4/11/07

We went to the shop last night. I got there first and installed the bushings on the wipers of Mr. Wiggly. I started to put them in and realized I had no idea which side they should go through. I took the mechanism out to the van and had a look. I figured it out and held my finger on the side of the hole the bushing was supposed to go through. I pressed the bushings in and filled them all with grease. Out at the van however, the bushings were in backwards! What the fuck? I took it back inside and flipped them. Back out to the van and I tried again. The first bushing popped on rather easily. Unfortunately, it popped right back off just as easily. I was getting pissed. I looked at it again and decided that the first pop was just to hold it in place so some real force could be applied. I used the big-assed channel lock pliers and squeezed the hell out of it. It popped on with a much more satisfying feel. I did the rest and tried the motor. They turned nicely. I grabbed the wiper arms and started to install them. I remembered that you have to install the valance first before I got too far into it fortunately. I installed the valance and then the blades. I tested them and had to reset one of the arms so it wiped a better path. I was happy. I decided to check the fluids while I had the hood up. The water was fine. I checked the oil but the dipstick looked like it had been anywhere but inside an engine. John has shown up by now and asks what I'm up to when I come in and start rooting around for “dinosaur juice.” Most of the oil in the shop is synthetic and the only non-synthetic I can find are two quarts of Texaco Havoline Supreme and three quarts of Castrol GTX. I knew the Havoline was John's and the Castrol was mine so I opted for the latter. John asked how low the oil was and I said, “Pretty damned.” I fashioned a filling rig from a funnel and piece of hose, because I didn’t want to remove the doghouse to get to the “easy” cap. I poured in the first quart and checked the level. I didn’t think it would show up yet and was right. I poured in the second quart and checked the level. It was now up to the “Add” line on the dipstick. I went back inside and got the third quart of oil and poured it in. Now we read in between the “Add” and “Full” marks. It could have used another half a quart but I didn’t feel like popping open another bottle. I'll check it again next fill up, probably. I fired the engine and went for a mini hoon. I drove down to the RV dump station by the entry to the lake, south of the shop. I really like that van! I almost drove it home and in to work this morning but didn’t. I went back to the shop and parked. I noticed the other day that the nut in the middle of the steering wheel had come loose and tightened it as much as I could with my bare hands. I decided it would behoove me to put a wrench on it since it had come slack yet again. If it fell off completely it wouldn’t cause the van to rage out of control nor would the wheel fall off in my hands, but still, better safe. I took the nut off and went in to find a socket. I found it and then shot a pretty good blob of Lock Tite in the threads. Back at the van, I ran the nut on and off a few times to spread the Lock Tite. I hunkered down on the nut with the wrench and reinstalled the “horn button.” I use quotes because it really doesn’t activate the horn but covers the center of the wheel. I lock up Mr. Wiggly and go in to see what John is doing. I decide to check the front bolt on the crank of the Seven again but don’t want to remove the nose. I jack it up and set the front on stands. I find the wrench and crawl under the car. It seems to be tight still but I ask John to come hold a screwdriver in the Hugh joints to back me up. It is still tight so I look around underneath for anything else that looks scary. I see nothing that needs immediate attention so I put the car back on its wheels. I reinstall the main fuse and try the starter. It spins nicely so I fire the fuel pump up. The car starts and settles into a nice idle. The electric fan speeds up each time I rev the engine so I know the alternator is working. I rev it for a bit to put a little more charge in the battery and then shut down. I remove the fuse again, just to be safe, and close her up until Friday. Now, I'm not sure if it was the massive turd working its way down my tract or the exhaust fumes, but I suddenly felt like hammered dog shit. I got up and walked outside with a bottle of water and felt a little better. John got a call from a dude who wants the HL A-10 wagon’s rear axle. They set a time for him to come get the whole car and Gregg called me. I talked to him for a bit and may have convinced him to bring the poo brown 210 to Miserable Smells for the Datsun track day on Saturday. While I was talking to Gregg, John drilled the holes for his hood pins, the ones he bought at the swap meet. I walked back in and sat down to watch him work. When he finished we headed out to dinner. We went to Freebird’s since it was still early enough. Ok, so it wasn’t quite early enough, they ran out of rice and meat. They gave us coupons for free burritos on out next visit though. I was cool with that since I wasn’t very hungry, remember the monumental turd mentioned above? We decided to go to Don Pablo’s instead. I walked in and made a beeline for the craporium. There was an employee washing his hands and I gave him the “Oh dude, you do NOT want to be in here in a moment!” look. Perhaps it was Karma smacking me around for wishing someone ill will, but instead of Bill Gates shitting his intestines, I shat mine, the contents thereof at least. Don’t get me wrong, I still want Bill’s intestines to dislocate themselves from his stomach and prolapse out his ass causing him a lingering and painful death of course, but that’s another story. So, after besmirching the bathroom, I found John and we ate. I had the “Eat All You Can Shrimp Fajitas” and regretted it almost immediately. We both called it a night and headed for our homes; well I assume John went home. This morning I had an 0830 h meeting so I didn’t try too hard to get here at 0800 h. I got a few calls and pages about some folks not being able to get the projector up and running in the TOB but went to the 0830 h meeting first since he called first. I finally got to the folks in the TOB and they were up and running. I was going to stop off and thank the lady who got them up and running but there were two really hot women about to get on the shuttle. I rode back across the street. They got out before the main stop so I didn’t have to make an excuse as to why I was staying on the van. Larry, the van driver, and I talked about them all the way back to the TOB where I did finally go thank the lady who got the folks up and running. I stopped off to tell the guy in charge of the Cranberries, or Blueberries, or whatever those cell phone/pager/PDA thingies are called, to tell him that they were going to give me one in lieu of the pager and phone I'm carrying now. He suggested a certain kind of Boysenberry to get and I told him to watch for the request to come across his desk. He said he’d look into it and get me the good Snozberry. I thanked him and left. I surfed the internot for a bit and now I'm here talking to y'all. And with that, I think I'm through for the day. Toodles.