Suburban Bonding

Our neighbors across the street are almost identical to my family, but they are always working out... they are like our in-shape doppelgangers. They both work (only one from home from their bay area company), have two young kids, a nanny, and they moved here from San Francisco's Russian Hill. We both still had RuHi "A" parking permits on our cars for a year or so. Though he played football at some small school back east, and I think they both run marathons every Tuesday and Friday.

The Dad "Rick" is a total "do it yourself" kind of guy too; he remodeled their kitchen and built their back deck all by himself. I think I even saw him wearing his shirt once while he was hauling the lumber around the neighborhood. My personal strategy with home maintenance is more of the "close your eyes and hope the elves take care of it" variety. When all else fails (or when all elves fail) I hire a contractor.

This past weekend, Rick actually rented a F-ing jackhammer to tear up and replace his rock walkway. On Saturday morning I walked out on our front porch to refill our hummingbird feeder right when Rick was manning out on the jackhammer. I caught Rick's eye while pouring in the sugar water, gave him a knowing manly nod, and then went back inside. Yeah, we totally bonded.