and Sue’s house which makes for a very cozy gathering. My parents, Dave and Sue, Gwenda and Larry, Joyce, Sara and Sierra, Grandma and Dave and Sue’s niece were all there. The food is always to die for. Sara spent most of the day helping Sue cook Chinese food which turned out awesome. I ate myself silly and then ate pie and cake for dessert.

Kim and I played foosball with Sara and Sierra and had some pretty good games, even when Kim and I took on Sara and Sierra. Then we played a card game whose name I can’t remember, but whose biggest challenge seemed to be remembering to draw a card at the end of your turn.

It went late for a family gathering, I think around 11PM. After the party Kim and I spent the night at Grandmas. The next day we had a nice breakfast and Grandma and I went through a few lessons for how to get online and check email. It’s all very new to her, everything from the mouse to email, so I’m hoping it sticks. The weather was nice so we all drove downtown to take a walk through Riverfront Park and ride the carousel. Kim loved the carousel. I was a little bummed that the garbage goat wasn’t working.

Then it was time to get back in the car. That’s a lot of driving for 2 days, but it’s nice that it’s just a drive to spend time with my family.

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I’ve got a nasty, nasty cold and Alka-Seltzer Plus Effervescent Cold is the only thing that I’d found that helps. I think it’s the bubbles. However, either it doesn’t work as well as I remember, or this cold is tougher.

I helped Kim staff an Eco Encore booth in front of the PCC in Kirkland for a few hours. It was mostly just to get the message out about Eco Encore and what they do, but we got a few donations too. Afterwards we were driving to the Mariners game and guess who we ran into? Someone who lives in Kirkland… Give up? Okay, it was Jake, out for a bike ride. We chatted a bit and then took off for the game that we were already late for.

Gabe and Jacob were already there since I got all four of the awesome company seats and was able to invite friends. I suppose that could be because the Mariners kinda suck this year and nobody wanted the tickets. In fact, I think that they have lost every game that I’ve gone to see this year. True to form, they lost this one too. They were ahead when we got there and Ichiro was 3 for 3, but after we arrived they fell behind and Ichiro went hitless. Oh well, baseball games are fun anyway, especially when you get such good seats for free.

• Reading: "The World Is Flat" by Thomas L Friedman
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We were going to go climbing, but Kim got really excited when Waleska mentioned that she and Jacob were going to the Puyallup Fair. So we hitched a ride with them down to the fair to do some fair stuff. (more…)

• Reading: Stealing the Network: How to Own the Continent
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At the Mariner’s Game

My dad visited for the weekend to go to a Mariner’s game and hang out. He got in Friday night earlier than I expected, which was great because then we could go out and have some fun. He, Kim and I went to a supposed jazz show and fundraiser for one of Eco Encore’s recipients. (more…)

• Listening To: Sergent Garcia
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The approximate travel route

My friend Brian has been traveling through Peru and Bolivia, doing all sorts of cool stuff that I’m jealous of, and he’s documenting the travels with a lot of great detail in his blog (not to be confused with the comically teenaged blog by a different Brian Alexander). I wish there had been such a good way to share my travels when I was in Egypt or China.

I really liked one of his latest entries about his trip to the mines near Potosi. I can’t wait to see pictures.

I realized after these weeks of reading his blog that I really didn’t know the geography and had little idea where he was, so I put together a little map of his travels so far and the order of cities that he’s visited. I wanted to just use google maps or something like that to make the map, but they haven’t mapped out much outside the U.S. and Europe, so I just drew it on a little jpg. I may have misread or missed something, but this is the list of cities he’s travelled to:

Peru

• Lima July 19
• Arequipa July 21
• Puno July 24
• Uros Islands July 26
• Tequile Island July 26

Bolivia

• Copacabana July 29
• La Paz July 31
• Coroico Aug 2
• Rurrenabaque Aug 4
• Pampas Aug 8
• Trinidad Aug 15
• Santa Cruz Aug 17
• Bermejo Aug 22
• Cochabamba Aug 23
• Punata Aug 23
• Sucre Aug 26th
• Potosi Aug 29th