Graebals of fire

Graebal arrived today to pack the house and are truly professionals at their craft. I'm sure they find it annoying but it's interesting to watch them pack, they clean out the cabinets lickity split and yet each glass and plate are individually (and carefully) wrapped against damage.

Strange enough they were willing to ship the motorcycle even though their documentation clearly states "we will NOT ship vehicles, including cars, SUVs, boats, motorcycles, yada yada yada". We thought long and hard about it but decided against shipping, it's that import tax thing again.

Laura and I are getting ready for the big drive to Wyoming. My personal preparation is burning a bunch of comedy CDs, the miles fly when I'm listening to some poor sucker get heckled on the phone by Roy D. Mercer.

Speaking of humor, if you haven't checked out a year in review of MSNBCs most Peculiar Postings, treat yourself: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10562270/

Car lust

My former boss recieved his Z06, he took me around the block - what a sweet ride. $70k is a lot of money for a car, but good luck finding many others (if any) that can do 0-60 in 3.4 seconds for that price.

Don't most men go through a mid-life crisis? I'm thinking of having mine early and buying one of these bad boys. Naturally my wife asks where I would ever use that type of speed... let's see... Montana, South Dakota, entering the interstate ramp, groceries, where there is a will there is a way.

Official work visa

I got my official work visa, I’m now free to enter Denmark and earn a paycheck. It was pretty much a done deal a week ago except for a small typo on the acceptance letter; they had me working for “IBM Microsoft”. As my new boss says, it’s almost like I got dual citizenship.

Tomorrow is my last day in the Automotive Business Unit; I’m then taking a couple of days off to be with the in-laws. It’s pretty cool that all of Laura’s family is going to be here, our first Christmas at our house (like most young couples we normally fly to one of the parents for the fat man day).

Good-bye to the book club

I found myself in a rut; too often I was either reading a technical book for work or a Fantasy / Sci-Fi novel. To broaden my horizons a bit I decided to join a book club, doing a bit of research I chose a group of folks who regularly meet in Seattle.

Overall the book club experiment was a success; it got me reading books I normally would never choose. Not all of them were a pleasure, for example "Snow" had me pulling my (remaining) hair in boredom. The biggest attraction was discussing a book with other folks, what a delight to share your thoughts and hear other interpretations on characters and plots. The club members were also just fun to be around, we sometimes played games and often BS'd about non-book related topics.

This last Friday we had a Christmas party + good-bye to Chad party, part of festivities included making gingerbread houses. I always knew I had little (ok no) artistic talent, however this night had magic in the air... surely Chad would be able to create a master piece and realize he really did have skills. Right... my clumsy hands kept breaking the crackers so I desperately applied frosting bandages trying to keep the pieces together. The end result was a sick looking building that Hansel and Gretel would never enter. No cooking and eating children for me :-(

My Danish Z06

Cars are incredibly expensive to import, the formula goes something like this:

.35 x Invoice_price = y

Note: it does not matter how old the car is, invoice_price means exactly that INVOICE PRICE, as if it was brand new and sitting on the dealership floor.

.65 x Market_value = z

Note: OK, here is where the Danish take into account depreciation. Thank you for the small favors.

Final Import Price = y + z

So, using my 2001 BMW 3-series as an example, I paid roughly $32k for it... kelly blue book (kbb.com) claims that the market value is currently $19.7k. Plugging these two values into the formula we have an import tax of:

(.35 x 32000) + (.65 x 19700) = $24005 ... wowsers!

Why is it so high? Simple... the Danish hate vehicles... I'm not talking dislike or disdain, it's full blown hate. Buy a car there! That's the solution, right? WRONG. They charge 180% tax, so a 10k car will cost you 28k after they tack on the hefty tax. What I don't understand is why don't they cut a break for environmental friendly vehicles like the European Smart Car?

The Danish believe in bicycles and public transportation, so for a couple of years so are we. We're driving the vehicles down to Wyoming for storage and have purchased a couple of 'cycles.

Laura decided to pedal to a different drummer and chose a recumbent. It'll be interesting to see what the Danish think of it, I didn't see any when I was there interviewing. She chose the EZ-Tadpole.



I went with a Joe Breezer creation (he of Mountain bike creation fame) - he's now making a name for himself designing commuter bikes.



We have two little rug rats to tow around, for this task we chose a Burley d'Lite with the optional Walk 'n Roller kit so that we can detach and use it as a stroller.

Copenhagen bound

I'm moving to Copenhagen, Denmark! The move is because I accepted a Test Manager position in the Microsoft Business Solutions division. Our family takes the pond leap on Jan 4th, in the mean time my wife and I are busy getting all of the loose ends tied up, for example finding renters for the house.