New House Update

The foundation has been poured. Next should be framing.

New House 2nd Phase

Looks like there has been real progress. They may be pouring the concrete footer this week.

Goodby old (Sorta) friend

Yesterday, I said goodby to my BMW car. Traded it in on something a little more practical. The car was an exceptional machine with all comforts and conveniences that anyone would have enjoyed, except, there is little or no dealer support in my immediate location and I am forced to drive approximately 80 miles one way for service.

I traded it for a new small Chevrolet pickup truck that should be easier to have maintained in my local living area..

House Update

The new house is starting to be constructed, well... sorta. At least the shed is going up. And, there are promises in the wind about further progress.. Also met two of the fellas who are doing the building. Nice guys who actually invited me to visit often during construction.

WASHINGTON DOLLAR COIN

It took me quite awhile to get some of the new Washington dollar coins. Our town is really not considered to be a progressive hotbed especially in financial circles (my opinion only). There is quite a bit of activity in the job market here due to recent copper mine increases. Back to the issue at hand; I finally was able to get a small quantity of the new Washington dollar coins, and, since I really have an appreciation for coins, I was pleased to have finally obtained some. That is, until I looked at them. There appear to be several things associated with these coins that makes them not too desirable. Even though I really like coins & would gladly use them in place of paper dollar bills there needs to be some improvements. 1. The likeness of George Washington is simply horrible. It must have been done by someone hoping to discredit his image. The likeness must have been taken from a picture in which his false teeth were really irritating him and he must have also had just finished a bad meal. The Lady Liberty rendition on the back side is also second rate in my opinion. The engravers, for some unknown reason, decided to put the familiar epithets "In God we trust" , " E Pluribus Unum" , AND the Date and Mint Mark on the edge of the coin. Putting the information on the edge makes these inscriptions readable to only the few blessed with excellent eye sight (I am not one of those individuals & must use a rather extreme magnifier to see the edge information.) But, the biggest problem with the coin is quite simply, POOR QUALITY. The edges appear to be badly worn (these coins came from a bank & were in a roll); even given that they were circulated coins, the engraving (again on the edge) showed what I would consider to be significantly degraded and the gold tone finish is badly scuffed. Even further though, the edge printing is not consistent. On my sample of 25 coins, 7 showed the edge printing up when viewing the face of the coin and the rest have the printing down. In addition the edge printing starts anywhere around the circumference of the coin and varies in location with almost every coin. The US Mint should reevaluate its dedication to excellence; since its attention to detail is certainly non existent with this effort. If you think that I did not take a very good picture of the coins as posted, you are correct, but it was not done out of lack of capability, but as a small protest towards poor quality.

NEW BEGINNING

This is the start of our new house. It should be completed by mid July. It may not look like much now; but, should soon start to grow.

Raw ground

1st concrete pour

SOLD!

We decided to sell our house in Miami AZ. Since the Phoenix housing market is in a bit of a downturn, I assumed that it would be a buyer's market and tough times would soon follow. The big suprise is that this area is seeing a resurgence in copper mining & affordable housing is very scarce. Our house sold in less than 1 week at our asking price. Wow.. Also, from the picture, it is an average looking house but has the advantage of also being offered with an adjoining empty lot. Next, where to go??