Modern Vespa

The sun came out this morning, blue skies and a soaring thermometer greeted me as I walked out the back door with the dogs. As I wandered through our garden, enjoying the warm (relatively speaking 32F) morning I was mesmerized by how many branches and pine cones had come down from our 100 foot tall spruce and douglas fir trees. As I made it to the far side of the property I saw the phone and cable lines hanging down on the ground. "A branch must have broken off" I thought.

As I followed the lines toward the house I saw the branch -- the top half of a 100 foot Douglas Fir had snapped off and was now laying across a hemlock and paper birch tree. So I called our tree service to have them come out to have a look. And a second fir tree is suffering badly from a needle blight and should come down while they're here.

After I got off the phone I said to myself, "Damn, that's going to be half a GTS." And later in the spring I'll spend the other half on some other trees that need to come down. Last year I spent 3/4 of a GTS on trees.

I much preferred the days when I estimated costs in terms of six-packs of beer. The joys of home ownership...

I used to do that with vintage mopeds. Every home related expense I had was in terms of how many mopeds that job would cost. Now that I live in a retirement community with an HOA that does all the maintenance on our house, I don't think that way anymore. Plus, I stopped buying vintage mopeds and am now just focused on my modern Vespa hobby.

I do the same thing. My units are a little smaller ... I've measured things for years in Volvos. It's roughly $2000. It's a nice number to work with when dealing with home repairs.

Furnace and central air ... four Volvos.
Metal roof ... eight Volvos.
Eighteen custom windows ... six Volvos.

House paid off ... innumerable Volvos. I changed units to Rolls Royces for that one. So, one.

My new GTS 300 is exactly half the price I paid 3 years previously for a 6 month old ex demonstrator Triumph Tiger 800 and the same price just for the labour costs of my front drive currently being paved.


Vespa's are cheap

Yes, I do it too....usually with a GTS at a baseline, but if I want to ramp it up a bit and feel worse about my expense I think used.

I use bottles of wine... "Damn, that's 5 bottles of wine".... Both my my wife and I use this calculation...

Bob

homeownership: when you thought everything in life was already too expensive or too difficult your lovely new home taught you otherwise.

in the vein of another thread, you could always just buy a chainsaw and do it yourself. I mean, I'm sure harbor freight has a coupon for one. think of all the money you'll save over the years.

Are we proposing here a parallel version of the "Big Mac" index?

I always thought there was no relation to Vespas and rational finance.

Chris from CLE

vESPAsfw2 & greasy 125,

Removing large full grown trees is sticker shock. There was a time, long long
ago, when my Dad would get out the chainsaw and we would have a bonfire
with the neighbors.

Back on topic - we would always convert the cost to how many cases of cheap
beer we could buy. The priority order was School, Sex and Rock and Roll!

Bob Copeland

Interesting: the folks who recently bought the house to our left took out two trees from their backyard that were leaning semi-ominously over the back of our house in our yard, but that issue wasn't why they got rid of them: they were planning on having an extension to the house constructed, not too dissimilar to what we did with ours. They decided to nix the extension, though…apparently, the level of bureaucracy to get through the process of approval has grown since we did ours over four years ago. But, hey, no more leaning trees! Is that in ascending or descending order?

bob, I know all too well. I used to work in the industry and I have large trees on my property.

there's a reason I never sold my chainsaws or my spikes and climbing boots. tally hoooo!

You can apply a financial metric to time, as well.

When I was working as an independent contractor, I would joke that my overseas tour only had "xxx dollars", instead of days, remaining.

I was very mercenary in those days.

amateriat,

The bunch that flunked out my freshman year obviously went
the sex and rock and roll route. Many were in school to avoid
Vietnam and the army draft.

I took the school stuff seriously then chased beer, girls and
rock and roll as much as possible. Despite this, I was in
the military 8 days after graduating.

I moved ahead of the army draft by volunteering for the US Navy.
It was a four year commitment versus two years in the army.
This is also how I ended up in Italy drinking wine and riding two
wheelers.

Bob Copeland

Same for me, Bob. I ended up playing trumpet in the 2nd fleet band. It was a great gig!

I lived on boats for years and everything was measured in "boat bucks". Boat Bucks made it easier to accept the high cost of owning boats. When I started 1 Boat Buck equaled $100. By the time I sold my last boat another zero had to be added, 1 Boat Buck=$1,000.

Bust Out Another Thousand as it's also known...

I know an obstetrician who calculates the cost of anything in terms of the number caesarian sections he needs to perform...

My yachting friend - presently somewhere in the Atlantic* between St Helena Island and Brazil - said that you only lose money three times when you own a boat...

1) when you buy it,
2) when you fix it and
3) when you sell it.

*If you want to see where: https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV_SeaDancer/

I don't use a fixed standard, but I do comparison constantly. Otherwise, it's just meaningless numbers that my brain doesn't recognize the value of. The second I translate it into something, anything other than money, the associated value REALLY kicks in. I don't know why, always been like that for me.

It gets really..."fun"...when you're using percentage of the value of the thing being repaired. Replacing & upgrading the 23-year old dying HVAC/oil heat to functional all-electric was 20% of the price of the stupid house.

I know you're taking the piss, but we did exactly that two Novembers ago with a Genie boom lift rented for a few days for a second story reno. The whole reno was $10k, entire because of poor workmanship a few years earlier by the previous owner. The zoom boom was in the driveway for almost a week anyway.

My neighbour mentioned he used them for work and suggested we go up and do the trees. We back onto a 130+ year old cemetery. I was all too happy to get some additional ROI ona reno that shouldn't have been necessary. We probably saved 5 to 10 chainsaws each that evening. HF and their coupons are one of a dwindling number of ways for a young man to get ahead in this world. I'll forever be grateful for them lol

Ha! We used to own a boat. Used it quite a bit for the first 10 years before turning into one of those owners that just lets it sit there. Our "formula", if you will, was:
1yr moorage/maintenance = 3-5mo vacation (depending where you go)

A corollary to to this kind of thinking is in mileage. I have various units that I use based on distances from my house. For example I'll think to myself, "That's about one San Diego from here" (125 miles) or "That's almost two San Franciscos" (400 miles each). There are smaller units (the Danny's House) and one prominent large one (the New Orleans). So a six-day road trip in a motor home at two San Diegos a day could easily run you about two thirds of a Used Modern Buddy in fuel alone.

I grew up with boats and continued to own them as an adult. No boats now.

My last was a 30 ft Hunter Sailboat. I kept it at a marina in Oshkosh Wisconsin
at the Pioneer Inn on lake Winnebago. The name on the back of the boat was
"Just Copin". Sort of a play on my last name and the fact I could barely afford it.

We referred to boat ownership as "Standing in a cold shower ripping up $50 Bills".

Scooting is a whole lot less expensive.

Bob Copeland

For time constrained distance trips, I tend to think in hotel rooms and half-increment IronButts. Especially when trying to figure out car (minivan) or bike. Difference in fuel cost is measured in hotel room nights when camping isn't an option.

You're a youngster and probably haven't received the paperwork yet from the US Department of Geezerdom. Congress passed laws in the 1960s banning old men from working on ladders and doing their own tree work with anything other than a pruning saw.

So I won't be taking a chainsaw out to handle this bit of business. I do feel a bit of regret, I can envision one or two viral videos on YouTube for my efforts. One huge, dead 100 foot fir tree is ten feet from the power lines. And the neighbor's house. Two of the others will require climbing and rigging that is beyond my physical prowess. But it would be great to create sparks and see the tree crash through a livingroom!

The quote came today, a post-colonoscopy gift for me. I was wrong -- the job is 7/8 of a 2022 Vespa GTS 300 HPE. Oh well, money is for spending.

I successfully dodged the sailboat bug a couple times. I finally received full immunization during a transit from Jacksonville to Peakes Island, Maine. Enough storm related damage to repair at sea to last me a lifetime. And listening to my friend's accounting of the costs of owning a 37 foot Hans Christian cutter was painful. At least he lived at the water and not my rationalized 4 hours from the water perfect situation of ownership rattling in my head.

No doubt that decision to not buy a boat is why I can afford to pay for trees!

If I were younger, and you could actually get a lift into position, and if it were possible to cut and drop pieces (this job will require roping each piece down) it is exactly what I would have tried.

The tree service has a spider lift with a 150 foot boom that can traverse uneven ground and boulders to get into position. The rental lifts would never get there. Oh well.

I had a colonoscopy this morning. The removal proposals were awaiting my return. I spoke to the doctor before the procedure. He does 13 to 15 a day. I wonder if he does the same calculations as the obstetrician??

Isn't there a saying, along the lines of "two of the greatest moments in a man's life are the day he buys a boat, and the day he sells a boat?"

I paid just over $6,000 out the door for both Rocket and the Xmax.

So $6,000 has long been the incremental value I assign to big expenses. One Rocket.

When I fell off of Vanessa on a dirt road in Nevada, the part of the hospital visit not covered by insurance, plus hotel and flying home was one Rocket.

Painting my house last year. One Rocket.

Painting my office this year. Strangely, also one Rocket.

And for Greasy and Steve, the cost of a a funeral after falling out of a tree? Several Rockets.

Plus the black borders would be around even longer.

Bill

I was relating to this thread but Seamus, Volvo $2,000? My wife drives a S-80. It's now ten years old. At that I can't buy a hubcap for $2,000.

Anyway I look at it from a motorcycle perspective. I'm spending my heirs inheritance one motorcycle at a time. Last year a Gold Wing, this year another GTS. Before those a Can Am Spyder then a Super Cub. The garage is out of room. I'm a geezer I don't know how many more motorcycles I have time to buy.

We rented a Genie Z45. Solid machine. Only 45 foot lift to the bottom of the platform, hence the name.

Anything 150 feet up is probably attached to something 45 feet up. I say Timberrrrrrrrrrr

But yes, looking forward to reaching the point in life where I can just sit back and outsource. For now, DIY jobs when possible for me.

Buzzard,

I relate to your buying style. I had no need for, but, really wanted to get
the Honda Super Cub.

There are stereotypes. As a career salesman, I am a 12 step member of
Over Buyers Anonymous OBA. Joke: You stand up in the meeting and
say "My name is Bob Copeland, I'll take two of those".

I expect you exercise more restraint and control.

Bob Copeland

I think HF did away with coupons.
If the trees are that tall, it would take at least an 18" gas saw, a whole bunch of wedges and an ax. You would probably want someone to rope them off from the top too, and put pressure on them to fall the right way, and you need to really know how to notch a tree so it falls where you want it to, especially if you are trying to get them to fall away from their natural lean, which is fairly common when they are that close to the house.
You would think felling large trees is a required course at Humboldt State, but I learned all this over the last summer, when I had the distinct pleasure, and moments of sheer terror, felling about fifteen big 60-70 year old trees on the property. Three of them were within 10 feet of the house. Now I'm learning about disposing of the remains of fifteen big trees. Fortunately, you can burn just about anything here and the gf is a pyromaniac.

Aren't you on the wrong side of the lake to be posting that?

...But seriously, I want to see the grater that goes with that thing.