Jade Gets Shanked

Haven't done a lot about Jade here, because there hasn't been a whole lot to post about, but now I've got a couple things. A couple weeks back we were driving home one evening, and there was a loud noise from under the hood and the alternator light came on. Pretty instantly I correctly analysed the problem to be the serpentine belt to have let go. We're around 7 miles or so from home still, but on the freeway and moving pretty good, and it's been California-cold these nights, so I kept her moving with an eye on the gauges. Coming off the ramp by our home, and it made a pretty bad sound going around, so I pulled into a parking lot for a quick visual inspection. Sure enough, there's tattered belt, but nothing else seems out of sorts. I proceed home, going around the back way, which is not as steep so as not to get the engine any hotter than it already is. About halfway, it starts not going, like the engine has lost power or the transmission is slipping a lot. Parked and walked home for the other car to fetch my wife.

On my way home the next evening I pick up a new belt, then head over with my tools and a scissor jack. The belt is a little tight, but is a lot easier if you pull the top engine mount off and jack up the engine a bit. Only five nuts to pull the mount, but I'd forgotten to grab my 15mm deep socket, so it didn't come off so easy. Tried with my combo wrench, and could only get one. Oh well, I'll try just snaking it in and working the tensioner to see if I have any luck. I start trying to get the belt in position, and notice it's short an idler pulley. Hmmm... I start looking closer, and there it is, down by the crank pulley!!! I fish it out, and even find the bolt that is supposed to hold it on resting on the frame rail!!! Looks like the bearing on it has seized up, and I theorize that having done so, it unscrewed the bolt. Looks like I'm not finishing tonight (and it's just starting to rain) so I try starting her up and driving her, and she works just fine for the little bit over the hill and down to our home. The next night I picked up a pulley and finished that job off with no further issue, and she's been running fine since.

THEN, this last Friday, We're out on our way to pick the younger up from school and head out for some dinner, and as we're getting near I start hearing a tick-tick rotational noise coming from the rear right. Huh. When we arrive, I go to investigate, and as I near the offending corner, I can hear the air hissing out!!!

I check it out, and discover it feels like a spike sticking an inch or more out of the inner sidewall!!! I ask my awesome shadetree mechanic friend if he's got a local place that'll sell me a tire, and he says he's got one guy who'll set me up with a used one for $35, or another place that will sell me a new one for around $55. Of course, for $20 difference, I'm going new!!!

We head over, and since he knows the guy he goes in and asks the guy if he's got a tire for $50, and the guy right off says yeah. Should have said less!!! I say at that price I'll take two!!! That's all mounted and balanced, for just a bit more than some shops charge just for the labor!!! A bit more background, Jade had two nice Goodyears on the back when we bought her, and a couple cheapies worn off on the edges in the front, and a pretty good pull to the right. Early on, we took her for an alignment where the guy noted the disparity in tires and suggested rotating the good ones to the front, which I'd already been planning. He did so at a bargain rate.

Anyway, that's the good news, it got the bad tire. When he got it off, it turned out to be a hex driver bit that had nicely speared the sidewall. In the shot of the strut, you can see it has an area where the paint is chipped away to metal!!!

Turned out, it was a lot longer than it originally appeared!!!

Hinkey

Since my last post, I've managed to get a couple things taken care of. I took her to an alignment shop and got that taken care of. I also disconnected the idle control valve and sprayed the connector with some contact cleaner, and that seems to have fixed that problem. When I was getting the steelie out of the shed, I'd discovered a BF Goodrich tire I'd saved when I'd bought tires last for Scruffy, because it was in great condition. Another project altogether, the back tires on the Falcon have been going flat again for a while. I had one off already, so I jacked up the other side to pull the other one. I was using the jack from the Camaro, which is like a horizontal bumper jack with a cantilevered arm at the end. As soon as I got the tire off and was going to set it down on a jack stand, it tipped the jack up and slid about a half a foot over, onto the floor pan!!!

Took the Falcon wheels and the oldie but goodie BF Goodrich over to a tire shop while I was getting the alignment done and had it mounted on the back right that kept going flat, and bought a new pair of tires for the Falcon. With that steelie on the front left and the BF on the rear right, I've got a half decent set of tires on Scruffy!!!

The new tires for the Falcon were largely so I could move her around some, and have some driveway room opened up!!! Not to mention, it pretty much gets it back to road ready at any point, only other things would be going through the exhaust hangers and replacing them. As previously mentioned, 3 is up for a smog check, and preparatory to that I was doing an oil change and piston soak. We went on a quest for Shamrock Shakes and Szechuan Sauce on Monday in the Falcon, and parked her on the street. Tuesday I drove 3 to work, and backed her into the driveway when I got home. After I'd eaten, I pulled the plugs and started the piston soak procedure. Wednesday I cranked all the oil out, and did round two on the soak. Friday I cranked the oil out again, did the oil change, and rotated the tires for the first time in a while. I'd been hoping to get the 17's onto Scruffy, but ran out of time. This morning I went out to drive her, and hitting the remote to unlock her did nothing. Huh. Used the key on the door like a caveman, and discovered why the remote wasn't working!!! The battery was completely dead!!! I've got the charger on her now, and discovered that I'd popped the trunk, probably Friday afternoon, so it was likely the trunk light did the deed.

Anyway, I've been rolling more miles than usual on Scruffy this week. Mostly she's been doing fine, but there's one thing. Long ago, I'd bought a replacement radio for Scruffy (can't remember, or find a post if I did one, may even have been for Janice) that seemed pretty sweet. It's "mechless", meaning it has no physical drives, but has input for Aux cord, an SD card slot, and a USB jack you can play music through, as well as AM/FM tuner. Also was a bit before Bluetooth connectivity was much of a thing for car radios. It seemed pretty good, but it doesn't tune AM very well at all, and the display is pretty dim. Recently it has gotten to where the display will go out completely. Another thing she's doing is sometimes the fuel gauge won't work. The last couple weeks, if one is working, the other doesn't!!!

Down With the Other Half!!!

Last Friday I finished off the lowering job on the back end of Scruffy. It was considerably easier and more straightforward than the front!!!

Of course, it was just springs and struts on this portion, no suspension components other than those. I'm quite pleased with the way it sits!!! Even with the bald tires, it still seems to corner quite well, too!!! Scraped the exhaust on two speed bumps and a driveway so far.

I think I'd better start carrying around some blocks, it's almost impossible to get a jack under it now!!! In addition to the passenger rear tire, the driver's side front tire has been losing air, so I stuck the one remaining steelie on the front for now.

The end of the tailpipe had been tweaked where it was pointing right at the rear tire in the center of the tread. I managed to get it bent to where it's way forward of it.

One other thing, it had this flexy plastic air dam under the front. I have a feeling it wouldn't last long at this altitude. It's gone!!!

On the way home, it was running strange. Idling high, around 2,000 to 3,000 RPM. Way back when we were still shopping for Jade, I'd replaced the idle control valve because it had been stalling. Now it's gone the other way. I'm not sure it might be because it hasn't gotten much driving since I put it in, and the computer hasn't quite adjusted to it yet. I popped the hood that evening, and pushed on the connector a little, and it came down to where it should be. Maybe just dirty contacts??? Hopefully this coming Friday I'll get the alignment done and start driving it a bit more!!!

Erosion

Over the weekend I changed the air filter and spark plugs on Jade. The previous weekend I'd performed a "piston soak" on it. Most S series Saturns usually end up burning oil at higher mileage, and short of taking the engine apart and drilling drain holes in the stock pistons or getting new ones, this is about the only fix. I have performed this operation many times, but had recently come across a detailed procedure. I had been using maybe a quarter ounce of Marvel Mystery Oil on previous rounds, but the procedure actually calls for about two ounces in each bore!!! That, and letting it sit for a good 24 hours or more, rotating it, and repeating it if you are able. I did so on Scruffy, but since I haven't lowered the back end, I've been holding off on the alignment, so I haven't been driving her, so I have no idea how well that's worked. Anyway, at the low miles Jade has I wouldn't have expected her to be going through much, if any, oil, but I was mistaken. Don't know how much good that's done yet, either, but while I was doing it, I noticed this!!!

I've never seen a spark plug with this much wear!!! Look at that!!! It actually burned a circle opposite the electrode!!!

The side view shows that it's considerably thinner, too.

I'm not sure if they were the originals or dealer installed replacements, but I'd bet they've been in there at least 50,000 miles. They were AC Delcos, and I think the factory ones were NGK's.

Interestingly, 3 is the only Saturn I've owned that hasn't had oil useage issues, but it's just past 90,000 miles thus far. I don't believe either of the others began with much oil use, either, but the mileage was also lower when we got them. 3 is up for an oil change, and I'm thinking I'll give her a piston soak before I do it, too, just as a preemptive measure. Also, it's nearing it's 2 year anniversary, and thus is up for it's first smog check since I've owned it. I don't predict any issues with that, but also this year Scruffy will be due. That may prove more problematic.

Creepy Caterpillar

This was pretty cool. I probably can't really take credit for it, but I'm going to anyway!!! Back in October on the Woody Show, Greg was telling about a nightmare he'd had of caterpillars. I sent them over this text:

Well, just last week they posted this video!!!

I thought there was a detail that got edited out where there was a camera inside and Woody had a screen where you could watch inside. I was thinking of trying my hand at doing a drawing of this situation. The other scene I'd like to try to make a drawing of is when Menace fell asleep on the floor before he could make it to the couch, and have his dogs thinking about eating him!!!

Half Drop

Since a month and a half (or so) back, when I got started, I've been collecting parts...

Before I mount up the new rims and tires, I wanted to get it aligned. Before I got it aligned, I wanted to replace the tie rod ends, ball joints and struts. While I'm at it, I wanted to drop it down just a bit. Auto Zone had a deal going on for struts, buy two and get the 2nd one half off. Not bad. Of course, no one has them in stock, so I had to mail order them. Rock Auto had about the best prices around for Moog suspension components, so they got my business for that. Dropped springs, I ended up buying from some place I'd never heard of before, but they had the best price on about the only brand that you can actually get anymore.

Most of the stuff came pretty quick, except for the front struts. Auto Zone sends me a message a couple days after I'd ordered them saying there was going to be a little delay. OK, no big rush. A couple weeks later, and they still haven't shown up. Got in touch, and they say so sorry, we don't have them in stock, and the manufacturer doesn't know when they will make anymore. Nice. I start shopping around. Amazon has a vendor who's got one on closeout for cheap. Sold!!! Only problem, the key word there is one. Look around some more, and Rock Auto has some on clearance for around twice as much, but still it comes out to a decent price altogether. Last Friday I head over to my parents house to try and get it all together. Start on the passenger side, and after pulling it apart, I'm getting ready to put the new spring onto the new strut. I open up the box from Rock and go to put it together, and discover that the strut is already pretty worn out, it would seem. It didn't automatically extend, and had very little resistance to movement. Huh. It looked pretty clean, but the top threads look discolored, and it has a hex drive for the shaft instead of a torx. I suspect someone returned their old one. I pull out the Amazon one, and it's much better. Put that side together, and it's around the end of the work day already.

I had to work the next day, but afterwards I found an Auto Zone that has a strut in stock, and swung by there and picked it up. It was late by the time I finished it, but got it wrapped up in time to get the spring compressor and the inner tie rod tool returned. Still have rear end to do, but it should be half the job of what the front was. It pulls to the left, but everything feels tight!!!

Not a huge drop, but I wasn't going for that anyway. You can also see in the final shot the black replacement fender.

More to come...

Haulin'

Or, "Will it Fit: Mobile Edition"

Last Friday we stopped in to a Goodwill store, and there was a fine looking recliner. Great condition, and a great price. On Christmas I had been lamenting that another Christmas come and gone, and still no new recliner. Of course, with the three of us, there was no room to haul it. Headed back the next day, but in the interim, came across a futon!!! My younger has been wanting one for quite a while. I actually told my parents that if they could find a good used one, he'd like that for Christmas, but once again, no dice. See, I was hoping that would happen, as they have better equipment for hauling.

So, him and I took Scruffy out there the next day, first stop where the futon was. Brought along much rope with the thought of, if it'll fit, hang it out the back and strap the hatch down with rope, a la the water heater adventure. Try as we might, it was a big no go for that, too. Headed over to the Goodwill, and picked up the recliner, which of all amazements, fit!!! As I had thought, it has to be in a reclined position, but that's all.

Called up my dad and asked if I could borrow his Trail Blazer. Don't think I'd made mention, but he got a Trail Blazer. Someone turned left in front of him in his Durango around a year ago and totaled it. The Trail Blazer is its replacement, and a fine machine. He took it off road a few months back for the first time in 29 Palms along with my mother, and they managed to get turned off the trail onto a crossing dry streambed, so they did do some trail blazing!!! Anyway, they got stuck in the loose sand and ended up spending the night in the desert, and found the cargo area to be lacking in length to sleep in. Thus, when I asked to borrow it to haul a futon, they said they didn't think it would fit inside. Well, still have ropes and tie downs, one way or the other, we got this. Well, surprise!!! Just a little tilt, and it fit in without any trouble!!! I took this picture and sent it to my dad with the message, "Don't know what your problem is!!!"

This last shot is the recliner again, only with no flash. It's a little fuzzy, but I liked the look!!!

Yule '17

Many days pass away, as always busy as can be at this time of year. Here's a little recap!!!

Started the month off with the company Christmas party. Since the year we had it under the shuttle at the Science Center, it's been the tradition to have every other year at some sort of destination. This year was at Harry Potter land in Universal Studios!!!

That was a lot of fun, first time I've been to Universal out here since they put in Harry Potter, and a lot of other stuff. I'm pretty sure it was 2008 last time I was there. Only time I'd been on the Harry Potter ride was last time we were in Florida, and it was real soon after it had opened, and it was a zoo!!! Don't know if I ever posted about that, we had been staying at the Nickelodeon resort, and had been to one of the two Universal parks there the day before. My wife and the younger boy wanted to take a day off and just stay at the hotel that day, so only the firstborn and I went to that park. Besides the ridiculous crowds in that area, a couple things I remember were the Jurassic Park themed area with water cannons shaped like velociraptor heads, and some indoor area where a bunch of foreign kids laid down for their siesta. But I digress.

My wife doesn't get around walking for any length of time so well these days, so we rented her a wheelchair after we'd walked the half mile or so down City Walk to get in the park. Asked them about returning it after hours, you know, like when the rest of the park is closed and it's just the company party until late. "Oh, no problem, we'll have someone there" they said. You can guess how that went. I wandered deep into the bowels of that area, and when we finally got someone over there, they had issues getting the register back open.

I went on the Harry Potter ride, which was pretty much a walk on with such a reduced amount of people there. Got up to the first projection dome, and the ride broke down!!! Started back up a couple minutes later, but the video for that part didn't go, so we were shaking around and the audio was going, but no visual. On the way out, they directed us to a short cut if we wanted to go again. Three of the four of us who'd been on with me (all bin fillers!!!) did it.

Since I've got a troll living in my basement now, a lot of the stuff down there has been moved around. I'd seen these before, but never set them up. Vintage Christmas decorations, Santa and his reindeer!!! Well, 8 of 9 anyway.

This year I strung my lights to a pole, something I'd done years ago, again, simulating a Christmas tree. I also finally got rid of all the old incandescent Christmas lights I had knocking around which I haven't used in probably 5 years or more, replaced by LED lights. Oh yea, there's a vintage color wheel down there I'd been seeing the box for for years, finally dragged it out and replaced the heat lamp with an LED bulb, and picked up a white tree to change from the super campy pink tree we've been using for years, and used it with the wheel. It's different, kinda nice for a change. That, as well as Christmas morning, I've got on my DSLR card, I'll unload at some point.

Then there was the annual announcement of the profit sharing (480%, very good, and word is next year should be good, too) goody day, and profit sharing distribution day. Should I say here that, with that very generous profit sharing, this is my first year breaking six figures??? Might as well, I don't think hardly anyone reads this. Comment if you do!!!

Just like the end of last year, I'm hearing a lot of people complaining about what a terrible year 2017 has been. I don't get it. Worst I can say about it was I had a few people I know passed.

On Christmas Eve we went to John's Incredible Pizza. They were having a deal, and it was as empty as I've ever seen it!!! They had this cheese bread which was basically pizza crust with cheese. My childhood friend Sean had been sensitive to tomato sauce, claimed it was too spicy for him, so he'd always order pizza with no sauce. In fact, around a week before I heard about his death, my younger was saying how he was one of the most sensitive to spicy food people, and I regaled him with tales of Sean and his sauceless pizzas. At the celebration for Sean, one of the guys who spoke of how he'd order pizza, so on into his forties he was still having it that way!!! Of course, I had to have a slice of their "cheese bread" in his memory.

Last Saturday, Alt 98.7 was doing a meet and greet at a T-Mobil store over on Whittier Boulevard, with Ravey from The Woody Show meeting the plebs. It was 2 till 4, and I am out of work at 3:30 on Saturdays, and it's about halfway between work and home, so I was able to go over and visit. I like all the guys on the show, but after meeting and getting to talk to Ravey in person for a bit, I like her even better now!!! She's cool. Never made a post on it this year, but we'd gone to the Renaissance Faire on the same day she did. Never saw her there, but on the way in the station had a booth set up. They set us up with a couple shirts, that's where I got the sweet #ALLIN shirt in the picture. It's super soft material, too.

The very next day, at John's Incredible, got to meet and take a picture with Incredibear!!!

More Red Flags...

I'm sure you've seen the terrible wildfires going on in Southern California. For the first time in a long while they actually called red flag day in my neighborhood. Before last years' vacation to Tennessee, it looked like there was a possibility of there being one while we were gone (we managed to dodge the first summer heat wave) but to avoid the possibly of having my cars impounded I used the day before we left to sell off the carcass of Baby as well as the wreck of my old Scirocco. Looking back, the place I had all the pictures of my ol' Scirocco aren't in service any more. May have to dust some off if I can find 'em to repost here.

Anyway, last week they called a red flag day on Tuesday, I believe. Our area never had much wind at all, which is one of the components of the alert. The conditions are defined as wind speeds 25 mph or more and humidity 15% or less (cut and pasted from their website). Accordingly, the next day it was lifted. Of course, the areas around us were burning, so the next day it was back in effect, once again with little wind in our area. For one day. As you can see, the Gif I made up shows it switching from one status to another with only a few seconds between. Apparently you need to manually refresh.

I know what the reasoning behind the red flag days is, and have no problem with it... EXCEPT they always call it when conditions aren't actually met!!! The local news outlets aren't much help, either, their maps pretty much show everything south of Frisco as being active red flag areas.

There. I haven't had an actual raving here for a while!!!

And So It Begins

That tenuous transitional step between concept and reality, to actually stop just thinking about something and start doing something. I suppose the real first step was finding Jade (thus far the name my wife has decided on for her new ride, as good a name as any, I suppose. She is SO happy with her, you'd think I bought her a new Cadillac!!!) so I can get to modding on Scruffy. The next, and and finally getting some actual skin in the game, step occurred on this last Friday. New tires are a very soon necessity for her (Scruffy), and prior to doing that, I'd wanted to locate the next set of rims, to keep from having to pay to get the tires moved around. Currently she's rolling on the alloys that came on 3, which are also the exact same style as jade has. All that works out, because one of them on Scruffy was said to have been bent, and feels like it at certain speeds. A couple on each also have some curb damage, so between them there's likely a good set.

SO, I had the idea to find some steelies I could moon-cap and maybe do in the contrast color, whatever that turns out to be. I slightly rued having sent the originals of Scruffy's west with Baby, but in the interest of saving alloys, it was necessary. Also, it looks like the profile of Saturn steelies isn't well suited to having a center cap hub cap. Lots of cars have the same bolt pattern, so it shouldn't be too difficult to find a junkyard set that would work, and over Thanksgiving weekend, my dad and I were thinking of heading over for their sale day. That never happened, I worked Black Friday for the double time and a half, as well as my normal Saturday shift, and it was far too busy to get that in.

Another thing I'd been looking at was some manufacturers are now making larger rims of steel. First noticed this on the lady friends' Scion, which has hub caps on 16" wheels. I was going to jam her up and see if she'd be interested in trading for some factory Saturn alloys that would have a lower cost to put tires on, but alas, it's the newer model with 5 lugs. As is my custom, I kept looking around to see what people might be selling, and came upon these!!! Not what I had in mind, but a good looking style that will go fairly well with the primer black aesthetic I have in mind, and are also larger diameter. Currently they have 205-40R-17's on them, which are shorter but wider than what I've got, but by just a tad each way. Nets about 3/8" of drop. There's probably a year's worth of tread left on them, but I'm planning on going with 35's eventually, which will be even smaller than what I've got, as well as surprisingly affordable!!! That will get a total drop of about 3/4", plus the around 1 1/2" that dropped springs get. Of course, that's a ways out still, and will give me plenty of time to decide if I like it fine with what I've already got. Speaking of affordable, the guy only wanted $200 for the whole set, which of course is almost less than just getting 4 tires mounted!!! No curb rash whatsoever. Ironically, they were off the earlier model Scion with the same bolt pattern as Saturns.

So now it's time to start getting other things in order. The wear patterns on the current tires suggest that things aren't right with the alignment, and I know the tie rod ends are shot. At 190,000, likely that's not all!!! If I'm going to be putting in dropped springs, she'll be needing an alignment anyway, and may as well refresh everything before that happens. Of course, while I'd be putting on new springs, new struts are only logical. I have ordered both the springs and struts thus far, and will soon be ordering tie rod ends and ball joints. May also get some polyurethane bushings to tighten everything up even more!!! I'd already planned on going with rebuilds on all the brake cylinders while I'm in the course of refitting and new hoses, as well as probably new rotors and pads up front, since I'll have to give everything that will show through the new rims a coat of paint. Oh yeah, also I ordered the necessary lug nuts to fit on such a rim.

This morning I took the original picture from when we'd first got her where I'd tinted the rear windows and put it back in Paint Shop Pro. First I removed the rear doors, then made the panels continuous from front to back. Came out better than the first attempt!!!

Hmmm, while I have Paint Shop Pro going, how about seeing how she'd look with a bit of a drop??? With them old hub caps, no less!!! Got that done, and did the scroll back and forth between the files, and was amused by the jumping effect of the drop I'd performed... a GIF is in order!!!

After that, I messed with the shadow to make it look proper, then black and whited it to simulate primer, as well as mirroring it to make it look different than the other shots.

Hey, you may ask, what about your idea to gull wing her??? Still knocking around in me melon, it is, but thought I'd share the sketch lady friend did before I did mine, back on the reunion lunch day. There you have it, folks, the first rendering of a Saturn Gull Wing Wagon!!! Upon completion, it was noted that it looked a bit like a space alien!!!

Collect All Three!!!

So, Scruffy is getting a bit long in the tooth. Over 190,000 miles now she has. She still runs good... kind of. In the last couple weeks she had a low idle issue on and off, happened once while I was driving her, and then started again about a week back, more on than off. What's more, the transmission has been acting up a bit. Not a whole lot, but for the last few months losing a bit of fluid, and when that happens, she starts not upshifting. All it takes is a bit more transmission fluid, and she's good to go again. I was able to give the filter almost a quarter turn a bit ago, and it really hasn't had that problem since. Of all the Saturns we've had, this is the only one I've had this issue with, and several times!!! More troubling is sometimes shifting into reverse, it'll not go, then finally do a slam into gear. I've seen this symptom before, and I suspect a bad solenoid, which is fairly easy to do, but at the same time rather involved. Oh yeah, the tires are at the end of their lives, too.

So for quite a while I've been keeping an eye out. Mostly the criteria was automatic, power windows and door locks, and low miles at a decent price. A couple months back I'd seen an ad for a fairly low mile wagon that looked good in the pictures. Ended up not looking nearly as good in person, and I messaged that back to the seller and left without even taking it for a spin. Not long after I saw another wagon with similar low miles. Ad didn't specify if it had power windows and locks, so I'd messaged them and asked, to which they replied yes, come and have a look. I moved money around until I had it in hand, then went out to take a look, planning on jumping on it if it ran and looked as good as the pictures. Got there, and what do you know, no power windows and door locks!!! What, do you think I'm not going to notice that??? Don't waste my time.

Kept an eye out, and one I kept seeing recently was priced on the high end of my range, $2,500, with 90,000 miles. Looked fairly clean in the pictures, and had the bonus of a sunroof. The distinction I'd never heard of was that he had it listed as a "Glenview Edition". Last Friday my curiosity got the best of me, and we went out and looked at it. The mechanical and interior were fairly flawless, and the body wasn't especially bad, but had all the bumpers scraped, a tweak in the lower part of the driver's door down to the metal frame, and a wrinkle on the front of the hood. While we test drove it, he told us of one time he'd come out and found footprints over the top, and on the sunroof!!! After the test drive, I noticed a small dent on the back of the roof that fit the tale. Indeed, it had "Glenview Edition" pinstriped on the side, and was fairly loaded, even having ABS and traction control, but with steel wheels instead of the alloys I would have expected. There was one more about an hour's drive away I wanted to look at with 100,000 miles but only asking $1,750. We headed out, but Friday traffic was too much, and we went home instead, and I replaced the idle control valve that seems to have been causing the low idle problem on Scruffy.

When I'd gotten in touch with the second one on Friday letting them know I wouldn't make it that day, I asked if I could come by Saturday after work. They weren't going to be there, so I'd been planning on going Sunday. As is my custom, I kept looking, and Saturday night I saw an ad down in the farther away section. The price of $1,800 caught my eye, and the miles of 75,000 sweetened the deal. A scan through the pictures showed something that put it into the extraordinary category, white faced gauges!!! The only other ad I'd seen these in was a Red Hot edition coupe that I was never able to get in touch with the seller of. A closer look at the picture showed the Homecoming Commemorative Edition script on the tachometer.

These came with most of the options, and as the Red and White Hot coupes feature, blacked out badges. The interior has leather on the outer edges of the seats and cloth on the center portion, which given the propensity of G.M. leather to crack out, seems like a distinct advantage!!!

Also featured on the Homecoming Commemorative Edition was a pearl Mint Green paint. The paint has seen better days, having quite a bit of clear coat delamination on the hood, trunk, rear wing (also included in the package), and door surrounds. The seller hadn't done the current smog check on it, but I was reasonably confident that it would pass with no issue. It did, with almost undetectable amounts of NOX. I offered $1,600 on account of the lack smog check, and they agreed. Less than a minute later, they said they'd take an additional $100 off for the smog!!! Told my wife, "See, I can't spend more on your car than I did on mine!!!"

I'm seriously considering looking into getting a repaint on her, and there's a myriad of little things that could use fixed. Hadn't realized she has a salvage title, but with those low miles and niceish condition not a big deal. Being 18 years old, I don't think we'd ever get that much as a payout from anyone's insurance anyway, and hope to never find out. I'd like to get the back windows tinted, and a 512 Labs exhaust made up for it, but my wife kind of is enjoying the quietness of it right now. I'm thinking maybe just hack off the last muffler and straight pipe it out the back and see how that goes, or maybe put another resonator out back.

In the meantime, now I've got a wagon to play with!!! I've of course had the idea to sedan delivery her since we got her, and now I've also got the outlandish idea of doing gull wing doors!!! Before I get going on that, new tires are in order, and I've been kind of looking around for some 16" steelies I could wrap in low profile rubber, and I'd probably do a refresh on all the struts and tie rod ends as well as getting those lowering springs. Now all I need is a lot of time to do so.

Once again, The younger boy is pretty excited about it, showing off all the special features to his friends. My wife is thrilled with her new ride, and once again I was able to tell her "Merry Christmas!!!"

What I Got on My Vacation

Here's something of a throwback post, a few of the shirts I picked up on the last couple of vacations!!!

First up is a couple of shirts I got from last year, while we were in Tennessee. Pigeon Forge, in addition to all the arcades and mini golf and go carts, has several gift shops competing for your business. One we stopped into had 3 for $10 tee shirts advertised. Not all of them were, the better ones went for more.

I'd done an inventory of my shirts not long before we'd gone, and discovered I didn't have any red shirts. Found this one with the Smokies memorialized on it.

The rest of these are all from this year's trip to Texas. First up is also the highest price tag on this whole post from the Johnson Space Center.

The next three all came from our final stop in Galveston. One of the things we kind of look for while vacationing is restaurant chains we like that you just don't find here. One of these is Cici's Pizza buffet. Looking on the map, discovered one of those there, and just a bit over from it was a Goodwill. My wife had taken a little joke of a purse that kept spilling stuff out, so she wanted to go in to see if she could find anything. Shockingly, she did!!! I had the thought of looking for another shirt while we were there, but I ended up with three!!! First up has nothing to do with Texas, except for the fact that it is Sheldon's state of origin. It's a little small on me, but I couldn't resist!!!

The next couple are quite retro, but both in excellent condition. The one from 2009 is about as quintessential Texas as you can get, and also a color of shirt I don't have much of in my wardrobe!!!

The last one has two sides to it, and is also pretty Texas, with the longhorn skull on the front.

The back has what is now my only Harley Davidson branded shirt, along with Walker, Texas Lawyer, whatever that is!!!

In other news, I really have far too many tee shirts...

The Obligatory Halloween Post

I've got another post to instant blog at some point, but in interest of keeping things timely, I'll do this first, the Halloween post!!!

Since I had nothing in mind in particular this year, I was going to reprise my Karkat costume again for this year... if I could find my candy corns headband!!! It's been several years since I had them out, and figured once again I'd have many new people at work to admire it. Don't think I ever posted a picture of it here, but after the first two years I ran that one, I found a white headband and a white glove and went as High Five Ghost from The Regular Show. That costume, while well received by my co-workers, was very top heavy and wanted to fall forward or backward all day. Anyway, the Friday before we were at the 99 Cent store and they had these eyeball antennas, and I was sold!!! As you can see, I also had one of my favorite shirts, the eyeball surfing through a ring of fire to go with it. One of my co-workers said, "Great costume, I almost didn't recognize you!!!"

The younger had the plan to go as Kevin from Welcome to Night Vale, a fairly easy costume in the clothing area, a lot trickier in the make-up department. I didn't get a day or even a half day off this year, so I had none of that, but lady friend stepped up and did an AMAZING job!!! I figured the older and her would go out to WeHo or somewhere like that for Halloween, (which sounds like a nightmare to me, but like something they'd do) but they didn't do anything. A few weeks before they'd gone to the Universal Studios event and taken the R.I.P. tour, so they got in on some anyway.

Of course, it was late by the time I got home, so the younger already had gone around the block behind us, and had a decent bag going.

I'd noticed that the street at the base of our hill is relatively flat and has a lot of houses on the way home, so we went down there to try our luck there. It wasn't that good, a lot of houses with no lights on, but we did get to go by one house we knew had a couple dogs that bark at everyone. We walk by, and the smaller one comes out barking, and he turns his scary face towards it, and it backs way off, that was hilarious. On the way back we took a video of it, but it's kind of dark.

One of the houses we went to told of a street I'd never heard of they'd taken their kid to that was hopping and pretty flat. We drove over, and it was pretty late by then, but we still did better there!!!