A gift decision

Has been reached.

  • We have a small car.
  • Amazon have not delivered all presents yet.
  • We have a small car.
  • Parity of gifts important when away from home.
  • We have a small car.
  • We have very generous friends and family.
  • We have a small car.
  • Our kids can get “present fatigue” very easily.
  • We have a small car.
  • We are going to someone else’s house for Christmas.
  • We have a small car.
  • We will need to bring back presents we take plus Santa’s gifts.
  • We have a small car.

So, with this in mind, this is what we are taking with us:

This is what has been left behind:

Did I mention the wonderfully generous friends and family? Yes they are in my walk-in.

The Thanksgiving Break

It’s taken me a little while to write this as I am missing everyone like crazy so it’s been tough to get things written down.

It was wonderful.

We stayed for three days in the company of family (on the hus-creature’s side) in their stunning guest apartment.

I got to know a number of my lovely in-laws a lot better, which was really something special.

We had the turkey. And the hus-creature and I most generously offered to save everyone from the dreaded dark meat.

Honestly we truly prefer it.

Let me see if I can list the culinary delights:

  • Turkey – of course
  • Mac and cheese (delicious)
  • Jalapeño cheddar corn bread (I need the recipe for this wonder)
  • Sweet potato bourbon maple mash (oh so good)
  • Green beans
  • Gravy
  • Cranberry sauce

Then there was pie. Oh so much pie.

  • Chocolate peanut butter
  • Apple
  • Pumpkin
  • There were two more but I forgot.

Apart from the apple briefly going missing, it was all delicious.

The kids were remarkably well behaved.

TT ate actual food:

#1 Son… did not. But I didn’t really expect that he would.

They had loads of fun outside in the gorgeous grounds of the main house.

TT made daddy take her for a ride in the cart:

There was much happy shouting of “wheee” and “MORE” 💕💗💕💗

#1 Son just ran about a LOT.

There was a brief moment of panic. Do you see the large body of water? There was a moment when Daddy could not find him. He had wandered in to tell me about his “club house” and wandered off again. He meant the guest apartment, which is where he had gone.

Without telling us that he was going there!!!

So no, he had not drowned himself, but we all panicked. He was most confused as to why.

On Friday, almost everyone else took the train to visit New York and do the tour of Lady Liberty.

We opted not to attempt to drag the offspring up 200+ steps. Granddad also decided not to go. So there was brief discussion on how to entertain said childer-beasts, and we decided to go to the nearby aquarium, and leave granddad to rest.

However he decided that he would like to join, which was lovely. However there wasn’t room for five people in our car, lovely though it is.

Therefore, rather than take a Lyft on a very busy day, I selflessly (honestly, see the halo 😇😇😇) opted to stay behind in the guesthouse with my knitting, tea and leftover turkey.

Totally generous of me wasn’t it? 😂🤣

They had a lot of fun:

Right until they found a soft play area. Whereupon #1 Son had a full on meltdown, including trying to escape from granddad, because other children wanted to play with the things he was building an invention out of.

How very dare they 🙄😐🙄😐

And so the trip was cut short and they all came home.

All in all it was a lovely visit with family with many moments of happy.

The drive home was much less eventful than the trek up, we managed it on a full ‘tank’.

However upon our return we discovered that when, in his haste, the hus-creature had dropped the car charger to the ground before we embarked, it had gone kaput.

Which, in my humble opinion, makes it entirely unfit for purpose. Sadly it is still busted over a week later but the company are working on it. Stand by for that update.

So yes, that was our Thanksgiving Break. Many thanks are extended to Domi et al for putting us up and for inviting us up for Christmas.

We are very much looking forward to it 👍🏻😘

The Tesla Saga

There is some background required here:

 

We begin, dear readers, with a car accident in 2016. An accident wherein our hero, the wonderful hus-creature and his faithful steed the Chevy Volt were stationary waiting to turn into the local rubbish dump, and got rear ended by a stupid (woman) driver in a very old Skoda.

Cue the exchanging of insurance details and immediate admission of fault from other stupid driver.

Addendum: I am completely convinced she was on her phone somehow at the time, as she never quibbled once.

But you see, our beloved steed was no longer road safe. Bits were hanging off the front, but fortunately the battery cage protected the car’s vital organs.

 

So the insurance company provided us with a courtesy car.

A VW diesel Passat. Which was apparently Car of the Year in 2013.

But it is Diesel. When we are used to a true hybrid.

It handled like a cow. And not a graceful one. Nico Bellic was feather light in comparison.

Your courageous author merely had a provisional licence at this time, and so was unable to drive it, and so I am therefore only able to repeat what the usual driver told me of his experience.

He drove it three.miles.

 

Came home, declared that we were never having a dinosaur powered car again. And how did I fancy a Tesla?

I fancied one very much thank you. But never, for a moment did I imagine that he was serious.

The next moment I am handed proof of a reservation for the upcoming Tesla Model 3.

Which is due for release in the UK late 2019.

 

Please note that this is for the UK.

 

The observant amongst you will have noted that we are no longer in the UK.

 

As soon as we moved, back in July, we headed to the Central Boston Tesla Store (it is not a dealership) to see if we were able to transfer our current Model 3 reservation cross-continent.

 

We were-assured that as production had not yet begun, and the hus-creaturehad already switched the address of the reservation to a USA based one, that there would be no problem.

 

He even checked with the high ups.

Their website also confirmed this in their FAQ Section*

So we muddled along under the assumption that our reservation would be brought forward to Spring 2018.

Well, that still left us car-less. So we began to consider our options.

Front runner was to use house sale profits to buy a second hand Tesla Model S.

Yes, a luxury car, with no tax breaks or state benefits, because not new, but we would be entitled to free fast charging as that was a service transferred with the vehicle and not its owner.

And, frankly the S is sexy as heck.

Then we would use the S as collateral for our new Model 3 and get some tax breaks.

But lo and behold our “easy” house sale drags on. And on. And on.

And in the meantime the resell price is used Tesla’s increases. Which means that by end of September, they are way out of budget by over $10K

😱😭🙀😰

And Tesla have not backdated our reservation. At all.

And when husband type person contacts them directly to enquire as to why this might be, is told “oh no, that cannot happen. You will need to re-reserve” But have to put down another $1,000 deposit, and lose our place in the queue.

He points out that this contravenes both the information given in person in July and what is stated on their own website FAQs. They hem and haw and bugger off for over a week. Then tell us that if we cancel our UK reservation and make a new Stateside one, they will refund the second money (as refunding £1000 into dollars will cost more) and backdate the reservation date.

Except that was over four weeks ago and none of this has been done.

Our USA reservation still shows our UK delivery date. No sign of the money.

And their customer service has been shocking. Totally non-existent.

So we started looking at options. And, frankly, I was (and am) so grumpy with Tesla that even with it being a dream car I had gone off the idea.

The Chevy Bolt is new. It is shiny. I know how to drive it. It has all the shiny gadgets, and Chevy has excellent customer service.

And we can knock $10,000 off the initial cost due to federal and state incentives.

Ok some of that money won’t be returned until tax season, but it was a big carrot.

So, I have put on my big girl grown up pants and said goodbye to Tesla for now.

We haven’t cancelled our second reservation – yet – since it may prove useful longer term. But I’m just going to forget about it for now.

And stroke our new shiny:

*And in fact it still does

Pray excuse my absence

Gentle readers, for it has been a hectic week.

First, we come to you live from what appears to be the Tiny Tyrant’s first night terror:

We have been curled up together since about 21:00. She has been crying pitifully since 20:00.

She’s woken up enough to demand “tabbit” (her tablet – which I had foolishly left upon the duvet) and then pathetically “more fish”

I am not sure if she meant Skin Wars or Finding Dory.

¿Porque no los dos?!?!?

Neither of which is she allowed at over two hours past her bedtime.

Man she’s wriggly though. And currently snoring, so I write a post and lie here.

The landlord came two weekends ago and helped us install our former Bennos (IKEA* storage units) and so I have been able to make dents in the remaining boxes. Not literally (though both TT and #1 Son are making a spirited attempt at this!) and we think we are down to the last seven!!!!

W00t w00t. Dear god, I might be able to begin sorting and finalising next month.

I am bloody well not doing this again, I can tell you that for free.

Now, as you know dear readers, our hose sale concluded on Friday 13 October.

However. Due to the vagaries of international money transfer, it was not available to us until last Friday. 20 October.

So yesterday a new shiny thing of wondrousness was purchased:

Now the observant amongst you may notice something fundamental.

THIS IS NOT A TESLA

 

No, it is not.

It is a brand new, all mod cons Chevy** Bolt. In blue. Because goddammit. If I had to give up (at least temporarily) my dream of owning a Tesla, I was bloody well getting the car I wanted in the colour I wanted.

I have sat in it. It is lovely. It has new car smell. It has swishy blue lights in the dashboard trim. It has heated seats. Front and back. But it is not my Model 3 😐

But, you see, Tesla cocked up. They cocked up big time and if you piss me off enough, well, let us just say, I hold grudges. For a long, long time.

I feel that The Tesla Saga ™ should be covered in its own post.

À bientôt mes amies.

*This post is not sponsored in any way by IKEA 😂🤣🙃

**This post is also not sponsored in any way by Chevy