{"id":14792,"date":"2016-02-12T05:00:08","date_gmt":"2016-02-12T13:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/?p=14792"},"modified":"2016-02-12T07:15:21","modified_gmt":"2016-02-12T15:15:21","slug":"happy-friday-randomness-116","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/?p=14792","title":{"rendered":"Happy Friday + Randomness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-14799\" src=\"http:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja1.jpg\" alt=\"2016sve-fromsonja1\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja1.jpg 800w, https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja1-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Our little black 2001 Honda Civic died nine days ago. RIP. It chugged along with so few complaints and problems for almost a decade (we bought it used), but it\u00a0expired ignobly by\u00a0overheating repeatedly, becoming unfixable. It had seen better days, sure, but it never felt precious &#8212; not once did I feel the need to admonish clumsy hands attached to kid bodies for spilling a few morsels\/drops of eats and drinks and we gave muddy shoes little thought. It was a no big deal kind of vehicle. Car thieves bypassed it with upturned noses, not even deigning to steal it for parts.<\/p>\n<p>We have been living without a car for nine days. The funny thing is, we&#8217;re thinking of going carless for the time being because we&#8217;re finding that it&#8217;s really not so bad. In fact, I&#8217;m walking about 5\u00a0miles a day, and my legs feel like pipes of titanium alloy and may even start to look sculpted and svelte if I keep this up. I <em>love<\/em> walking. Carpool options seem to materialize effortlessly at every turn whenever necessary, and the only area of concern is grocery shopping but I&#8217;m looking into delivery services. Even that may not be necessary though, since we live within a mile of two grocery stores. With choices like \u00dcber, Lyft and Car2go &#8212; not to mention public transportation and cycling, which is M&#8217;s favorite mode of transport &#8212; we have alternatives to owning a car&#8230;it&#8217;s tempting. No insurance, no gas or maintenance costs, no putrefying of the environment or adding to the already jammed roadways. We drove less than 8,000 miles a year anyway, so yes. Tempting.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-14800\" src=\"http:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja2.jpg\" alt=\"2016sve-fromsonja2\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja2.jpg 800w, https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja2-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016sve-fromsonja2-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The image is not of our deceased car, obviously, but of my Secret Valentine gift!!!!!! Or at least the unopened gift. I did peek at the beautiful card, but I&#8217;ve been a good girl and mentally shackled my hands and feet to avoid tearing into it before Sunday. I&#8217;m beyond excited just from the packaging. I&#8217;ve used that very same Nani Iro loveliness for a <a href=\"http:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/?p=13397\" target=\"_blank\">miniature dress<\/a>, and the fact that she adorned the present with that particular fabric\u00a0already elates me. Side note: I purposely hadn&#8217;t\u00a0checked who my partner was (Ute and I split the pairing of partners and she did the portion that included my name) and I had unknowingly commented on my partner&#8217;s IG sneak peek, &#8220;My favorite colors!!&#8221; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/gingertakesphotos\/\" target=\"_blank\">Sonja<\/a>\u00a0was probably thinking, &#8220;Well, duh&#8230;&#8221; I&#8217;m dying to open it, Sonja!<\/p>\n<p>I will report more fully on the gift and do a general final round-up of the Secret Valentine Exchange soon! Remember, many of the gifts are coming from way yonder so quite a few may not make it to your doorstep by this Sunday. Thank you for your patience, and <em>thank you, thank you, thank you<\/em> for all the wonderful exchanges we&#8217;re already seeing on Instagram with hashtag #2016sve! Our hearts feel full.<\/p>\n<p><em>I may have no car<\/em><br \/>\n<em>But the Secret Valentines<\/em><br \/>\n<em>are fuel for goodness<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Happy weekend, all!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Our little black 2001 Honda Civic died nine days ago. RIP. It chugged along with so few complaints and problems for almost a decade (we bought it used), but it\u00a0expired ignobly by\u00a0overheating repeatedly, becoming unfixable. It had seen better days, sure, but it never felt precious &#8212; not once did I feel the need to admonish clumsy hands attached to kid bodies for spilling a few morsels\/drops of eats and drinks and we gave muddy shoes little thought. It was a no big deal kind of vehicle. Car thieves bypassed it with upturned noses, not even deigning to steal it for parts. We have been living without a car for nine days. The funny thing is, we&#8217;re thinking of going carless for the time being because we&#8217;re finding that it&#8217;s really not so bad. In fact, I&#8217;m walking about 5\u00a0miles a day, and my legs feel like pipes of titanium alloy and may even start to look sculpted and svelte if I keep this up. I love walking. Carpool options seem to materialize effortlessly at every turn whenever necessary, and the only area of concern is grocery shopping but I&#8217;m looking into delivery services. Even that may not be necessary though, since we live within a mile of two grocery stores. With choices like \u00dcber, Lyft and Car2go &#8212; not to mention public transportation and cycling, which is M&#8217;s favorite mode of transport &#8212; we have alternatives to owning a car&#8230;it&#8217;s tempting. No insurance, no gas or maintenance costs, no putrefying of the environment or adding to the already jammed roadways. We drove less than 8,000 miles a year anyway, so yes. Tempting. The image is not of our deceased car, obviously, but of my Secret Valentine gift!!!!!! Or at least the unopened gift. I did peek at the beautiful card, but I&#8217;ve been a good girl and mentally shackled my hands and feet to avoid tearing into it before Sunday. I&#8217;m beyond excited just from the packaging. I&#8217;ve used that very same Nani Iro loveliness for a miniature dress, and the fact that she adorned the present with that particular fabric\u00a0already elates me. Side note: I purposely hadn&#8217;t\u00a0checked who my partner was (Ute and I split the pairing of partners and she did the portion that included my name) and I had unknowingly commented on my partner&#8217;s IG sneak peek, &#8220;My favorite colors!!&#8221; Sonja\u00a0was probably thinking, &#8220;Well, duh&#8230;&#8221; I&#8217;m dying to open it, Sonja! I will report more fully on the gift and do a general final round-up of the Secret Valentine Exchange soon! Remember, many of the gifts are coming from way yonder so quite a few may not make it to your doorstep by this Sunday. Thank you for your patience, and thank you, thank you, thank you for all the wonderful exchanges we&#8217;re already seeing on Instagram with hashtag #2016sve! Our hearts feel full. I may have no car But the Secret Valentines are fuel for goodness Happy weekend, all! &nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,68],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14792","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-life","7":"category-secret-valentine-exchange","8":"entry","9":"has-post-thumbnail"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14792"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14802,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14792\/revisions\/14802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sanaeishida.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}