10/6/08

Yeah, yeah, wipe that smirk of your face. I said it “might” be the last rant. Turns out the laptop survived the toss across the room after all. Well, I did just notice the CD drive is poking out a little and won’t respond so that might be a problem there. We’ll see. I will give it this; it is a tenacious little bastard of a computer. If I can just get rid of Tiny and Flaccid’s Windows as the operating system, I think I'll be shittin’ in high cotton. Oh sure, I'll probably curse Linus Torvald the way I do Bill “Tiny and Flaccid” Gates after having to deal with Linux’s issues, but it has got to be better than Windows. John says he’s not a fan of the system but Ryan says I'll love it. I just have to finger out how to make it happen. Ok, enough of that, on to the weekend. Saturday morning John came to the house to pick me up so I could drive Mr. Wiggly home and leave a spot for the Crown when he drove Matilda home. We were of course banking on Gregg coming through and delivering Matilda to the shop. Of course he had an excuse, are you kidding? We decided that John and I would load John’s steel Versa wheels, a jack, the impact wrench, a breaker bar (just in case butt-nugget didn’t have electricity), and the big assed Channel Lock pliers (for the center caps on the Volk wheels) into the Crown and go get the car. Now, I've been saying that Gregg was living in Outer Buttswainia, remember? Well, that isn't exactly the truth. He’s actually in East Bumfuk Nowhere, about fifteen miles past Outer Buttswainia. We drove out there and swapped the wheels. Of course by “we” I mean John swapped the wheels, I just stood there looking pretty. Matilda was low on gas but the “Low Fuel” light hadn’t come… oh, there it is! The light came on as soon as I got the car rolling forward. We headed two exits further south, one more was the exit for Tierra del Fuego I believe, and filled up. I followed John back to the shop, he drove the Crown while I drove Matilda. I think that car is slightly peppier than Darth Versa. Gregg pointed out that the sunroof probably adds at least 200 pounds plus being an SL, there’s probably another hundred pounds of sound deadening. That’s like always having John and Pat (at 150 pounds each, wink wink) in the back seat with me in Darth Versa. I don’t care, Darth Versa is still a fun assed car. *Cough nitrous cough* So, we drop off the Crown and I fill Mr. Wiggly’s tires with air. We talk a little bit about the fate of the Panasport wheels he had had made for the Crown and I think we have made a deal. Mr. Wiggly is going to roll on a set of 17” Panasports in the near future! Oh hells yeah! Since his plates are due, I think I might also get a set which say “WIGGLY.” No, I'm not going to get the $400.00 plates, I'll get the $40.00 generic personalized plates. There’s an oxymoron for you, “generic personalized plates.” Of course, after seeing the black plates on Shichi, I don’t regret that decision too much. They do look awesome. Anyhoo, I drive Mr. Wiggly home and shuffle cars so I can park him on the back patio. I move Fifi back to the driveway and go inside. Mom wants to go to dinner so I shower and we head to the Black Eyed Pea. Sunday morning I take Darth Versa to change the oil. I stop at the Boys of Pep and buy a set of ramps, a gallon and a quart of Mobil One oil, and a filter. At the shop, I assemble the ramps and give them a test. They just barely fit under the bumper but work well enough. Of course there is a quabazilliard mile an hour wind blowing through the venturi of a drive in front of the shop so half of the oil draining out gets blown away from the pan. Oh yeah, huge mess. I get the oil drained and the filter off, making more mess by the way, and then fill the new filter with fresh oil. I install that and wipe everything down underneath. Up top I pour in the rest of that stray quart and then the gallon of oil. I check the level and she's good. I fire up the engine and look for leaks, there are none. I back the car off the ramps and survey the mess. I sure hope I have some kitty litter. Marty drives up just as I'm about to drain the pan into the waste-oil drum. I ask if he has any kitty litter but find an unopened bag in my shop. I pour the bag of litter on the oil slick and let it absorb. Ooh, I just had a thought. It rained last night/this morning, I'll bet that is a nice chunk of oily concrete right about now. Oh well. Anyhoo, I show him the new plates on Shichi and remind him that the Japanese Old School Car Show is at 1900 h at the Purple Cow on Hulen and I-30. He says he’ll try to make it. I clean up and close the shop so I can go for a hoon in Darth Versa. I filled up and ran through the car wash then had an idea. I'd stop at the fabric store and buy some elastic and snaps to make an anti-rattle device for the snaps on the cowl of Shichi! This I did. I bought “one yard and twelve inches” of black elastic, a snap installation tool, and a bunch of snaps. Oh, the “one yard and twelve inches” was because fabric stores don’t understand “four feet” apparently and that was all they had. I went back to the shop and crawled into Shichi. “One yard and twelve inches” was just exactly the right amount, apparently. I installed the snaps and snapped the contraption to the car. It looked like it ought to work. We’d find out in a couple hours. I closed up again and went for the hoon in Darth Versa. I didn’t take Shichi because John was supposed to meet me later to caravan to the car show. After hooning, going home, taking a shower, eating a peanut-butter and jelly sammich, and taking a nap, I got a text from John saying he’d meet me at the show. He didn’t want to drive the Crown anymore. I replied “Ok.” I napped for a little while longer then headed to the shop to get Shichi. I was about an hour and a half early so I went for another hoon, in Shichi this time. The anti-rattle device worked a little bit but the two center snaps weren’t in enough tension so they still rattled. I finally headed to the Purple Cow about half an hour early and met Aaron and his wife in the parking lot. When the dude with the MR2 showed up, we had our collection of cars. John arrived in Matilda and we stood around talking for a bit. We went in and ate eventually and then all left. I almost considered thinking about the possibility of taking Shichi home and driving it to work today. When I woke to rain, I was glad I took the car back to the shop. So, there you have it. We’ll see what I have to say tomorrow. Probably plans for the next few weekends. We’ll see.