Fenwroth, believe me, I have been through all of those options :). Pizzamaking forums are full of people defeating safety features on ovens trying to get the temp high. While that kind of works, the dynamics of a home oven still don't match the neopolitan cooking. So while it would be good to not have to fire up the wood oven for a quick meal by using higher temp, I would have probably still gone for the wood oven. As to using the grill outside, that is what I am going to do for our primary house. But in Seattle area where I live, it rains 6+ months. And for making Pizza, it is more convenient to do it in the kitchen as opposed to carrying things back and forth. So in the new kitchen we are opting to put the wood oven. As to Capital, yes, we are looking at that also in addition to bluestar. So far, I am concerned about the sealed burners but have not done enough research to know if it will really bother us. Also, their 30K wok burner takes 24-inches which pushes us to get a 60 inch unit to have a griddle which is larger than what we were planning for. We may still go for it as the appeal of 30K is high in our eyes :). But I am not quite there yet.

Yup, that would be it! (There's something ironic about dogbane growing all over a hill where people regularly walk their dogs..)

Thanks for the responses. When I had my 50th birthday party, I wasn't thinking about gifts at all, so it didn't occur to me to write "no gifts" on the invite. But judging from the number of gifts I received, most people think a gift is obligatory for a birthday party, no matter the age. I suspect that my friend's situation is similar--she didn't write "no gifts" because she's thinking "party," not "birthday." The guest list is expansive, not just "ladies." Family, friends, husbands, kids are all invited. Come to think of it, gifts may be completely overwhelming. Nonetheless, I did get something for my friend, so I will do at least a card, and maybe a token gift, for her friend as well. The evite had a slide show of the two of them going back to 1987. It was very cute and sweet.

What are your top dimensions please? I’m betting they were out of slab which would explain the long seam placement. On the other hand, the perfect vein match makes me think it was one piece at one time. The quality of that seam is unacceptable, considering today’s CNC machines and SeamPhantom. They didn’t use factory specified color match adhesive, a rookie mistake, and grossly underestimated the fussinesses and sophistication level of their customer. They have to pay for these errors.