2013 Started Out With A Punch

No, not literally. But metaphorically? Yes.

School took over the majority of my time, hence why there has been no posts for ages. So, allow me to get you caught up... (click the read more link, there's a bunch of content that I don't want to slow you down with until you're ready to actually consume it)


Since I got my driver's license back in December, Dad finally got his own more fuel efficient commuter vehicle. (After all, why have two cars when there's only one driver in the household?) Since the beginning of summer last year, I assisted him in researching and selecting a car that would meet his requirements. He chose the Ford C-MAX and is very happy with it:

At the dealership, 28-Dec-12 around 6pm. Yes, it was below freezing. Yes, that's a Lincoln dealership in the background.

All things considered, it was a very sweet deal, considering that he was able to get a top of the line model for a bit less than MSRP and not even have to custom order it (which would have resulted in a wait time of six to eight weeks). In fact, that vehicle was brought to the dealership that afternoon, so it was very good timing.

Ford has been challenged about the EPA's results of 47/47/47 MPG (city/combo/highway), but Dad's vehicle reports an average of 44 MPG and climbing (he's had it for about seven weeks now). Either way, it's a whole lot better than the 23 MPG the Highlander puts out.

Enough of cars. We've relatively recently been to a new place with some of Dad's coworkers called Van's Pig Stands (website, Google), whose specialty is barbeque. Quite good, especially if you're a carnivore. Vegetarians may want to look elsewhere. For the sake of space, I'm going to collapse my comments about the restaurant.

If you're truly curious, they had the best brisket I've tasted in a while, their chicken and ribs also have some pretty good tastes. Everything was focused on the cooking techniques, which as far as I could tell involved smoke and copious amounts of time. Everything else was a second thought. The restaurant itself felt homey, while food was served on paper plates and hotpans (for our party). There was no silverware, everything was plastic or paper. That being said, the food still tasted great. If you ever happen to come out to Oklahoma and eat here, be aware that the parking lot is tiny. Wasn't pleasant to get in and out of.

If you're wondering about the house, we've had people come and go to fix items on the one month punch list. That includes wiring that was wonky, a front door that got horribly malformed during the winter, and driveway caulk for the connections between the driveway and the street. For the most part, it's complete and running relatively well. There are still a few things that are on our eleven month punch list, but hopefully that won't grow to include anything major.

Speaking of winter, we got a few days of snow in there. There was (of course) the White Christmas, but we also got a good two to three inches of snow just this past Tuesday. It was pretty impressive, but did not affect school (to the disappointment of the majority of most of the students in the school district, not including yours truly).

This was directly after lunch, it started only a couple hours before this.

Finally, I come to the final topic for this post: For the past couple of weeks, I've been working along with some of my classmates to create a toothpick bridge for possible entry into a state engineering fair as a project for physics class. Christened the Cat Canary by Mom (a play on the technical word catenary, which describes an arch that is not a perfect semicircle (think a negative parabola)). After 30 hours of group and individual work, it is now curing inside a back room at school. Here's a not so recent photo:

Since it has been decided that it will enter the state contest, I'll be updating the Displaced Socaler's Google+ page with updates directly from Science Museum Oklahoma with cool pictures of other entries and news for how it does. That will be on Tuesday morning, from approximately 10a-12p CST. Hopefully the signal won't be too weak, so we'll see how it turns out.

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I think that should get you caught up on what's happened so far in 2013. The main rush is over, so I hope to post something at least bimonthly on the blog and weekly on Google+. Depends on what's happening with us, I suppose, since we no longer have the house to report on.

As for returning back to California for a visit... that has been floating as an idea for quite a while. Unfortunately, the family visit has first priority, so no news on that front. After all, it has been over two years since we saw our folks back in Hawaii... stay tuned for news on that as well.

If you haven't given up on me, I thank you for reading. And with that, I shall sign off with a belated holiday greeting: