Hills of Hayward

Harrison bought me a PRIUS!

It’s been very exciting in the past two weeks especially for Harrison. He’s been talking about buying a Prius for a long time but we never got to do it… I don’t even remember how it started; but all of a sudden, we found ourselves starting shopping and bargaining. We got quotes from the bay area to LA. It was a really fun process. I realized that the skills I learned from the Program Management Negotiation class really can apply… Anyways, the MSRP is $24186; the invoice price is $22384; and the lowest price we got is….. $21700!! Can you believe it!? We also installed leather seats which made the car even nicer.

Well, for Harrison, one of the bigger tasks for him is to sell his Lexus IS300. I never know that he is such a good sales man. The craigslist ad he wrote, the way he showed the car and the way he lined up the potential buyers and pressed them to make quick decisions, it was just amazing to me and that was not the Harrison I knew of! Within 4 days, the Lexus was gone with a pretty good price.

Let’s set an appointment for Thanksgiving?

Isamu is lazier than Garfield.

A fun little website here at http://www.meat.org. Brace yourself… what makes this scarier than your run-of-the-mill slasher flick is that everything profiled here is true. I have read articles in various publications regarding cruelty to farm animals by the meat industry, but words pale in comparison to this little video to bring out an emotional response.

My reaction to this video is not to go vegetarian, but to remember to be grateful when you eat meat. Some poor animal lived a horrible torturous existence for you in a cage where they could not walk or even stand. Another altenative for carnivores with a heart is to buy Animal Compassionate meat products from Whole Foods.

During my visit to Hong Kong this January, Christine and I went to the Ladies Market for some casual shopping. As we squeezed our way past the hordes of shoppers and the tiny stalls, I noticed something interesting. A good percentage of the stalls were using compact flourescent bulbs! I was excited to see that other parts of the world are taking action on using less energy.

What got me thinking about about light bulbs today was this article on NY Times: A U.S. Alliance to Update the Light Bulb

While Australia seeks to ban the wasteful old-style incandescent light bulb by 2010, and Canada is seeking to do the same. US seeks to maybe eliminate the incandescents by 2016, and possibly not at all.

This nation’s energy conservation actions reminds me of certain “special” kids way back in middle school:

These are the ones who come in late, who forget their books, who don’t have a pencil, who aren’t sure which page we’re on, who whisper through the explanation, who didn’t know there was homework, who didn’t have time to read and so forth. Fortunately I have only a couple like this, but they are repeat offenders. ( Quoted from Violet Eclipse )