4/9/07

That was a totally wasted weekend. I did virtually nothing for three days. Friday morning I wasted in bed. When mom got home from whatever she had been doing, we went to lunch, I think. After that I headed out with the intention of taking the Seven to the Motorsport Ranch so we could see if it would fit in Ray's enclosed Go-Kart trailer. I walked out the door in a long sleeve T-shirt and my BNSF pullover thingy. I was carrying the blue jumpsuit to put on over all the other layers when I got the car out. I started off to the shop with the windows down in Matilda to acclimatize. By the time I got to 377 I was cold enough that I decided against driving the Seven. I called Ray to see if they were at the Ranch. They were so I headed that way. Once there I hung out with Pat and Ray for a while. Pat and I went to look at the trailer and took some more measurements. We think the car will fit. I got tired of watching them work so I left. I took the long way back, out 171 to the opposite end of FM 5 and all the intervening roads. I think I went to the shop after that. I stopped at Lowe’s and bought two 90-degree 1/8 NPT female to male adapter hoozi, a 1/8 NPT to ¼ NPT female-to-female adapter, and a ¼ NPT male to 1/8 hose nipple thingy. Or did I buy those on Thursday evening? I seem to remember working on the gauges while John was at the shop so I must have bought them earlier than Friday. Ok, so Thursday evening I played with the gauges and decided that I was going to use hose clamps to hold them in place. The clamps worked for retention but allowed the gauge to rotate. Friday I guess I installed the electrical tape on the gauges to prevent that. I also put pipe tape on the fittings and tightened them down where I think I want them. I took the gauge panel out to George and gave them a test fit in the cockpit. When the steering wheel is straight ahead, I cannot read the vacuum/boost gauge but the water temp and oil pressure are fine. When I turn the wheel I can read the other. Of course, with the way I align cars, the wheel probably won’t be straight ahead in level flight anyway! We’ll see. When I got bored messing with George, at least while trying to stay clean, I decided to go home. I'm not sure of the time, but it wasn’t too late in the day. Saturday morning I was supposed to meet John and his brother at the LaGrange swap meet. I bundled up again and headed out. Oh, did I mention it got butt-assed butt-butt cold on Friday? Yeah, it did and didn’t warm up for Saturday. So I meet John and we head into the meet. One of the first booths had a couple cast iron Chevy bell housings. We started talking to the dude and he mentioned he had an aluminum one as well. I bought it. We were close enough to the car that I could have dropped it off and then continued with the walk. Did I do that? No, I carried that damned thing the rest of the swap meet. It was dirty and had sharp edges. I'm dumb. Before long, John started looking around in a funny way. He said, “Is it snowing?” I said I had heard that snow flurries were possible. Neither one of us could believe it so we pressed on. Sure enough, it started snowing. It was a veritable blizzard! Well, for Texas in April, it was a friggin’ blizzard. We were fine walking with the wind, but going against it visibility was poor to say the least. In fact, my contacts are still burning from it. Anyhoo, people began packing up to leave. As soon as it had begun however, it was over. I'd say maybe half an hour, tops. We continue walking and don’t find anything else we need. Oh, John bought something, I don’t remember what, [ Hood pins... - SM ] and I bought four tie-down ring thingies for Ray's trailer, along with the bell housing. We never did see his brother and left the meet by 1045 h. I think it was the earliest I have ever been to and left a swap meet. From there we went our separate ways. I headed to the shop to see if the bell housing would fit the transmission I have. It won’t. I have a Ford T-5 and I need a Chevy T-5. I think we’ll figure something out but I didn’t want to mess with it any more. I called mom to see if she wanted me to pick up lunch but she didn’t. I wasted the rest of Saturday napping and watching TV. Sunday I met mom at church then she and I took the Chinese couple from the church to Granbury where we all had lunch at my sister’s house. By the time we finished lunch and drove back it was 1730 h so I gave up on getting anything accomplished. I wasted the rest of the evening. Now I'm here talking to y'all. Well, that gets you up to speed with my life. I think I'll go grab some lunch.