Sturgeon’s Law Ninety percent of everything is crap.
Derived from a quote by science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon, who once said, “Sure, 90% of science fiction is crud. That’s because 90% of everything is crud.” Oddly, when Sturgeon’s Law is cited, the final word is almost invariably changed to ‘crap’.
|
I drive a Miata. It has a tight suspension (really only slightly tauter than stock) and 50 series stiff sidewall tires. It handles like it is glued to the road. One by product of this is that bumps, holes and ripples in the road are felt a lot more than in you typical family sedan. I try and avoid them when I can, but it is not always possible. Lately in our little town, the top layer of asphalt seems to be coming out in dinner plate sized chunks along the tracks of where most cars wheels travel in. Not just one or two places, but more like several dozen. On the commute to work there must be 10 of these little patches of 2 inch drops that I try and slalom around. I think that one day if a cop follows me for any distance he will probably pull me over for my seeming erratic driving.
Up at dawn for the road trip to northern Georgia, again. This time we were with another couple in another Miata to go almost exactly where we were last weekend. We even used the same route we took home last Sunday to get there. Destination was Amicalola Falls State Park. we were parking our cars and then hiking a 5 mile trail to Len Foote Hike Inn where we would spend the night in the quiet splendor of the forest.
It is a fairly easy hike, mostly up, but some down too. We got a slightly early start as there was rain predicted for the late afternoon. We were prepared for rain (stuff packed in plastic bags, etc.) but just really didn’t want to get soaked. The rain didn’t come until around 7 PM and when it did arrive it wasn’t torrential. The best part was the lighting and thunder show. After dinner a lot of us gathered on the porches surrounding the various wings of the inn and enjoyed show. It was nearly dark and the lighting was going off all around us on different peaks surrounding us. As if arranged just for us, the evening’s entertainment finale consisted of a criss-crossing of almost the entire eastern sky with cobweb of lightning streaks. Almost if there was a cause and effect relationship between them, after the lightning a rainbow appeared against the gray sky backdrop. Because there is no TV and heaven forbid, no Internet, we were in bed by 9:30.
Purchased Today: nothing
Money spent since 03/03/03: $156.58
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 69
After a hearty breakfast the four of us began the trek back down the mountain. To add a little variety to the trip we took the alternate route back down. You continued on the trail to the inn for an additional mile and ran into the Appalachian Trail Approach Trail and went back to the top of Amicalola Falls where our cars were parked.
To make amends to the Miata for leaving it out all night in the “wilderness” we used the 4 hours we had to waste before checking into the lodge on the state park and went for a drive in the surrounding mountains. We tried to duplicate the loop the bicyclists took last weekend in the reverse direction. We almost made it, missed one turn, so we didn’t drive across the one-lane bridge, but that wasn’t a great loss. The best part of the drive is GA60 north of Dahlonega. There is a stretch of it that is nicknamed “The Snake” and is a Mecca for motorcyclists because of it’s twisty loopy route over a couple of mountain passes. Yehaw! The highlight of the whole drive was about 03/4 of the way through when about 75 yards in front of our 2 car parade a decent size black bear bounded down from the woods on one side of the road and beat feet across to jump the guardrail into the woods on the other side. That was either one smart bear to wait for a gap in traffic or a lucky one.
Purchased Today: $14.50 in gas
Money spent since 03/03/03: $171.08
Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 71
The trip home this morning was uneventful and along our now familiar route. GA 52 to Lula, GA 51 to Washington and then GA 17 to I-20. Settle in for a 4 day week of work before we travel to middle Georgia again next Friday. This time not so far up north and we are coming back Friday night. The Master’s Miata Club is going to visit the Panoz Factories over near Braselton (the town that Kim Basinger once owned.) We have to come back as the Club’s annual trip to the Big Mo is on Saturday night.
Purchased Today: $8.00 in gas & $2.13 in oil
Money spent since 03/03/03: $181.23
Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 74
Went away for the weekend to go hiking in the Georgia mountains. I left early Friday morning and returned Sunday at noon. I checked the email before I left and when I go back I had received 42 pieces of spam at the Master’s Miata Club Yahoo email address in those 54 hours. My favorite is the one from Venessa with the subject line, “Sick of Deleting Junk Email.”
Rainy day. Tonight after work was a busy one, first it is our every 4 week haircut appointment and then we had just time enough to get a bite to eat before going to 2 hour class on the basics of understanding stocks. It was put on by a local Edward Jones Investment Advisor and was intended as an intermediate course in evaluating stocks. I wasn’t interested in going, but Donna said she’d pay me $25 to go with her, so I did. Every man has his price and fortunately for her, mine is really low.
Purchased Today: nothing
Money spent since 03/03/03: $181.23
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 77
Gassed up for the dawn launch. We are leaving the house 30 minutes earlier than we would if we were going to work. It will be a long day, over 300 miles, but it should be worth it. Panoz here we come. Not only are we touring the street car factory, but the race car site and the racing school facilities as well.
Purchased Today: $14.50 in gas
Money spent since 03/03/03: $195.73
Started down, went up, went down again, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 82
Totally bailed on the drive-in event with the Club. It wasn’t all because we had spent most of yesterday with the group either. Several other factors entered into it. First off being that we have been on the go for the last 2 weekends and not being lovers of living in the fast lane, we wanted some down time for ourselves. Second, the more we thought of going to the drive-in to see a movie, the more we realized why people stopped going to them in the 70s. So instead we did the 90s thing and watched a DVD in the comfort of our living room. No mosquitoes, no stale tasting popcorn, no kids running around, no mini-vans in front with there tailgate in the air blocking the view and most importantly no rickety, smelly bathrooms.
Speaking of minivans, I saw my first Chrysler Pacifia this evening, this is the minivan that a man wouldn’t mind being seen driving.
Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $208.98
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 85
Is it quality control at the factory and they are shipped out that way? Is it that when shipped they are damaged in transit? Are they so cheap that after a short time in use something bends? We have been in 2 local restaurants in the last 2 days that have only been open for 2 months or less and both times we got a table that wobbled. Yesterday’s was cured by 6–8 napkins folded in half. This after moving from the first spot we tried because the table there wobbled too. Tonight’s table required the handle of Donna’s knife (approx. 3/8″ thick) to steady it.
That is how many I managed to slog through of the cult fave show, “The Osbournes”. I tried, I really did, but I couldn’t do it. The novelty of actually hearing the “F” word instead of bleep wore off rather quickly. Partly because it was used so frequently by every member of the household, including, I think, the dogs and partly because I guess I’m old fashioned. And poor addled Ozzy, I think he had too many nights of living the high-life. He shook when he was sitting on the couch, sad. I kind of like his music, I have a couple solo CDs and a Black Sabbath one as well, but when they showed him making a Tonight Show appearance and he sang, it sounded the same as every thing he has done before. Mostly though I am not a big fan of “reality” shows, I have enough angst living my little life without peering into the sordid little lives of others.
I’ve always had a short lived loud lifter clatter when ever it was time to change the oil or the level got kinda low. But the last few mornings I’ve gotten a very quiet little tick that sometimes takes several miles to go away. Hmmm, wonder what this means?
We watched Igby Goes Down this evening and now I seem to back on a hot streak of picking good movies again from Netflix. Tadpole, Playing Mona Lisa and The Business of Strangers to name a couple of others worth looking for at Blockbuster when whenever you find the shelf with the latest new mainstream Hollywood offering is empty.
Purchased Today: zip
Money spent since 03/03/03: $208.98
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 88
I went shopping for my new USB Thumb Drive on the net. I started with the Lockergnome version of a price grabber search and then tried yahoo shopping. At Yahoo I found a good deal on a 128MEG Apacer drive with a neato docking station/extension cord thingie for $49 from here. I placed my order using the info in my Yahoo Wallet and within moments received a confirmation email. So far, so good.
Later that night I got an email informing me that for security reasons they won’t ship to a different address than my billing address. I am informed, in a way that lead me to believe that English was not the author’s original language, that I need to fill out the attached form and fax it back to them. The them in question is a outfit called SuperMediaStore.com not the dvd-rw media .com I thought I bought from. The return email address is supermediastore_annie@linkyo.com, so I type in www.linkyo.com into the address bar of IE and I get a generic “we haven’t been built yet” page from yahoo/Geocities hosting. Now things are not so good, the warm and fuzzy I felt on originally ordering is all but gone, but being a red-blooded American consumer, the low price offered kept me in the game. It was too late to call the phone number in the email, even with the West Coast time difference, so I figured I’d wait until I get to work in the morning and fax the authorization in.
This morning I checked my email before heading off to work and I discovered an email from DVD-RWMedia.Com AKA Selvi@linkyo.com promising me a free pen drive if I bought a 25 pack of DVD-RW discs. Jeez, spammed already, I don’t remember any place to opt in or out of email offers during the checkout process from these folks.
Still intent to go through with the purchase, I went down to the fax machine and loaded up my form. After several rings, I could here the announcement in the background, “The number you have dialed is no longer in service. Please check the number and try again.” I check the number on the paper against the number I dialed and they match. Well, that was the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back, I’ve got to find another place to get my drive from.
When I tried to call the number that was listed on the web page for canceling, I got the same “no longer in service” message that I got when faxing. Then I went to Annie’s email and below her name was an 888 number and a different fax number (it probably works.) After listening to the 8 branches of voice mail tree I selected Customer Service and was connected to probably the same person who would have answered any of the selections. Judging by the voice, it was probably Annie Ang, author of the email. After seeing that the order was on hold in her system, she told me, “No problem, I’ll cancel it.”
There was a place that was close to getting my business yesterday, so I hunted them up in the history file and went back. Ordered a 128 MEG drive from a place called Wolverine Data. No fancy docking station, but it does come with a couple of different color covers so I can match it to my wardrobe or mood.  Like yesterday, I got an almost instant confirmation email. So far, so good.
Today I got an email telling me the drive had shipped.
According to Yahoo Maps it is 2825.7 miles with an approximate travel time of 43 hours and 28 mins. If that is true why has the mug I ordered from CafePress not arrived yet. They say it was shipped on 5/9 at 8:40 in the morning. That is about 97 1/2 hours ago. Had I known it would have taken this long I would have driven out to get it and I would be back by now with my mug.
Managed one little trip out in the car today. Minor running around errands. The top stayed up because of the off and on rain all day. Worked out that the lull we went out in lasted for the duration, so we could have had the top down, sigh. The thunder is rumbling right now, the radio station I am listening to has had a few weird pauses and I’ve been booted off line a couple of times in the last half hour. The signs are there, I shouldn’t even have the PC on, but the blogging must go on.
Never did watch Last Man Standing, but instead watched Reign of Fire. I like sci-fi, I like dragon movies, but this sucker shoulda never been made. All through it, I couldn’t but think that the millions spent to make this movie would have been better used to feed a mid-sized African nation for a week. I’ve never seen Battlefield Earth in it’s entirety, just a few snippets on the cable, everyone said that movie was so dark it stank, well this thing makes BE look like the Music Man. Just a couple of days ago I was on a good movie roll, seems to have gone 180 on me…
Purchased Today: zilch
Money spent since 03/03/03: $208.98
Started up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 93
Still no mug from Cafe Press. No Thumb Drive from Wolverine. both supposedly shipped from California via the USPS. Next time I order I’ll pay extra to go UPS, this way even if it takes a long time at least I can follow along.
Went out to grocery shop — top up. Went out for an evening drive — top up. After supper Donna wanted to go get an ice cream cone. Last Sunday when we headed into downtown Aiken, it was looking like a ghost town, but the ice cream shop was open. Tonight that’s where we went and we were an hour too late, they were closed. We took the umbrella and strolled through the empty streets and looked in shop windows. On the drive home the skies opened up, man we are glad we have a garage.
It will be amazing if I can get out of bed tomorrow, it is so depressing here now. The on and off rain that started Thursday is slated to continue until at least that day this week. Today was the third day in a row for a downer of a movie, White Oleander was on tap for this evening. I’ve got to go move a couple comedies up to the top of my Netflix rental queue.
Purchased Today: Nitso
Money spent since 03/03/03: $208.98
Started up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 93
Another gray day. No depressing movie for tonight, just a depressing baseball game. Red Sox are playing the Yankees and coming into the game tied for first place in the division and the Yankees scored 5 in the first and so far 2 in the 8th making 7 to 1. The Sox are bringing in another pitcher and I’m turning it off.
Purchased Today: $13.50
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 93
Everybody Loves Raymond used to be a must watch on Monday night. This season I just never picked it back up. Tonight I decided to watch the season ender. Robert was getting married and because it was so much TV they couldn’t get it all in 30 minutes. Tonight’s episode ran for a whole 45 minutes. It was painful to watch. It seemed pretty much like they used that extra 15 minutes to show commercials. On top of that there was some fat in the actual show that could have been trimmed.
Hot damn, a semi nice day! Top down on the way to work, up while there and down again after. Got a skate in after getting home and even went for an evening drive at dark. Amazing what a little outdoor fun can have on a person’s attitude. Blues, what blues? Every car that I caught on the way out of town turned off before they became a hindrance making for a very pleasant drive on one of our favorite roads. Things got exciting for a minute or so though, DEER! One dashed in front of the car causing me to brake hard, missed by about 10 yards. 5 seconds either way for either one of us and it could have been bad. Just after returning to near normal speed, car and heart, the brights illuminate another set of eyes to our left. This one stood 5 feet off the road and just watched us pass.
Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 96
Or they might get the same thought I had about the plot for a new reality based TV show. Of course Thy might not get that idea from this story, Chimps May Have Closer Links to Humans the way it was titled on Yahoo, but the headline I read in the Augusta Chronicle was, “Researchers put chimps in human family.”
Top motion was the exact opposite of yesterday today. We even saved an errand for tonight just for the pleasure of an evening drive, only to have it start to rain just as we left the house.
Red Sox — Yankees on ESPN2 tonight. I’ve got the game going in a small window in the upper left as I type this. The dreaded Yankees just took the lead in the top of the 7th. On certain Wednesdays ESPN2 is brining back legendary broadcasters and tonight it is Curt Gowdy. Brings back wonderful memories of warm Connecticut summer evenings listening to Curt call the Red Sox games. Pardon me while I get all misty eyed here.
Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started down, went up, went down, back up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 99
The Thumb Drive showed up on Tuesday. You know me, I’ve got some complaints: The old one had a red drive light that worked like the standard one, it was lit when there was activity. This one does the same, but has the added annoyance of flashing once a second to let you know it is, I don’t know, working? Another nice feature is that it came with a couple of different color covers to match your mood or I-Mac color. The fly in that ointment is that to change the cover you have to remove two screws from the back which are hidden underneath the sticker that says, “Warning! Warranty void if removed.”
The Mug arrived the next day, Wednesday. You know me, I’ve got some complaints: It took a whopping ten days to get here. The thumb drive came from California too, and it made it 5 days. The dark green of the outside ring of the logo came in way too light. That is livable, but the big problem is that the Club’s circular logo appears oval when looked at on the mug. They preach what you see is what you get, the photo on the site doesn’t look like an oval, but in real life it sure does. My wife thinks I’m too picky, but I think it is unacceptable. I tweaked the logo by stretching it in the horizontal by 10% and ran a cylinder filter on it in Paint Shop Pro. I test printed it and it looks a lot better. I uploaded the new image and ordered another mug to check the results.
I liked the first movie, up to a point, so what made me think I would love this one. Hope springs eternal I guess, after all I’m a Red Sox fan. Some funny stuff like the first one, some totally stupid stuff too. Nothing makes the word fuck sound so poetic as an Italian/New York accent. And is it just me or does Lisa Kudrow with her hair pulled back look like the prototypical alien — all high cheekbones, sharp chin and big eyes?
It wasn’t raining and the radar showed no more green so we dropped the top for the ride to work. Apparently radar doesn’t show light mist. We did make it to work with it down, but it went right back up. At quitting time, lunch time today, it was still misting. By the time we were done eating and then doing a little shopping at 1:30 it had stopped misting so we drove the last couple miles home in the open air.
Bought a model of the 50’s version of the Batmobile today. Haven’t built a model in a while, this one needs a little painting on the interior and then it gets glued and screwed together. Hope I finish this one, the last model I bought was an X-Wing Fighter and it sits semi-assembled in a box in the garage…
Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started up, went down ‚went up, went back down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 102
I’ve had the DVD Norah Jones: Live in New Orleans right at the top in my rental queue for about 5 weeks and the status has been “Long Wait” the whole time. So I was pleasantly surprised when I got an email on Wednesday that it had shipped and that I would receive it on Monday, May 26th. It was taking longer than the other movie that shipped the same day because I guess it was coming from California as opposed to the regional center in Georgia. No problem, I’ve waited this long, a couple of more days won’t hurt. Well today I got an email from Netflix saying I had returned the DVD. WTF? I hadn’t even got it in the first place, how could it have been returned? I guess it got a wrong label or something. I went and put it back on top of the queue and it’s status is now, “Now.” Maybe when they ship it out this time it will make it all the way to me.
Today was an MMM…Time with the Miata Club and one other person besides my wife and I showed up at the Sonic. We just chatted for about a half hour and then went our separate ways to finish our Honey-Do Lists.
The Batmobile is coming along good. I have got most of the painting done and have started the assembly. This morning I realized that I didn’t have any model cement, so off to Hobby Lobby we went. Whoever all those glue sniffers were I would like to put a curse on you. This new cement smells of lemons and doesn’t really hold. Good thing this puppy is put together with glue and some screws. After a couple of missteps (from not reading the directions,) the chassis is all together. Tomorrow comes the interior.
Purchased Today: Zero
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 102
Well, guess what showed up in my mailbox today? That’s right, Norah Jones: Live in New Orleans. Now comes the moral dilemma, should I just keep it? Netflix thinks I’ve already returned it. The downside is there is probably some schmoe out there who returned his copy, but Netflix will think he didn’t. I’ll probably just return it, if I do like it I’ll just buy it, it’s only $11.24 at Amazon which is a dollar and four pennies less than her album, Come Away With Me sells for there.
Went for a nice drive this morning to go hiking in the Sumter National Forrest on a trail we used to mountain bike on back in the day. We haven’t done the drive in a while and it seemed pleasant, but to be truthful the drive is part of the reason we gave up the mountain biking. The trail we went to today was about 45 minutes from home and is the closest place to drive to for single track riding. The other “local” trails are around 15 more minutes away. The experience went something like this: 10 minutes to load the bikes, 60 minutes to drive to the trail head, 10 minutes to unload the bikes, 60 minutes of riding, 10 minutes to load the bikes, 60 minutes to drive home and 10 more minutes to unload the bikes. It got tiresome. Now with hiking: you drive 60 minutes, walk 140 minutes and drive 60 back. Still work up a good sweat in the woods with a lot less hassle, it only takes a minute to fill the Camel Backs and shrug them on.
Batmobile is 88% complete. The only thing let is to assemble the desk and the items on it and then screw the interior to the body and then the chassis to the body/interior. That’s right, desk, back before the Bat Computer the Caped Crusader used pencil and paper to catch evil villains. Come back tomorrow for a picture.
Purchased Today: Zippo
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 102
Completed the triathlon on this 3-day weekend, I went for a 20 mile bike ride on Friday, a 6 mile hike in the woods Saturday and a 4 mile rollerblade skate today. Also completed the Batmobile this morning. Want to take some pictures, but it has been raining all afternoon. Wanted to use the natural outside light as I’m sure the dig-cam’s flash will not capture the model well.
Purchased Today: Nothing
Money spent since 03/03/03: $222.48
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 103
I am not a morning person. I hate getting out of bed, I am always the last one out in our duo. Early on in our marriage we agreed that the last one out of bed in the morning had to make it. No problem it is a small price for me to pay for those 15 minutes of extra horizontal time. I then eat breakfast and use the time as my wife dresses to make the bed. The only problem comes when I fluff the pillows up to artfully display them against the headboard — sometimes they still feel warm, DAMN I wanna just curl back up in there. That is so cruel.
The cockpit cover saved my bacon this morning. The Weather Channel had no mention of rain for today so the top was down and the cover on when at around 9:30 there came a 15 minute downpour out of nowhere. At our normal walk around the parking lot at 10:00 PM we peeked underneath the cover into the cockpit and there were a few moist spots, but nothing like there could have been.
This morning when we left for work there was a light scraping noise coming from the right front of the car. It sounded like the squealers warning of low brake pad thickness. It was there when we left work to come home too, but both times at the end of the commute it was gone. When I got home I jacked up the right side of the car and checked the pad thickness front and back. Both were nowhere near the worn out indicators. MMM, next diagnosis is a sticky caliper. With any luck it is just a sticky slider pin. This weekend I’ll pull them apart and re-lube the particulars and see what happens. I had to remove the tires to get a good look and I realize that they are getting down close to the wear bars. Only put these on last February about 19,000 miles ago. I think I am going to step back one notch in performance this time, maybe go back to getting 25K from a set. The current Bridgestone S-03 Pole Positions are awesome tires, but I don’t really drive enough at that level to warrant them.
Purchased Today: $13.25 in gas
Money spent since 03/03/03: $235.73
Started up, went down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 104
I missed you. Since sometime Wednesday afternoon my home phone has been dead or severely wounded, thereby severing my ties with the digital outside world. Called for help on Wednesday evening and bellsouth promised a visit on Thursday by 6:00 PM. Thursday AM we had a dial tone on the phone, but no DSL line sync. Called the service center and called off the technician, figuring I could troubleshoot the DSL when I got home. Sometime at mid-day Thursday the dial went away again. My mother-in law called in for help and they said we can’t guarantee a visit today because you called after 12 noon. True to their word, no one came. As of noon today still no one has arrived to fix the phone. We now have a dial tone and so much crackling that a conversation is impossible. I am blogging from work where I have Internet access. I can even check my email on the web, but don’t want to spend too much time online as around here that is a firing offense.
Purchased Last Couple Days: $zero
Money spent since 03/03/03: $235.73
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 104
Phones back. Needed a new line run from the pole to the house. According to the repair guy, squirrels had eaten into the line!
Went out shopping tonight and bought some stuff for tomorrow’s brake procedure. New high temp grease for the sliders and pad shim connections. Brake Cleaner in a can for cleaning up any crud that is on these surfaces before re-greasing. Some brake fluid and a one-man bleeding kit for the possible fluid change out. There will be grease under my fingernails all week.
Purchased Today: $19.93 in stuff
Money spent since 03/03/03: $255.66
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 104
Jacked up the back of the car and put its ass in the air on jack stands. Took apart the brakes and cleaned ‘em up real good. I put new grease on the backs of the pads, the old stuff was a bitch to get off. The pad on the passenger side was real dry, that is the side the noise was coming from, so I thought that might be it. While I had the wheels off I did the brake bleeding thing to swap out the old fluid for new. Won’t be entirely new, but the fluid color in the reservoir on the master cylinder is looking cleaner already. On to the fronts. On a side note I need a hydraulic jack. All this up and down was accomplished with the scissors jack that came with the car. That is a lot of cranking!
Remember how I said the noise sounded like the squealers warning of low pad thickness? Turns out there was a very good reason for that, they were worn. They were worn at about a three degree angle so that one side was plenty thick. This was the side I saw on the outside pad when I removed the wheel the other day. the wear groove is in the middle so it looked OK, but the end of the pad with the squealer was very thin. Bolted the front tires back on and headed to the local Mazda dealer for some new front pads. Looked in the Moss catalog to get an idea of how much they were going to cost first, looks like around $80 for the front 4. When I got to the dealer they had in stock something they called the value pack, just the pads for only $34. Seems they learned that they could cut the cost some by leaving out the all those springs and clips that never really need replacing, thanks Mazda. While I was there I also bought an oil filter. On the way home I bought four quarts of oil and a can of Gunk Engine Flush, hoping this would solve my new annoying lifter tick. I guess those pads were worn out, the new ones were twice as thick as the thickest part of the old ones. Swapped out pads and “bled” the fronts to match what I did in the back.
The brakes were done, now it was time to flush the motor. Instructions said pour it in and let the car idle for 5 minutes. When I started the car up I really heard the ticking loudly. I had the hood up and when I looked in I could see the number three spark plug wire bouncing around. I shut off the car and pulled the wire off. I then tightened the spark plug back up and it took an awful lot of turns, a few more days and it would have backed itself out entirely, yikes that would have been fun. Restarted the car to finish my 5 minutes. Took off the drain plug and drained my thin black oil out. Took off the oil filter. I then hand tightened the new filter on. When I went to snug it up with the filter wrench, it wouldn’t go, the wrench just spun freely. I realized that the filter I got was about a 1/2″ in diameter smaller than the one I took off. I called the parts department and asked if they gave me the right filter, somewhere in the foggy recesses of my mind I thought that M2 filters were different sized. Parts lady said nope, I got the right one, it was a new part that was superceding the old. I asked if she had any old ones and when she said yes I drove back over and swapped, but I guess I will need a new (smaller) wrench for next time.
Took the car for a drive this evening. A little 25 mile loop on some back roads, nice and quiet, no squeal and no tick. I will sleep the sleep of contentment tonight.
Purchased Today: $56.35 in stuff
Money spent since 03/03/03: $312.01
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 104
|
|
