12/6/10

Well, it’s Monday. So here’s what happened over the weekend. Saturday morning I met John at the shop and we pulled the cross member from his 1200. We left the car on stands for the time being as he wasn't willing to drill the new cross member for the big bolts Marty had installed with the spherical bearings. John is going back with rubber bushings. I feel I ort to give him shit about it, and the younger me who was more into the race stuff might have, but his reasoning is sound. No, I'm not going onto it. Anyhoo, we got the cross members swapped and took “mine” to the chop saw. Well, we took a few measurements first, of course. With the ends hacked off, we test fit it to Nadine. T’was nice. We took some more measurements and decided how much of a “step” we needed to cut in the ends so it would sit lower in the frame rails. After changing the blade in the Sawzall, I made the cuts. Another test fit and we decided that some angle iron or similar material welded into the breach of the cut would add some strength and make for a nice weld face to the frame. I found some galvanized angle stuff with holes in it and we cut it to length. We cleaned the galvanizing off one side, the wrong side it turns out, and I zooked them in place. Yes, I have had a bit of a headache since, and everything tastes sort of purple, but other than that I think I'm apricot sorbet. Invisible robot fish. We test fit the thing again and liked what we saw. We debated bolting versus welding and while bolting would be the right thing to do in the “do nothing irreversible” sense, I think we’re just going to weld it in and be done. I'm ready to get moving forward on this project. Yes John, I know we’ve discussed this. “We ARE making forward progress.” I just... your face is forward progress. So, with all that done, we closed up and went to lunch. We ate at Benito’s. It was yummy. Oh, I forgot to mention that I drove Lil' Wiggly to the shop and lunch on Saturday. I really dig that car but it “needs” more power. After lunch I went for a hoon. I think I probably did a hundred miles in the car on Saturday. Eventually I got home and hung out for the evening. Sunday morning I should have gotten up and went to see the implosion of the Amon Carter Stadium at TCU. This I did not do. 1) I didn't go to TCU so it wasn't that big of a deal and b) I'm not sure I could have gotten to a good vantage point anyway. Yeah, those are the reasons. Instead, I picked up Larry Shuttlebus at his house in Newark so we could go to the gun show in Mesquite. Go ahead, look those locations up, keeping in mind I live on the far west end of Fort Worth between I-20 and I-30 off of Loop 820. So, have you looked at a map of the Metroplex? See the giant triangle of locations? Well, it gets better. From Larry’s we head through Grapevine to see Gregg. He wanted me to shop prices on a Saiga 12 gauge for his father for Christmas, remember? From Grapevine we went around Not Texas on 635 until we got to the Resistol Arena in Mesquite. Yeah, the Mesquite gun show is not nearly as good as even the small Fort Worth gun shows. I hesitate to say it sucked but... well, there are few other words for it. We walked the thing and saw a few items of interest. Very few. There were two Saiga 12s there. One was $520.00 and the other closer to six hundred. We’ve seen them for much less here in Fort Worth. I called Gregg and told him this and the decision was made that we’d wait until the next show here to buy. Going in, I told Larry that my cutoff price for a Mosin Nagant was $85.00 and to not let me go over that. We found one guy selling them for $89.99. I walked away. Of course I immediately walked back. I told him my cutoff price and asked if he’d match it. He could not, which was for the best because I really do not need a Mosin Nagant. I'm not even sure why I want one to be perfectly honest. When we found the book seller guy, the one we actually came to see, and by “we” I mean Larry, we checked out his selection. I bought a book on... yes, Mosin Nagants. I think I'm going that route instead of a Saiga 12 as my next gun. Again, I don't know why. Well, I kind of know why. They are cheap. And that one in the Blood Bath & Beyond catalog with the synthetic stock looked really cool. I don't know. We'll see. Anyhoo, once we were done with the show, we headed out. I asked Larry how big a hurry he was in to get home. When he said he wasn't, I asked if we could swing by the shop for a second, totally out of the way home. Yeah, go back to that map of the Metroplex and look for Benbrook lake. Look on the east side of the lake for Saint Francis Village. The shop is next to that. The reasons I wanted to make that trek were: I'm almost out of argon for the welder and wanted to pick up the bottle so I can get it refilled this week, and I wanted to show Larry the place and cars. We headed south on 635 then west on I-20. As we were rolling through Grand Prairie, John called to ask the name of the Chicago hot dog place in south Arlington. I couldn't remember but said we were in the neighborhood and would stop there for lunch. Turns out, John and family were also in the neighborhood looking to eat there as well. They found it first and we “joined” them. We sat at another table but were back to back with them so it was kind of like we “joined” them. Anyhoo, they ate and left then we did the same a few minutes later. At about the I-20/Loop 820 split in Arlington, my bowels decided they were done with the Italian Beef sandwich I'd just eaten. We went north on 820 and abandoned the trip to the shop. I thought I might be able to drop Larry off before it became urgent for, as the Germans might say, “Eine Poopenmachen.” I was wrong. Before we got to I-30 on 287 it got urgent. I said I was going to have to stop and began formulating a plan as to what hotel lobby bathroom I was going to desecrate. Larry suggested the Amtrak station downtown and we made for that. I hopped out at the curb and had Larry drive Fifi around the block while I ran inside. I just made it. Oh, did I mention the super hot habenaro beef sticks I bought at the gun show? Yeah, I had eaten a few of them before the Italian Beef with hot peppers. Needless to say, I had Hot Hole something fierce. I duck-walked back out to the truck and drove Larry home. At about the I-35/287 split, my bowels rumbled again. It was a false alarm though. I eventually made it home and hung out until time to go to the Purple Cow. John declined my offer to drive The Seven to the event because it was, in fact, too cold. I hopped in Lil' Wiggly and it fired up on the first crank. Hmm, I guess chokes really do work after all. I met John at the PC and we hung out waiting for others. No one arrived so we went inside. We ate and just as we were about to leave, Jeff shows up. We all chat for a bit then head home. Again, Lil' Wiggly fired right up. I really like that car. So, that’s about all there is to say about it. I may go to the shop some evening and pick up the argon bottle and I may not. We may go do that first thing Saturday. We'll see.