Chris & Maria's Blog

Spoiler warning!!!  Stop reading if you’ve not watched the last episode of LOST.

We just finished watching the season finale of LOST, and really enjoyed it!  I managed to record the phone call Kate gets, and it says, “The island needs you.  You have to go back before it’s too late.”  If you want the MP3, you can listen here:  http://www.chrisdotson.com/lost.mp3

As with all endings, it leaves more questions than it answers.  The rescue boat blows up, the island gets moved by Ben, Locke is put in charge of all of Ben’s old cronies, but then shows up dead in a coffin at the end of the episode.  Jack breaks into the funeral home, and while staring at Locke in the coffin Ben walks in behind him and tells him he can’t find the island alone.  Everyone has to go back…including Locke.

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been experimenting with what is known as hypermiling. In case you don’t know what that is, you’re not alone. Until a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t know either. Essentially, it’s a collection of methods to get the most miles per gallon as you can by driving differently. It’s not magic. It’s just practicing some simple methods that make sense. Some, though, do not make sense and should not be done. Regardless of how many miles per gallon it gets you, drafting (riding on the tail of some other vehicle, such as tractor trailers) should not be done.

The one practice that I’ve been working on is coasting to a stop and trying to sit idle as little as possible. If your car is running and you’re sitting still, you are getting 0 miles per gallon. You’re expending fuel but not going anywhere. Also, most people approach a stop with their foot on the accelerator. They go straight from that to the brake. Instead, take your foot off the gas and just coast to the stop. If it’s a red light, try to coast long enough so that you don’t actually have to stop. Once you stop, you lose all the energy that you have built up. You have to spend fuel to get that momentum back.

So I tried this method after my last fill up, and I was able to increase my miles per gallon by about 30%! Most of my driving is in the city, and I actually got more miles on the tank than I did when I was doing all highway driving. I’ve got a faulty O2 sensor right now, and I need to get a shock replaced in the rear. Both of those things would increase my MPG even more.

There are other good techniques at the hypermiling website. Keep in mind there are other things on there that are dangerous and should not be done (drafting and extremely over inflating your tires). Use common sense if you want to try this. But if everyone did this, we would all save a lot of money and use a lot less petroleum.

We had fun looking at houses last weekend. One of them really caught our attention – it’s in a gorgeous neighbourhood (great re-sell potential), has a great layout with a couple of huge rooms, hardwood floors and a big fenced in yard with a cool bridge. We liked it enough to drag 3 friends and 3 family members to look at it again with us the next day but we’re still not decided.  It’s towards the top of our price range and yet still needs some work – new windows, new floors downstairs, lots doing in the yard. So we’ve decided to continue thinking about it, but also to continue looking. We’re getting to realise what we need and what we don’t like. I am incredibly lucky to even have the option of house-hunting and I know I will be more than happy with wherever we end up. Where I come from in England, you can’t get a one-bedroom flat for under £100k. The exchange rate is really in my favour at the moment.

Other random things going through my head today:

No spell check will ever stop me spelling neighbourhood with a u.

The cocoa-butter formula I bought to help get rid of scars from insect bites seems to be attracting the mosquitoes. I love irony.

Somebody should market P20 to the US. Nothing else has ever worked for me and my Irish skin won’t be able to survive a Tennessee summer without it. Luckily my sister has promised to send me some. Woohoo!

The Half-Blood Prince teaser trailer is due out any day and I am beyond excited!!

That is how you should make a superhero movie!!! Wow!  I can not articulate how cool that movie was.  Well, let me put it to you this way…I will see it at least one more time before the weekend is over.  I might see it two more times.  The “gang” is going to go tomorrow evening to see it in the same theater we went to last night, but I REALLY want to see this in IMAX.  Maybe I can take my little brother.

I struggle to find a weak spot in the film.  First off, suspend ALL disbelief.  Forget real world physics.  This was a comic book, and a pretty faithful adaptation thereof.  If you think you will have trouble believing that a man in an iron suit (technically it’s not iron, and that’s explained in the film) can fly, this probably isn’t the film for you.  The character development was good, the action was great, and the humor was well placed.  The line between what was CGI and what was practical effects wasn’t just blurred, it was gone.  I have a very good eye for that kind of thing, and not once did I see something as a CGI visual effect.  Those types of things distract me, and that never happened in this film.  If you know me, then you know what a huge huge HUGE Batman fan I am.  I have to say this movie rivals and possibly surpasses my fondness for Batman Begins.

Sundown in the City was going on last night and The Doobie Brothers were also performing at the Tennessee Theatre, so there was an interesting mix of people out and about downtown last night.  I’ll keep this post about Iron Man, and not about the other “shows” we both regretfully saw while going into and coming out of the theater.  Most of them were drunk, which always makes for some entertainment.  Let’s just saw we saw things that we should not have seen and wished we hadn’t.  While the movie was PG-13, these were definitely R.

It has officially started.  Last Tuesday we went looking around for a house.  The lease on the house we’re renting is up in June, so this is just shy of a mad dash to find a place.  We can continue to live where we are now, and pay month to month, but I have a fundamental problem with paying someone else’s mortgage.

Two of the the three we looked at on Tuesday were okay.  The first one smelled of smoke, and since neither of us are smokers or ever will be, we pretty much ruled that one out.  They all were the same model of house (split foyer), and I’m just not a big fan of that style.  I keep in mind that there is a high probability of moving again within the next 5 to 10 years, and I want a house that’s easy to sell.  Split foyer houses are always the hardest to sell.

We are set to go out again Saturday morning to look at 6 or 7 houses.  The styles are different this time around, but they won’t be as close to work as the other three.  I realize we can’t get everything we want, and I’m not being that picky (though it sounds as if I am).  I just want to provide my family with the best that we can get.  If we find anything amazing, we’ll post some pictures.

We just finished watching the last half of the timeless classic, “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”.  Maria had never seen it (GASP! SHOCK! HORROR!).  I’m reciting the lines, probably much to her dismay, and towards the end the question crops up in my mind, “What happened to the gummy bear girl on the bus at the end?”  So I Google around and find out.

Her name is Polly Noonan.  Aside from bit parts in a couple of other films, IMDB didn’t have a whole lot.  A little more searching, and it turns out she’s doing theater now.  I know you lose sleep at night wondering what Polly is up to, so here are a few pictures of her all grown up and on stage….for your enjoyment.

All good things must come to an end, but I think we’ve had an amazing week with Josie and Mike. I’m not sure what is on the agenda for today, but everyone is getting cleaned up and ready….except me, of course. I’m blogging. Such is the problem with having a house with just one bath.

I digress. So far this week, we have gone to Gatlinburg, Cades Cove, Sevierville and Pigeon Forge (shopping), Biltmore Estates (pictured) in North Carolina, a drive in movie in Maryville, The Lost Sea, the Tosca Opera, the Rossini Festival downtown, the Mall, Wal-Mart (nothing screams America more than that hole), and to the World’s Fair site and Sunsphere. Today we may go to Dollywood or possibly for a hike through the mountains. I’m not sure which yet.

There has been loads of Wii play, and Mike has become the Wii Sports Tennis champ in the house. A few more matches and he will be listed as a pro.

The dogs have all but abandoned me and Maria. If I get home from work tomorrow and they have gone, I’ll know they are on their way to England. It sounds as if everyone is about ready, so I had better get it together and wrap this up. This is our last day with Josie, and we want to make the most of it. More later!

I debated between the above title or the famous Paul Revere line, “The British are coming! The British are coming!” If only Josie and Mike had waited until the 18th of April, that would have worked seeing as that is the date Paul Revere shouted those lines on his ride. But I thought a reference to music versus war was more appropriate, as I love my extended family and we get along quite well.

As of this writing, Josie and Mike should be flying over our very heads. We finally managed to get the bedroom pulled together and the house in order. Knoxville just isn’t the ideal vacation spot, though we have been trying to come up with things to see and do while they are here. Alas, I don’t think there is any way to escape Dollywood. Just please note that it is NOT an accurate representation of East Tennessee or even the Smoky Mountains for that matter. We will probably take them to the mountains, and see as many cool places up there as we can.

We still have a few things left to do, so I’ll wrap this up. We’re both very excited and anxious for them to arrive, and I’m such a neat freak and perfectionist when it comes to having people over. I blame you, Mom and Dad. I love you, but it’s your fault I am this way. 😛

Wired Magazine is running a photography contest with the theme being macro photos. I shot one last night, and I’m posting this to generate as many votes as I can. I’m late getting in, so I’ll need LOADS of help. The winner gets their photo published in the magazine.

Mine is the fly, and is called “Fly On”. Just click the green up arrow to vote for me. 😛

http://reddit.wired.com/submissions_macro/

Chris and I helped out at a family wedding this weekend. Chris took some excellent pictures and by elimination I was left with the video camera. I didn’t tell everyone that the only experience I’ve ever had with a video camera is filming some salt mines in Poland on a school trip when I was 18 – it was so bad and out of focus that part didn’t make it into the final film! But luckily we had time to practice and I don’t think it turned out badly in the end.

It did make us realise though, that we still want to have a reception of our own. (And we definitely want the chocolate covered strawberries they had on Saturday). We have no plans, no dates and no real venue ideas (we don’t even know which country it will be in) but we will be having one, so if you’re reading this, you’re invited. 🙂