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Money has changed hands

Much more than any previous transaction, at least. My first post in a week comes bearing news of a new vehicle in our garage...news that anyone who at least semi-regularly reads this probably knows already. ;-) We picked up a 2005 Saab 9-2X Aero, practically right off the truck. Manual transmission, Deep Blue Metallic with the cloth seats, and the non-optional cold weather package. We've put about 250 miles on it so far, with another 750 to go until break-in is complete. It's the first new vehicle for either of us, and the first time we've had car payments. With $7k in rebates, the dealer wasn't offering any kind of special financing, but fortunately we got a pretty decent rate through Costco.

So what happened to the Neon that is being replaced? Well, we're still going to hang on to it. It was giving a check engine light for the O2 sensor the day after we got it running, but the other day that stopped. Took it in for emissions testing today, and it thankfully passed (tags set to expire today). It still needs a new coolant overflow tank, but the part just arrived at the local dealer, so that should be taken care of soon. The a/c works now, so that's good. Once we're confident it's in good working order (or at least, close to it), the car should be back out for autocrossing, hopefully in time for the fall season.

Again with the unusually-large purchases, we bought a tv a couple weeks ago as well. Again, excellent deal through Costco (it's like I go there a lot or something). Panasonic 43" 16:9 LCD rear projection HDTV, 720p native res, lots of inputs. The day after we bought it I went to the Cox store to swap out cable box for the HD box, and now we're enjoying all that HDTV has to offer (and occasionally find it hard to go back to regular programming). Our dvd player does upconverting as well, so it's nice to take advantage of that, and get 480p/720p/1080i in the various video games that support those resolutions.

Now for some other random stuff that I just never posted earlier.

My grandparents in PA moved in January, and sent some of their stuff out to my parents. Of the truckload of stuff that was unloaded, we got two of the coolest things:
First, the largest pepper mill I have personally used. I think it's probably about 3 feet tall.

Second, this what we called a "smør bucket", where smør is Norwegian for butter. I believe it was last regularly used at the house my grandparents used to have in Norway. So now we have a place for butter.

Finally, pics of the free box I received to house all three extended editions of the Lord of the Rings movie. Come on, free! This came in the mail months ago, and I took pics, just never did anything with them.