hilltop

Jokes told to me by the new neighbor boy today

He is 5 years old. He was trying to make Viola laugh.

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Hammer.
Hammer who? (At this point I was hoping for an MC Hammer reference, but the joke took an unexpected turn)
Hammer about to hit me over the head.

Viola actually was laughing, but I think it was a tragic laughter.

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Car.
Car who?
Car about to run me over.

Is he just making these up as he goes along, and, if so, does he realize how loaded they are? The last one was best:

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
House.
House who?
House about to let me jump off the roof.

I resisted telling him the knock knock joke I made up as a kid, which I thought was totally hilarious.

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Kenny.
Kenny who?
Kenny Rogers.

It's not nearly as nuanced as his.

May the Farce be with you

Since I've been hanging out at home on Thursday and Fridays with Viola, I've had a little time to think about my home here on hilltop. That and Zillow keeps me apprised of how our home is faring in today's real estate market. Our house is up 31.6% from when we bought it 5 years ago but down 12.4% this year. Not bad, but then I saw this sign while walking Viola around the neighborhood. Would someone actually buy a house from this company?

Dude, Where's...

This is the spot where our new-to-us car should have been on Monday morning, because this is where we parked it the night before:

And this is the Seattle Times (again, RIP Seattle P-I) lying on our sidewalk:

Sometimes it's not just the horoscopes that have predictive power.

We are nice neighbors

Someone please go to Bellevue next Saturday and buy this house for $1,000. Put it on your credit card. And then occupy it. Then at least one of the four houses between us and 9th St. will not be vacant.

UPDATE: The house has been removed from the auction. Is this because one of you dear readers has purchased it? I will await the good news.

Not the mixed nuts! Anything but the mixed nuts!

Until last week, the home intruders I was most concerned about were of the rodent variety. Long-time readers will remember the mouse graph of 2008, which documented a few rounds of mouse catching at our house. Even after the mouse graph, we have experienced additional breaches of our studio (to access a cough drop) and pantry (to get at a bag of dried porcini).

More newsy updates from the frigid Hilltop

I know you’ll all be excited to learn that I accomplished a major goal of my pregnancy last night: parking in the Expectant Mothers parking spot at the bourgeoise Metropolitan Market in North Tacoma. The spot is marked with a stork carrying a baby, and a sign above it says “Expectant Mothers ONLY.” I have been meaning to do this for some time, but I don’t shop at Met Market very often. I may have cheated a little, because Joe was with me and he was driving (Lucky is in the shop having a dent fixed), but it still saved me from walking across a cold parking lot.