So, having bought our new-to-us Camry on Friday, and brought it home Saturday, I noticed some interesting things about it Sunday.

It has THREE brands of tires on it. The front tires look new, but they’re called ‘Road King’ or something like that. The passenger rear was a Dunlop P4000 touring tire, and the driver’s side rear was a BFGoodrich something-or-other.

The BFGoodrich tire was also backwards.

Some tires, particularly rain tires, have V-shaped treads that dissipate water, IF THEY’RE MOUNTED CORRECTLY! If they’re not, they approximate the wet-road traction of a greased pig.

Yep…this is the Quentin Tarantino version of my weekend…

So, this morning, I arise at ye earlie momente of 5am, make coffee, scour the house for my badge, finally leaving with a backpack full of books, computer, power brick, passport, and other assorted goods.

(And, I just remembered…without lunch…CRAP!)

So, I get to the security room, and notice that the interior of my car reeks of coffee. I unzip my backpack to find the thermos tipped over. Usually, this isn’t a problem, the thermos is watertight and double-sealed at the top…

there are no words….. big gaping hole gasping w…

Whitney - Nov 4, 2006

there are no words…..

big
gaping
hole
gasping
wretch
vomit

no…..none of them quite say it….

This doesn’t sound much like Lou:

Only 15 percent of eligible voters turned out to cast a ballot in this year’s primary elections, according to an American University study. Never before have so few of us bothered to vote in primary elections. And it’s no wonder. Our middle class is beginning to get the joke.

Most Americans understand that all the major decisions have already been made.

His point on outsourcing is apt: No matter which party is in power, outsourcing manufacturing will continue unabated. The next congress and definitely the next presidency will see the utter collapse of Ford or Chrysler (possibly both), destroying the heart of the middle class.

Actually I think that started when it became cheap…

Whitney - Nov 3, 2006

Actually I think that started when it became cheaper to import steal from China than manufacture it domestically - and thus 98% of the steel industry was outsourced to China. America is so stupid in terms of self-sufficiency. And yes, btw, the whole PC global economy, era of the world is a load of crap.

We spent 12 hours yesterday and ~2 hours today looking over cars, and we found-out several things:

* Old Buicks. Wow…no one can amortize production costs like General Motors. The Buick Century we looked at definitely felt like a quality buick from 1985, manufactured in 2002, right down to the front bench, column shifter, and coarse, powerless engine.

* Mazda 626, a very surprising, well-handling machine, but too small for our needs, we think. Whitney had a ball driving it, but it felt like a ’tween’ car…between a civic/corolla and a decent family sedan. Also, CR doesn’t like them too much

Well, if you run out of rental coverage, you can b…

Jeff Roberts - Oct 1, 2006

Well, if you run out of rental coverage, you can borrow the Elantra for a couple of days. I don’t mind driving the truck (no A/C) in this nice, cool weather.

Link

Still, I don’t really care. I want my ER doctor to understand anatomy, even if all she has to do is put the computerized defibrillator nodes on my chest and push the big red button, and I want programmers to know programming down to the CPU level, even if Ruby on Rails does read your mind and build a complete Web 2.0 social collaborative networking site for you with three clicks of the mouse.

Good article, the site’s now in my at-work RSS fee…

Jeff Roberts - Oct 5, 2006

Good article, the site’s now in my at-work RSS feed list.

It’s not final yet, but our Intrigue is junkyard bound. Whitney got a call from the ‘State Farm Total Loss’ department, which we assume implies it’s totaled.

I went by this morning, and collected what few things I’d left last week–garage door opener, some CDs, lotion, hair brads/clips/scrunchees. The poor car looked so sad…one year, 25k relatively trouble-free miles, we’re moving on.

Last night was narrowing the list…our requirements:

* Must be < 200" long (has to fit in our garage like Sharkey did).
* Within our budget
* Whitney must be able to drive it
* 4 doors
* Big enough to be a ‘family car’–stroller, car seat, etc.
* Safe
* Reliable
* Low operating costs–regular gas, good mileage, cheap/easy to repair.

Erik suckered me into reading another of his slightly-off books: Gil’s All-Fright Diner

Pretty neat, little book, read over 2 hours in 2 days. The premise is essentially a folksy, redneck buddy tale, but these two buddys Duke and Earl (yeah, ask Erik says, “You gotta know something’s up when the two main characters are named Duke and Earl”), they happen to be a Werewolf and a Vampire. Redneck Werewolf and Vamipire…

Further on the I need a small digicam front:

Driving home Monday, what should appear in my rear view mirror…silver with two blue-ish stripes?

Yep. Ford GT, Tailed by a bellicose Fox-bodied mustang with an exhaust, this guy wasn’t having any of it. Right at the Northern I-64/I-75 split the GT driver put his foot down and it was like the Stang had thrown out an anchor. He was GONE, all this on a roll from about 85mph (at which point, the GT was probably only at the top of 2nd gear!)

Haven’t slept very well since the excitement last week, and it’s wearing on me…my routine is off and I’m suddenly a very light sleeper. I still go to sleep easily, but I wake up very easily, too, and I’m having bad dreams.

And boy, have I just been a joy to be around–moody, sleepy, and quick tempered.

Everything’s just in limbo at the moment–all 3 projects I’m on, my car’s in the shop, Whitney’s car. Total state of suspended animation.

So, we picked Joey Actually-My-Name-is-Simon, and headed Team Combs over to McDonald’s in Shelbyville. While in McD’s, I noticed the fry assembly line: At one end, close to the drive-thru window is the holding area, where crisp, deep fried potatoes sit under a heat lamp in red McDonald’s packages awaiting customers.

To the right of that is the deep fryer, the heart of America’s burgeoning atherosclerotic crisis, where hyrdogenated vegetable oil at God-knows-how-hot fries the rather-uniform Taters as they sit in baskets. The fryer’s apparently run by a digital timer, set each time a basket lowers into the oil.

Gotta love a good mechanic’s vise:

Installed my birthday present from Stu on the orkbench today…felt like a crime drilling those 4 half-inch holes in that beautiful workbench, but it went pretty well.

It’s an awesome vise: Two positions, two work anvils, and it swivels through 360 degrees.

Other random photos:

Team Combs will be riding in style, yo

Joey, da ninja!

Nice vise. What I can see of the bench looks great…

Jeff Roberts - Oct 6, 2006

Nice vise. What I can see of the bench looks great, too. And the kid ain’t too shabby either :-)

Unless it turns out to be one of those suddenly-it’s-70-degrees-on-Halloween sort of years, he’s gonna need some lil’ ninja shoes!

Not much funny about this one.

Whitney’s fine, the baby’s fine, and the car (at first blush) looks repairable. Joey’s up with his dad in Louisville, so he’s good too.

Whitney was pulling across North Broadway in front of our church, from the Buzz Cafe to the church, and ran the right front of the car into the left side of a northbound Lexus GX470

They bumped at about a 45 degree angle.

Went to warn Sandra but remembered she had her fen…

Jeff Roberts - Oct 5, 2006

Went to warn Sandra but remembered she had her fender bender already. So I guess things DO come in threes!

Fall is often the time I turn over a new leaf. Surmounting my annual September insanity, October and November are often times of rededication and renewal. Weird, I know, because for everything else in the Northern Hemisphere, these are times of dormancy and decay.

So, yesterday, I did it again: For personal reasons, and after much consideration, I gave-up unbounded use of the internet at home. My wife is my accountability partner, guardian of the (changed) passwords to all accounts on our computer. It’s a pretty drastic step, but the last 10 years of so of my life have left me with little other choice.