4/5/07

Woo hoo! It’s Friday! Ok, I know it is Thursday but I'm off tomorrow so it is Friday for me! Again I say, woo hoo! I have come to a decision; I like four-day weeks when it is a Friday off but do not like them when it is a Monday off. Monday off throws the rest of the week into a tailspin. Tuesday through Friday weeks seem so much longer than Monday through Thursday weeks. Hell, they feel longer than Monday through Friday weeks! Ok, I'll stop talking about this now. Let’s see, where was I in the narrative? Oh right, Sunday morning I waited around for mom to get home from church so we could go to lunch. No wait, I got a call from Gregg asking if I was going to the shop. He said he’d call when he was headed that way so I got ready for that. He called back about the time mom was getting home from church and said he wasn’t sure if he was going to make it. It was then that mom and I made lunch plans. I mentioned the other day that Thursday for lunch I had pasta, Friday for lunch I had a calzone, Friday for dinner I had pizza, and Saturday for lunch I had calamari and a stromboli, remember? Well, I told mom the same thing and said I didn’t really want Italian food for lunch. She said that was fine and we rolled towards the restaurants at Bryant Irvin and I-20. We drove past The Black Eyed Pea but there were people waiting outside. We both voted against The Outhouse, er I mean Outback for some reason. We drove past Mimi’s but the folks were waiting outside there as well. Mom suggested Luby’s knowing there wouldn’t be a wait. I said it was fine and we headed that way. On the way Johnny Carino’s was suggested and almost shot down due to (tee hee, doo-doo!) it being Italian food. I said I could eat Italian again and we went there. There was no line. We ate and Gregg called. I said I was having lunch and would call him back when I got home. I did and we both set out for the shop. I got there first and started looking at stuff. I didn’t get far before he pulled up. We walked out and had a look at Barbara. He agreed that between the brown 210, Barbara, and the two cars Marty was “giving” him, he could build a pretty “nice” fun “sporty” car. We went back in to discuss intake and exhaust options. We looked at DGV options, we looked at DCOE options, we looked at SU options, and we looked at motorcycle carburetor options. I think it was left with the decision that we would put the “pretty” A-12 manifold on with the ceramic-coated manifold and give a single SU a try. I noticed that if we inverted the DGV to SU adapter I made for the turbo project, it would bolt to and adapt a single SU to a Datsun manifold. We both looked at it and said, “Why not?” I think we’ll try the SU I bought for the turbo first and then maybe move up to a Z-car carburetor. We’ll see. Besides, if it doesn’t work we can always drop a DGV on there since we know that works. We left after a little while and I went home to waste the evening in front of the TV. Monday morning… I don’t remember what happened Monday morning. Tuesday morning… I don’t remember what happened Tuesday morning either. Tuesday afternoon however I do know that the wheels began to fall off of my day’s plans. I got a call from the lovely Katie in the Bored Room saying she couldn’t get the lights to work. I went down to try and figure it out. My gear appeared to be fine but I re-booted it anyway. It still didn’t work. I poked around a little more and noticed that the lighting control panel didn’t have any lights glowing, like it should. I called facilities to ask if they had turned off the power to the lights in the Bored Room and was told that they had not. An electrician showed up and we looked it over. We decided to wait until the current meeting was over and look then. I knew the meeting would be over by 1500 h because I was supposed to meet the lovely Katie in the Viewing Gallery then. We went back in after the meeting and had another look. After poking around for a bit I said, “Look, this is all low voltage. The lights are high voltage. There has to be some other bit of gear converting low to high, right?” Erv, the electrician agreed so we went to grok the dimmer packs. Sure enough, the first breaker in line was turned off. As soon as I turned it back on I saw the drapes closing in the Bored Room. We went back and tested it out and all was well. Unfortunately it was 1700 h by the time we did figure it all out. So, Tuesday evening John and I went to the shop. He installed brake pads on his “new” 510 and we bled the brakes. It began to rain. No, I don’t think I'm getting across the severity of it, IT BEGAN TO RAIN!!!!! It was so loud in the shop that we literally could not hear each other screaming. John went ahead and replaced the clutch slave cylinder and we bled it. We washed up and then went to Sticker Shock Mexican Food, aka Caro’s, for some dinner. I went home and went straight to bed because during out fight with the Bored Room, the lovely Elizabeth showed up to test the system for a meeting she was having at 0800 h Wednesday and I wanted to be there to help her get it set up. I forgot to set my alarm. I didn’t roll out of the driveway until 0800 h. I got three pages and two voice mails from the Bored Room before I got there. They couldn’t get access to the LAN. I got another call from someone who needed my help at 0900 h in NOC 1 so I said I'd come back to figure out the Bored Room after the current meeting. Oh, they were able to use the computer without the network somehow so it wasn’t a total catastrophe. As I'm waiting for the 0900 h people, I get a call from folks across the street saying they can’t get the projector to come on. I ‘splain that I'll be there as soon as I can since this fire caught first. The 0900 h people show up, one of whom is the lovely Katie again, and I get them setup, or so I think. They want to show a DVD but not the first bit, a second video deeper in the menu. I can’t get my gear to pull up the menu. The remote doesn’t work either. I fast-forward through the first section and think we have it set then go across the street. They had figured it out already. I head back just in time for the lovely Elizabeth’s meeting to end so telecom and I can finger out what’s going on there. We reboot the computer and it works. What we figure happened was the LAN cable came out of the back of the computer and it failed to recognize it when it was plugged back in until reboot. I had the telecom guy put a new end on the cable and we pronounced it fixed. I got a call from the lovely Katie saying they couldn’t get the video to work. I ran back up there and finally got the remote to work by replacing the batteries. D’oh! My wall panel still wouldn’t access the menu though and I'm still not sure why. So, I get them setup, or so I thought, and finally head to my office. I sit down here at 1100 h! At noon I call the desktop support guys for lunch and head down. Out of habit I look through the Dance Floor to the Viewing Gallery and NOC 1. I see that they are fast-forwarding the DVD again. I tell the guys to go ahead since I needed to go make the thing work. It was the lovely Katie after all. I get in there and reset the menu with the remote and wait for them to be ready to watch. I start the disk and they all cheer. Huzzah for me! The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. I did go back to talk to the lovely Elizabeth again to ‘splain what happened in the Bored Room and got tied up with a discussion about how much installing a projector was going to cost. I didn’t mind too much because, well, it was the lovely Elizabeth after all. Today has been pretty quiet, hence the long rant, and we’re supposed to go to the shop again tonight. I think the plan is to get the car on its wheels this evening, but we’ll see. As I mentioned earlier, I'm going to be off tomorrow so I guess this is it until Monday. Wow, two pages of rant today. I'm impressed. Buh bye.