Lizard's Lair

2010 Chevrolet Camaro LT1

In my never-ending strive to find the right car, I get a hankering to drive the new Camaro. I've read various reviews on them, but a retro American pony car was never on my wish list, but it's fun to drive new cars, none the less.

It definitely looks retro, like Dodge Challenger a bit. A bit more edgier than a Mustang. It has a high beltline, and when I fist sat in it, I was way too low. Luckily, the seats had a nice manual height adjustment and visibility was not bad, better than a 370Z. I did feel more confined with the seemingly short cockpit. the dash looked retro-ugly and the steering wheel's odd shape turned me off too. It was an automatic with paddle shifters and 3.6L V-6 pumping out 304hp.

Sorry for the glare in the photos from my iPhone, but it was around noon and I was at a bad angle. Anyway, It's got good rear end looks. But overall, nothing impressed me. I guess you have to be a Camaro fan.

Padres @ Angels

Roadtrip for these Padre fans, as we traveled to Anaheim for a Sunday day game. It's my brother Dave and my friend Frank.

Notice the nice camera work as I framed the above photo just right...

but I didn't take this one, come on Frank, you gotta do better than that!

California Comfort

One of my favorite places in East County San Diego. California Comfort opened a couple of years ago, taking over and redoing a previously boring restaurant and creating a sports bar and grill type of place. This is their house pale ale, I think it's brewed by Redhook Brewery from Washington.

Happy Times

One of my favorite places to hang out is my backyard behind the grill. It's a great place to be when I'm entertaining friends and family.

My Japanese friend Yonemura-san gave me this gift of 12 year old Chivas. I was sharing drinks and a cigar with him, as we talked about our favorite places. When I left his place, he gave me this. Now it's in my liquor cabinet under the grill. I tell the story every time I share this scotch with guests.

Thank You Yonemura-san!

Sierra Nevada Empire Strikes Black

Extra black color, velvety taste, sweet malty, plum flavors with a hoppy tart finish. Delicious!!

O'Brien's Pub in San Diego specializes the local brewery's best beers, plus west coast breweries, and Belgium style beers, with an over 200 bottle selection. One of the best beer bars in one of the countries best beer cities, San Diego.

Sierra Nevada Empire Strikes Black

Extra black color, velvety taste, sweet malty, plum flavors with a hoppy tart finish. Delicious!!

O'Brien's Pub in San Diego specializes the local brewery's best beers, plus west coast breweries, and Belgium style beers, with an over 200 bottle selection. One of the best beer bars in one of the countries best beer cities, San Diego.

House at El Cid Mazatlan

 

My in-laws have a house for rent at El Cid. It's a gated community built around a golf course and tennis courts. I think the yard faces the fourth hole. There's a water pond with turtles too.

Here's some inside shots. These were taken last May and before some work was done inside the house.

 

 

The master bedroom with it's own bathroom and walk-in closet.

 

I think there's 3 bedrooms and 2 baths.

Dad's House in Mazatlan

Dad's house in the Sabalo Country neighborhood of Mazatlan. 3 Blocks from the beach and the original Pueblo Bonito Resort. It has 3 bedrooms and 3 baths. It was designed by Jorge Luna, a native Mazatlan architect.

It has a beautiful large kitchen.

A vaulted ceiling in the living room.

A wrap-around railing on the second floor. Marble flooring throughout.

Big dining room and family room too.

 

 

Nice backyard and garden with bannana, coconut, papaya trees and more.

Large master bedroom with it's large private bathoom with a jacuzzi tub.

 

 

Also, a rooftop terrace.

 

Taurino from El Salvador

An El Salvadoran beer that tastes pretty plain.

Ooh, ike a light beer, yuk!

Rib Eye & Cabernet

Building the Pond-Phase 2 The Hole

May 26, 2007 - The hole started with picks and shovels, then a jackhammer was brought in to break the big granite boulders that make up the base of my land. The largest boulders were used in different areas around the yard.

 

We've got some extra help with the heavy digging.

Here's my crew and the big boulder that just came out near my entryway.

May 27, 2007 - The junk piles up on my driveway. The two rear piles in center and right are the stones for the pond wall and the sand for laying the flagstone. See the pallet on the left? The pallet on the right is the blocks I'll use the build the wall around the pond. Looks like major construction.

You can see here how we marked the areas for the wall, initial pond ledge, then the deep part of the pond. We need to go deeper. There are big boulders in the way. On the left you can see the pipes are in for the rough plumbing of the pond.

I'll post more later.

Peavy Rocks!

Stone Pale Ale @ Petco

Padres winning 3-1, 9th inning, Peavy pitching.

Pliny the Elder

Light citrus taste, light golden color, hoppy tart bite, clean aftertaste.
At Hamilton's in San Diego.

Building the Pond-Phase 1 Demolition

May 13, 2007. We bought 4 Bird of Paradise plants. Those are going on the rise behind the wall. In my neighborhood, the houses are built on what's called a "zero lot line". That means the neighbor's house, as well as mine, has one wall along the plot line. That's why there is no wall or fence between my neighbor's house and mine. There is a fence at the backyard, you can see that on the right of the photo. I used landscaping chalk lines to draw on the dirt. I also laid out flagstone in the rough shape of the pond and the area around it. Thanks to my sons and wife in helping make all this happen.

May 19, 2007. One week later, the plants are in and the hard work starts. My sons are doing the heavy work, though I always start it to show them how it's done. Armando is on the roto-tiller, Manuel O. is on the jackhammer. The roto-tilling was to soften up the soil, as we need to go down a couple inches for the sand to be placed as the base of the flagstone. The jackhammering of the sidewalk started by putting a ton of holes in the concrete. Notice the sidewalk leading out? It's full of holes!

May 20, 2007, Sunday. Putting a bunch of holes in a sidewalk is one thing, breaking it up and hauling it away is a whole lot of more work. It was time to bring in help. Since I live on the edge of a rural community, there is a lot of day labor workers, eager to help a homeowner or contractor with whatever project comes along. I picked up a guy, he said he had worked on a pond project before, yeah right hehe, anyway, I think his name was Mario. He's in the hat at the back of the picture. Notice the sidewalk busted up? It took a pick and a sledge hammer to break it apart. I used my kid's plastic wagon to move the concrete pieces.

May 20, 2007. Here's "Mario" making a pile of broken concrete on my driveway. Also on my driveway is the pallet of new "rose" colored flagstone that will be my walkway, along with the coping stones for the top of the pond. The gravel and sand for the construction is also on my driveway.

May 20, 2007. The building blocks for the pond wall have now been delivered. My drive way will be devoid of parked cars for a while!

May 20, 2007. Teamwork in action, as the sidewalk is all busted up and is being carted off to the rockpile on my driveway.

Planning the Koi Pond

This is the before picture. That sidewalk will be gone and replaced with flagstone.

I measured all around the house and drew my plan with TurboCad Mac. That's the outline of my home and lot. It shows my backyard with the built-in grill on the right and a shed next to it with a palm tree behind it. The flagstone in the back of the house was installed by myself and the kids, in 2005. That was a lot of work.

Another 2 photos showing the preparatory steps. The sod was pulled off and the site cleaned and leveled.

 

Next came phase 1.

Yokohama Brewery Weizen

Traditionally cloudy, unfiltered, very Belgium like. Citrusy.

Happy Easter!

At the Marriot...
Another beautiful day in paradise.

Does This Look Healthy?

Post your comments, please.

2008 Alaskan Smoked Porter

Dark chocolate in both aroma and first taste. A hoppy nose and balanced malt makes for a delicious beer. Hooley's Irish Pub, La Mesa. Just opened.

Steelhead Double IPA

A delicious beer at my newest favorite bar, Press Box in Rancho San Diego!

Stone Black IPA

Current Glut of 2008 Porsche Boxsters

553 new and used 2008 Boxsters are being currently advertised for sale on AutoTrader.com. The one pictured above is going for $36,792, it has 24,500 miles and a certified-preowned warranty. There are multiple dealers giving at least $10K off a new Boxster.

From the same dealer as the car above, you can get a used 2008 Boxster S for $43,995, it's black, has 11K miles and a CPO warranty.

Ebay had a completed sale on March 3 for a new 2008 base Boxster at $39,000. The MSRP was $53,435, that's more than $14,000 off!

With 2009 models beginning to show up at dealers across the nation, unsold 2008 inventory will be continuosly discounted until they're gone.

#1 Lizard Lair Fan!

Frequent visitor to my blog, Dominique!

Is there a glut of unsold Caymans?

As I've been shopping for a Cayman a few months, my searches always had filters like maximum  price and manual transmission to keep the lists smaller. I usually set my filters to show me 100 of the lowest price Cayman for a particular year. I then wondered what is the real market of all unsold Caymans in the US right now.

My findings are far from scientific and my number gathering is limited to what is advertised on Autotrader.com. I use them, because it's easy to save detailed searches and I keep my top 25 car list on there. Here's my list as of today:

2006 Cayman S - 137 available

Here's the cheapest one, $31,995, 31K miles, Auto

2007 Cayman  and Cayman S - 181

2007 Cayman, 9K miles - $29,821

2008 Cayman and Cayman S (used) - 162

2008 Cayman, 5K miles - $37,900

NEW 2008 Cayman and Cayman S - 549!! I checked it twice.

2008 Cayman, 112 miles, MSRP $50,760 - $8,762 = $41,998

Five hundred and forty-nine, wow! That is a lot of excess inventory. I've seen the Cayman sales for the last few months and they are not good. November and December 2008 sales were less than 100 per month. 2008 new Caymans will available for a long time. The 2009 models will be out in a month or 2 and that is adding to the slowdown, not including the current terrible state of the economy. $8000 discounts are the norm. I've seen $13000 off a low mileage demo.

The day after I made this post, one of my favorite car blogs posted pictures of the world auto glut. The original photos with more information is here.

Caymans on Ebay

High mileage, 40K miles, 2006 Cayman S sold for $30,000 on February 15th.

This low mileage, 10K miles, 2006 Cayman S sold for alot, $39,000 on February 14th.

This 2007 Cayman S with Turbo style wheels and only 4700 miles was sold for $40,100.55 on February 14th

This 2007 Cayman with almost 25K miles sold for a great price, $27,900 on February 10th.

This 2007 Cayman S with less than 5000 miles sold for $35000, February 5th. It was nicely optioned, stickering for $67000. That's a hell of a deal!

This beautiful 2007 Cayman S in Carmona Red metallic, sold for $44000, February 2nd with 4000 miles. Hmmm.

2008 Cayman S, 14K miles - $42,500, sold February 2

  I just put a $29000 bid on this 2008 Cayman S in Oregon. I know I won't get it. It's easily $20K under what they may want for it, but it's fun and if by a miracle, one of my bids turns into a real car, then I'd be ecstatic.

I started looking for Porsches on Ebay this past summer. At first, my maximum allowable bid was $15000, because my account wasn't verified with Paypal yet. I already had a Paypal account from my time with the Hotline server, though I hadn't used it since then. My early bidding was limited so I bid on cars to start the bidding. Often, it's the first dollar or $1000. You place a maximum bid, say $9000, and you can be the first bidder. If there is no minimum, then it starts at a dollar. Almost all cars have an undisclosed reserve price that must be met before they will sell the car. There are no miracles like buying a $25000 Porsche for $1000 or something. The cars that do come through without any reserve get bid on by regulars on Ebay.

A way to what cars are actually selling on Ebay is to do a search for what you want, then click "Show Completed Listings". This will list all the finished auctions with green numbers for sold items. I'd say more than 90% of what I look for goes through unsold. My current search has 211 listings.

Here's another one:

Check out the Carrera Red interior!

 

I'm the current high bidder at $1000. My maximum is set to $25,500.

Here's one that actually sold December 26, 2008 for $40,800. It's a 2006 Cayman S with only 1328 miles. It's Buy It Now price was $42,900.

 

Do you like Speed Yellow? I don't.

2007 Cayman, 20K miles, Buy-It-Now $31,800, 1 hr to go, bid $28,000

This sold too, 2007 Cayman S, 9K miles, Atlas Grey - $36,900 on December 29th.

Here's a nice 2007 base Cayman in Blue, 16K miles, sold for $31,100 on January 2

Another awesome buy on a 2007 Cayman S in Carmona Red Metallic, 12K miles, sold December 30th for $36,000! Look at the original asking price, $7275 discount, wow.

2006 Cayman S, 17K miles - $33,500, sold December 6

BRAND NEW 2008 Cayman sold January 16 for $43,473!

2008 Porsche Cayman, 5K miles - $34,900

This 2008 Cayman in Denver is listed at new Best-In-Price for a 2008 base Cayman at $34,900. The ad lists few details. I think it's very lightly optioned. It's described as Black Metallic exterior, but the close up shots look more the Atlas Grey. It also has the tan interior I want.

On a Sunday Morning...

Black Magic Stout - Oggi's

Boxsters on Ebay

There has been a flurry of Boxster sales on Ebay lately. Here are a few:

This 2006 Boxster with only 13500 miles sold for $22000 on February 8. What a deal! This car was in Las Vegas. Great color combination. Brand new tires too!

Here's another example of what's sometimes seen on Ebay:

OUCH!! That must have hurt. This 2007 Boxster S only had 2000 miles on it, when someone rear-ended it. It's a California car that was sold with a Salvage Title. It wasn't until last year that I found out you can claim "loss of value" on insurance claims. The owner of this car must have felt sick when this happened. Personally, I'd never buy a car like this, unless I owned a body shop. It sold February 5th for $28000. That seems like a lot to me, even though it was pretty loaded, with CD Changer and Navigation.

This red and tan 2006 Boxster beauty sold on January 27th for $22900. Great deal for this New York car. It only had 4915 miles!

This Basalt Black Metallic 2005 Boxster in Texas sold for $23000 on February 2nd. It had 33700 miles.

This 2006 Boxster S sold on February 7th for $32,950. It had 30K miles, loaded, including Navigation.

 

This black 2005 Boxster S with a beautiful Terracotta interior sold for $31400, February 2nd. It had 25K miles. I think the seller came out ahead on that deal.

This 2005 Midnight Blue Boxster sold February 1 for $27500. It was in Boston.

2005 Boxster, 21K miles, sold on January 17th for $29,000... seems like a lot to me.

This Certified Pre-Owned 2006 Boxster with only 9K miles sold for $32,000 on January 17th.

On January 9th, this 2005 Boxster S with 29K miles sold for $28090. This car had been on my lists for months!

A new 2008 Boxster, Black, sold on Dec. 30th for $46800. That doesn't sound like much of a deal. I think it stickered under $52K.

2006 Porsche Boxster, Black with Sand interior, loaded, Nav, Wood Shifter and Brake, sold at it's Buy-It-Now $26,900 on Dec. 31...

2006 Porsche Boxster sold for $25,000 on Dec. 30th.

This 2008 Boxster with only 994 miles was sold for $34,099 on December 22, 2008! An unbelievable bargain. Congratulations to the winning bidder.

Here's another one:

 

This 2005 Boxster with 40K miles sold for $19,400 on December 14, 2008!

UPDATE: The previous purchase  must have dropped for whatever reason. Buyer didn't pass credit probably. It's back on Ebay, same "No Reserve" and it is currently at $18,800 with 2 hours to go! I asked my wife, she said no, but she would go to see the local Boxster that's at $21K with 55K miles.

Another one:

 

2008 Limited Edition Boxster, 5000  miles, sold 12-16-08 for $35,700. The Buy it price was $37,400. Whatever, I hate the color!

Here's another:

2006 Boxster, 36K miles, Seal Grey, Sand interior - SOLD $24,508