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’.
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 You know you are in trouble when the ace of your staff is a knuckleballer. Today Tim Wakefield fooled some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time. Even though the Red Sox didn’t win it was not entirely Tim’s fault. Randy Johnson pitched well, but he was beatable and even though Manny smacked a couple of monster home runs, they never got the offense going against him. I think it was more the sputtering offense and stupid base running that doomed the FRS to an 8 to 4 loss.
At least Cleavland lost today too. That means that even if they lose tomorrow and the Indians win they will still have a shot at the playoffs. The 2 teams would play a winner take all game on Monday to see who will advance to the “real” playoffs as the American League Wildcard team.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 305
Is irony used correctly in the following sentence?
During a Cleavland Indian at bat in the fifth inning, with a fan pounding rhythmically on an Indian type drum in the outfield supporting an offensive rally, was the public address system operator being ironic by playing a recording of the bugle call Charge at the same time?
I have decided to only restore 2005’s posts. 2002 through 2004 will languish in a file on my hard drive. Maybe when I get around to it I will go back and read through them and publish a “Greatest Posts” page. There are only 2 surviving 2004 posts and those are the Mr. Fletcher’s Ride photos and are part of a series that will finish up later this month. When that happens I’ll probably create a separate gallery for the images. Speaking of separate galleries for images, that is more than likely what will happen to the photo meme posts which weren’t restored along with the rest of this year’s posts.
The FRS won today big time over the hated Yankees and clinched the wild card playoff berth. In honor of this accomplishment I have given them their own category here on the blog. A five game series with the Chicago White Sox starts Tuesday afternoon in the Windy City. The Wild Card route is how they made it into the playoffs last year and look what happened then, they won it all. As a matter of fact the last three World Series champs have been Wild Card teams. So here we go…
We got a late start this morning, so we skipped the planed bicycle ride and decided to take a Miata drive instead. We got about a mile away from the house when we ran into a wall of light rain. Quickly turned around and found a spot to remove the boot cover. Then, still top down made another u-turn and proceeded with the drive. We managed to keep dry as we kept making direction changes to stay under the partly blue in the sky. While we took a walk around the North Augusta mile walking track the top went up as a precaution. The top made a cycle one other time while we were still moving to avoid a passing soaking rain, but after that it was a nice little drive.
Part of it was to go check out where our used-to-be-local Mazda dealer went to. There is a for sale sign in front of the old building, but it looks like they are still selling Izuzus there. The new digs are way over on the west side of Augusta and is the former Honda dealership building. There were still quite a few Hondas on the lot (I guess the new Honda store isn’t completely finished) and there were a lot of Mazdas on the other half. Only three new Miatas MX-5s were on hand and they were off in a corner. One red Grand Touring with black top and interior, one black Grand Touring with the tan/brown interior and one silver Touring. All of them with a supplemental sticker adding $599 dollars to the MSRP for premium handling, 5 year warranty and a couple of other bogus add ons…
New color scheme in honor of Halloween.
West Wing is on at 8:00 PM on Sunday nights, not 9:00 PM, so I gotta go…
Started down, went up, back down, up again, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 309
Donavan, who’s email address is Washburn@ypo.co.jp, was kind enough to send me a note this morning alerting me to a hot stock pick. It is currently trading at 15 cents a share with a 12 month projection of $1!
Founded in February 2000, m-Wise has rapidly established itself as a leading technology provider with the de facto Service Delivery Platform and related value-added data engines for Mobile Operators, Wireless ASPs, and large content and media providers.
Working closely with leading operators, ASPs and content providers, m-Wise is committed to take the lead and keep up to date with the latest industry headways in areas as diverse as content management and delivery, infotainment, mobile gaming and mobile community services.
I know I’m going to go empty my current 401K porfolio and put it in this company. In a year you will be able to say, “I knew him when.” Thanks again Donavan.
Hey, wait a minute, he sent it to the ASCO global list, everybody knows…
Added a couple of new things to the web site. If you came via the old blog page address you saw the main one. New index file in the root directory. Depending, you might have seen that image before. Once a couple years ago that is what the front page looked like and there were three links, one to each of my blogs. Unless there is a simple two step process to move the new Word Press blog into the root directory this is the new site.
Also we have installed Simple PHP Gallery to handle photo posting. This thing is simple to use, hence the name, all you have to do to add a quick gallery is upload a directory full of images under the main one and poof, there you go. So far I just have two online and the style is the default supplied, so there is no cohesiveness to the site — yet.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 309
The Chicago White Sox will still be reeling from their lopsided 14–2 win tomorrow, so much so that they will probably win by a closer score in game 2. Once the FRS are down two and their backs are against the wall, then they will kick it in and sweep the final three games to advance to the American League Championship Series.
Two years ago their rally cry was “Cowboy Up” and they lost to the Yankees in the ALCS. Last year it was “Why not us?” and they won it all. This year it is “Just 11 more wins.” Right now though it had better be “Not 2 more losses.”
Teeth — The Emperor’s Halloween costume arrived in the mail today. Probably install it tomorrow. Pictures to follow, possibly in front of a funeral home or perhaps in a graveyard at night. Instead of calling the Miata “The Emperor” maybe now I should call it “Nosferatu.” The higher cost of gasoline and the need for premium fits right in with that name too.
Peektures — Got the CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) of the Galleries to match the Blog. The Miata photos have the descriptions attached. The Post Office shots will be done tomorrow.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 309
I called it yesterday, “they will probably win by a closer score in game 2.” The White Sox did just that tonight, 5–4 over the FRS.
Now if I can only be right about the second part of the prediction, “Once the FRS are down two…sweep the final three games to advance.”
They kind of made the decision easy for me as I got a rejection letter in the mail today. Not that it was unexpected, I totally blew the “personality” side of the interview. They had 7 questions that outlined real life scenarios and required an answer using cause, effect and solution. I didn’t expect something like that and wasn’t really prepared. Plus essay tests were always the hardest for me, I have a hard time coming up with improv answers that are cohesive and intelligent. It actually took me until question #4 before I could give them any sort of answer and it was personal life based and lame. I struggled mightily on the next couple, looped back through to the beginning, but still totally refused, no just plead a case, that I couldn’t come up with an example for one question and left it blank.
I did alright on the “technical” side, but that was to be expected. They were more knowledged based, almost multiple choice type questions on AutoCAD and drawings. Plus I felt more at ease with my inquisitors as they were engineers not the previous HR folks.
The one on one with the department manager was a toss up, we chatted, I gave answers, I looked in him in the eye. I don’t now if it mattered, but I didn’t ask too many questions. I could get a gist of the job from listening and it was doable, there were a lot of new things to learn, but was more of a lateral move than a giant step up.
Even if they had called back, I’m sure I wouldn’t have taken the job anyway. I make pretty good money now and some how I don’t see them offering even that much money for that level of a position. And even with the better benefits offered I would have wanted more cash to jump ship.
Sorry Will, but you might need change your link to this site — again. Gonna put this blog back in the root of mr-miata.net. 9 steps and that’s it.
Moving WordPress
Tomorrow is the monthly MMC meeting, so I probably won’t have time then, maybe Friday.
Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 310
So shouted the headline the other day in the local paper. I wondered who. Did Madonna tire of the English countryside? Was P Diddy bringing his fleet of blinged Diet Pepsi trucks to town? Nope. The former lead singer of ‘60s rock group The Youngbloods and his wife are going to build a 5,000 sq ft cottage in Aiken’s Historic District adjoining Hitchcock Woods. Turns out that Jesse Colin Young married an Aiken native some 18 years ago and the family (they have two kids) wants a nice place to settle in. Even though they plan on living in Aiken full time, they are keeping the house in Hawaii.
Nope, just moving back into the old place, with the new furniture. Reclaimed the old name too.
Added a Mr. Fletcher’s Ride Photo Gallery and placed links to all the galleries in the sidebar for your ease. Don’t confuse the Miata Photo Gallery with the category Miata Photos, the Gallery will contain my favorite Miata shots, while the category will be populated with the everyday Miata pictures.
Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 312
Now that is more like the team I know. The FRS were swept out of post-season play, three games to none tonight by the Chicago White Sox. At least they didn’t lose to the Yankees.
I said way back in June that I would quit complaining about the erratic reception of WEEI on MLB.com and I kept my word, but now that the season’s over…I’ve got nothing bad to say. Sometime not too long after the All Star Game the internet broadcasts settled down, loosing all the annoying cut outs and became listenable again. I guess that means I’ll be signing up for next year broadcasts. When I’ll get treated to 162 ups and downs on the roller coaster life of a Red Sox fan.
…snakelike. The Vampire Teeth are in and the more I look at the car with them on, the more I think it looks like a snake. So I guess I’ll toss out the Blood Bank background idea and start looking for a Reptile Zoo.
Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 314
 29,000 pairs of socks. 29,000 knives. 29,000 VHS tapes. 29,000 out of date bottles of asprin. And 29,000 used chainsaws.
Today we went to the Jockey Lot outside of Anderson, SC. Someone thought it would be fun, so we planned a trip with the MMC and it was a nice day for a drive. While the Jockey lot is a huge ass flea market, pretty soon it all starts to look alike, did we have fun? You bet. Will we go back? Doubt it. About halfway there the Emperor passed through the 29,000 mile mark. We bought this Miata just before Thanksgiving in 2003 so it looks like we will make it past 30k before the 2 year mark.
Most of the time the skies were blue with scattered clouds, but on the horizon, in every direction you looked there were dark gray clouds. The weather forecast called for a chance of rain and while it never did (on us anyway) everytime we stopped for any lentgh of time everyone put their tops up in case. On the way back we stopped in the quaint little town of Abbeville for lunch. We parked over on the same street as we ended up at the last Trivia Road Rally the MMC did in May. I had snagged a picture of one of our member’s cars as it was parked and the wall and art there made a nice back drop, today the Emperor had it’s portrait taken there too.
Can’t really tell from the picture, but the car was really dirty. I did wipe off the big stuff with a towel I keep handy, but when we got home the car got a much needed bath.
Started up, went down, went up, back down, back up, down again, up again, then down, then up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 322
Got the freshly machined piece for the tandem’s seat clamp on Friday. Remounted the seat on Saturday evening. This morning we went for a 15 mile ride and everything worked just peachy. Thanks Tool Room Guys.
We ended the ride at our favorite Sunday morning breakfast spot, The New Moon Cafe, for fresh fist-sized muffins. Mmmm. While we were standing in line the fellow in front of us asked if there was some sort of bike thing going on because he had seen a few bikes around this morning. He is a semi-regular like us and drives a bright yellow custom Harley full dresser. We said sure the SC Governor was sponsoring a bike ride from Aiken to Columbia. He said no, I mean motorcycle, not bicycle, pointing to my Lycra attire, to which we shrugged who knows.
 Didn’t get a Vampire Teeth photo in, but for now here is an out take from Saturday’s portrait shoot. I’ve said the car looks more snake-like than vampirish, but in this picture it kind of reminds me of the Alien from the movie of the same name.
The only Miata trip was a run to the store for groceries, barely got the oil warm.
Donna, her Mom and I piled into the MSV and went over to Augusta to the Greek Festival, mainly to eat lunch and poke around some of the crafts for sale. Tables were set up for eating under a big ol’ tent in the center of which was a small stage and a dance floor, so for our dining pleasure we were serenaded and regaled by traditional Greek music and dance. I even had a Greek beer with my gyro called Mythos, and the connoisseur that I am declared it very beerish.
Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 323
I’ve added another gallery to the list. This one is for my Enchanted Ceiling pictures. I forget exactly how I stumbled on the site, but once I did I was hooked. I have 14 photos posted there (search for Brian, all but the Madison, WI shot are mine) and I have posted a number of them on my blog(s). When I went through the archives I discovered 18 photos with the category of Enchanted Ceiling and that is where the gallery started. When I started comparing the 2 lists it turned out that there were 4 on the Enchanted Ceiling site that were not ever added to the blog. Out of the original 18 in the category there were 8 that I hadn’t posted on www.EnchantedCeiling.com. Digging some more I found two other photos that were blogged about that didn’t get the EC category, nor submitted to the EC site. This means I have 10 more photos here than there. I guess I better get busy submitting…
Started up, went down, back up, back down, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 328
If you are a regular reader here you know that the one show left on TV that I make a point of watching is The West Wing (it probably should have it’s own category.) But the last couple of Sunday’s I just haven’t experienced that same magic. I’m thinking it is this whole campaign thing, I really enjoy the White House stuff a whole lot better. It was OK when a couple seasons ago Bartlet was running for re-election, because we still got a healthy dose of, well, the West Wing goings on. I am beginning to think, as happens with most TV shows and me, I lose interest. I want the same old comfortable stuff and they move on or I tire of the same old stuff they are giving me and I want them to move on. Oh, well, there are always the repeats on Bravo.
I have read a couple of his books before and they are laugh out loud funny. Today at the used book store Donna unearthed one of his from 2000 that I remember reading about, but never got around to actually reading the book. From Bill Bryson’s “In a Sunburned Country:”
“It’s all right,” she giggled. “It’s dead.”
We peered cautiously at the little object on her fingertip, a telltale red hourglass shape on its shiny back. It seemed unlikely that something so small could deliver instant agony, but make no mistake, a single nip from a redback’s malicious jaws can result within minutes in “frenzied twitching, a profuse flow of body fluids, and in the absence of prompt medical attention, possible death.” Or so the literature reports.
“You probably won’t see any redback’s out there,” Sonja reassured us. “Snakes are much more of a problem.”
This intelligence was received with four raised eyebrows and expressions that said, “Go on.”
She nodded. “Common brown, western taipan, western puff pastry, yellow-backed lockjaw, eastern groin groper, dodge viper…” I don’t remember what she said exactly, but it was a long list. “But don’t worry,” she continued. “Most snakes don’t want to hurt you. If you’re out in the bush and a snake comes along, just stop dead and let it slide over your shoes.”
This, I decided, was the least-likely-to-be-followed advice I have ever been given.
That is how I wish my words came out.
Started up, went down, back up, back down, then up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 332
That was how it was presented to us in an all employee meeting yesterday.
First the bad news, our company will not be giving a General Wage Increase (hourly) or a Merit Increase (salary) for all of 2006. Second the great news, they will now offer a profit sharing plan. And to kick it off we will be included in the company wide 2005 profit sharing. On November 15th an amount of approximately 4.78% of your base salary will be deposited in an account setup for you you use at retirement.
The great news was only great if you were not already living from paycheck to paycheck and really counted on that 3% raise for this year. Fortunately this probably is only a small percentage of employees.
For Donna and I it is doubly great as we will both get a nice little sum in our accounts. This will be in addition to our current 401k where we are tucking aside 15% pre-tax for our retirement. Our 401k is invested in a plan that adjusts automatically as we move towards retirement, slightly higher risk funds now that will slowly change to more conservative funds the closer we get to the “golden years.” This profit sharing stuff is kind of found money and I think we will plop it down in the most aggressive fund we can find. If it tanks, pffft, who cares, we already have Social Security, the meager retirement fund the company already has and that 401k to fall back on (God willing and the creek don’t rise.)
We have been after a 401k match for years and the whole we are a “cost center” and we must stay competitive thing had worn thin a long time ago. Every quarterly communication meeting, every yearly state of the company meeting and every bi-annual corporate opinion survey the first question asked was always, “When are we going to get a 401k match?” The first answer to the question, “What is the one thing that you would change about ASCO is?” “401k match.” More than a few folks have left the company and in their exit interview when asked why, the answer was, that’s right, the new place offers a matching 401k.
A couple of things aligned to make this happen. One of which was the company had a really good year (thanks to all of you who bought our valves.) Another was we saved a bunch on money on medical insurance by switching to BCBS of Alabama. The no pay raises for a year thing certainly helped a bunch. So big thanks to company management for pulling this off, we finally get a 401k match, even if it is variable from year to year (historically it has been around 5% for the last 5 years) and it is called Profit Sharing. When you stop and think about it, they did go the extra mile for the people too, a 401k match would have been cheaper on them because not every one participates in the voluntary savings program. With the profit sharing everybody gets a slice of the pie, even if they don’t want it.
Added a Washington DC gallery today. It is pictures from Donna and my 3-day trip to the nation’s capital back in March of this year.
I’m going to start working on making galleries for the all the photo memes I used to do before burning out. These will take longer and I’m not going to post every one. Theme Thursday and Photo Friday I did nearly every week for a little over two years, that means over a 100 photos and I know not all of them were winners. I’m thinking maybe what I consider the best 25 or 30 will be all I include from those two. Phototime Tuesday ran for about a year and a half and I had just started doing Lensday Wednesday, so those pools and consequentially the galleries will be smaller.
Started up, went down, back up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
I culled from 101 Theme Thursday (now called Thursday Challenge) photo submissions from the couple years I was an active participant and picked 20 favorites. They are now in yet another gallery. Still to come, my best of PhotoFriday & Phototime Tuesday entries in their own galleries as well. I’m not sure about Lensday Wednesday, because I was just starting to do it when gave up the photo memes cold-turkey I only have 17 entries total. Maybe I can get the top 5 or 10 in a gallery.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
…until I posted another gallery full of my pictures. Yesterday was Thursday and I added my top 20 photos taken for Theme Thursday. Today is Friday, so today I added my 20 favorite entries for Photo Friday. I now have until Tuesday to get my Phototime Tuesday images up.
…until I scraped my front lip spoiler on a curb. 53 weeks. Today at lunch I pulled in a little too far and heard that awful noise. Fortunately it just scraped the underside and is not noticeable unless you are laying on your belly like a reptile. After a year I guess I just got complacent, plus the angle parking thing didn’t help, I do it so rarely that it was easy to misjudge.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
 Spent the morning out cruising looking for Miata photo backgrounds. Time to start gathering images for my 2006 wall calendar. Here are the images I used for the 2005 calendar. I snagged about 4 images that should work today and I must have pretty close to the other eight stored on the hard drive already. For this photo the sun was on the wrong side of the car and seeing as I couldn’t really correct the contrast to my satisfaction I added some grain and pumped up the saturation. I kind of like the effect and this one will probably be for October 2006.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
 Last Sunday we went to the Mediterranean by enjoying the Greek Festival in Augusta. This Sunday we went back in time. We went and enjoyed an afternoon at the North Augusta Living History Park for something called Colonial Times. Lots of folks in period dress doing period things, with even a small battle between Colonists & Indians against the British. Now with blank musket fire to scare small children and pets. The best part was a family act as a traveling troupe performing magic and juggling and music. I only took a handful of pictures, but this is my favorite, apparently shopping in the 1780’s was an awful lot like 2005. A man with a list in a store comparing goods against his list while conferring with his wife…
I must apologize if your domain contains any of the following words because I just banned you from viewing this web site: meridia, xenical, carisoprodol, viagra, ambien, levitra, adipex, phentermine or hydrocodone.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
Added the last two photo meme galleries, Phototime Tuesday and Lensday Wednesday. I had only been doing the Lensday Wednesday for a short time, so I only had 17 pictures to choose from. I narrowed it down to 7 I really liked, but I hated to have a gallery with an odd number of photos in it, so I added back 3 of the honorable mentions to fill it out. If you can guess which ones were the 3 fill-ins correctly, you will win a prize. Maybe an 8 x 10 framed photo of your choosing or something else equally fabulous.
 One of our routes to Augusta has an old abandoned industrial looking building on it. I always thought it would be a nice backdrop for a Miata photograph, but it is always locked up. But a few times recently the gate has been open, so it is must be used for something. Unfortunately those times we have been on a mission and haven’t had the time to stop.
Last Saturday, Miata photographs were my mission and the gate was unlocked. I drove in and parked near a loading dock. There was a sign that said, “Please check in at office.”, but with its patinaed look I had no idea whether it was current or a holdover from when this place was actually in use. As I turned the corner I noticed a trailer with a door open so I called inside, “Hello.” A fellow in coveralls appeared and said hello right back. I asked him what was this place and he told me it is used as a training facility for heavy equipment operators. (This explains the half dozen old bulldozers, ranging in size from big to real big, parked there (not visible from the road.) It is open on every other Friday and Saturday, but today there was classroom training at a different location because they were installing new classrooms at this site. The rusty buildings aren’t used anymore, but they were a part of a Huber Clay Co. kaolin mine processing plant. I asked if he minded if I parked my car around the other side of the building and took a few pictures. He said no, so off I went.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
I’ve started to go back over my off-line archives and weed out the multiple posting of the same topics. I’m also taking out any of the photo related entries now that I’ve put them all in galleries. All of this was caused by having multiple blogs for multiple purposes and later combining them into one big ol’ blog-o-rama. I’m tossing out some of the lame entries as well, those that were posted just for the sake of posting and have no redeeming value. This is not to say that I can eliminate everything that has no value, if I did, there wouldn’t be anything here (and right about now there are some of you thinking that wouldn’t be such a great loss.) This is definitely slow going, I worked at it for a couple of hours on and off and only managed to get through a little less than two month’s worth. there are 3 years worth to do total.
 I’m only halfway through pruning 2004’s entries. There is a lot of trash entries in there. I’d like to maybe not write so many inane posts, forcing one, even when there is nothing to write about, but I’m afraid if I don’t write something every night, the “good” will never materialize. FYI, this is exactly the kind of post I am deleting…
Finishing up my thrice-weekly rollerblading tonight, as I passed by a minivan parked in a driveway not to far from home, a five or 6 year old kid standing on the passenger seat called out as I passed, “Old man skating!”
Ow, that hurt. And to make sure he had his parents attention, he said it again, only louder this time, “OLD MAN SKATING!”
Maybe I ought to look into some of this stuff?
2004. Now you can read almost all about it. When I first started with the text file of that year it was over 900k. By the time I was done it was half that. Quite a bit of that was due to eliminating the photo meme entries. I was doing 3 a week. Then I ditched a bunch of how’s the whether posts and similar filler.
Once I imported that file my list of monthly archives doubled in length. Not really happy with that development (especially if I do the previous 2 years too) I went looking for a solution. Like most things blog wise, if you can imagine it, someone else has already created a plug-in for it. Thanks Rob.
Now I just need to figure how to display the whole months posts on the archive page like MT used to do. Then I will work on getting them to display from first to last, which seems better suited to archives, rather than starting at the end of the month.
I wonder it categories should do that too? Or should they be like the front page and display from most recent to oldest? No rest for the weary…
Somewhere here before, I kiddingly mentioned that I should root for the Houston Astros instead of the FRS. A search can’t locate it, so that means one of two things, it happened in 2004 and I thought it wasn’t worth saving or it happened prior to 2004 and it is still in the archives. Well starting tonight I guess I will root for them, at least for the next 4 to 7 games. Houston and the Chicago White Sox will play in the 2005 World Series and I hope my cheering for the Astros doesn’t hurt them. 
I gave a couple of reasons why I should switch allegiances, one of which that the Astros current uniform is a pretty good match for the Emperor’s color, so I would be stylin’ and profilin’. The second was tonight’s Houston starting pitcher, Roger Clemens, AKA Rocket. Donna and I were lucky enough to see the young 20-something Clemens pitch the New Britain Red Sox to the Eastern League Championship in 1985. Ever since I have almost always liked the guy (there was that one stint of pitching for the Yankees.)
Go ‘Stros!
 I guess business was good last year. First they announced we will be adding profit sharing to our benefit roster, then yesterday they passed out free golf umbrellas to everyone and today we had a company Fun Day. They supplied the hamburgers, hot dogs (with all the fixings), chips and never ending fountain drinks and set up tables and chairs on the front lawn. They also gave away about 70 door prizes. Donna won a 8′ x 11′ dining canopy. And for desert they gave out Megapasses, admission plus all the rides you want, to the Western Carolina State Fair that is right across the street.
Donna and I were the only ones to actually walk over. It may have been right across the street, but you had to walk all the way to the other side to get to the entrance (probably a 1/2 mile.) We didn’t ride any rides, we watched other people ride. We didn’t partake in any of the games of “chance” either. We did walk around the whole place twice, we looked at all the displays and contest entries and came home. Thanks ASCO.
Oh, it happened again. Two days in a row now. On one of the circuits as we passed by the dunk the Bozo tank, I heard some one shout, “Hey old man!” When I looked over, the clown laughed and said, “Yeah you.” I kept on walking…
Sometime earlier this week I received a certificate in the mail that entitled me to a $35 gift card just for test-driving a new MX-5 Miata. So guess what we did Saturday morning? Right.
The interior is not as bad in person as it looked in pictures, for that matter the same can be said for the exterior. The gages are trendy in that they start at the 6 o’clock position, but are easy to read and they shouldn’t ever be hidden because of the Miata’s first ever, tilt steering wheel. Kudos’s to the return of a real oil pressure gage (although I didn’t really notice it.) The seats felt uncomfortable because they have tightened up the seat bottom bolsters making the seat narrower. I bet that you would get used to it after a while though. The car is larger inside, but really only on the driver’s side. I could actually get comfortable with the seat forward one notch unlike the current car. There is even a bit more headroom with the top up. They kept the 50/50 weight balance, but in and effort to reduce polar movement by getting as much weight towards the center of the car as possible they moved the engine back about 3 inches. To do this they moved the exhaust manifold to the opposite side of the engine than the current car and it encroaches on the passenger side of the interior. Not only is there a swelling of the center tunnel, but also the foot well has been pushed back. Donna is 5′-2″ and with the passenger seat pushed back all the way, she cannot stretch her legs fully out! I remember back in July when I sat in one at the gap it felt very tight on the passenger side and attributed it the center tunnel intrusion, but I see that it wasn’t just that. She was not uncomfortable, but just a little crowded. I would be uncomfortable on a trip over there though.
The door tops are marginally higher, but you can probably rest your elbow there comfortably. Although, for whatever reason, during our test drive I don’t think mine found its way there. The Z-fold top doesn’t tuck down as far as the current one, it stops about shoulder high, thereby filling in between the seats. The larger seats seem to block more from the back too. It all adds up to the interior being more encompassing, makes you feel like you are sunk down in the car. The steering wheel has audio controls in the spokes and looks like it was pulled from a Mustang, not a high point.
Exterior-wise, the fender flares are still polarizing; sometimes they look geeky and other times not so bad. The front looks a little too cute; it reminds me of Nemo, the clown fish from that Pixar movie of a few years back. I’m sure the after market will take care of that in due time (a nice set of shark’s teeth in the mouth might help.) There were several things that glared out at me in the pictures I’ve seen that I didn’t like at all, head lights, marker lights, tail lights, third brake light, but standing next to the car in person, they didn’t really bother me. One thing that really bugged me in the pictures I saw of the car with the top up was a funny hitch around the window. Made it look like it was coming undone from the frame or something. Turns out to be an extra folded seam along the edge of the top (hard to explain) that is a rain rail. Once again it didn’t seem so obvious in person. The Z-fold top with one center latch is trick. The no boot thing is nice, sorta, I don’t like the looks of the empty spaces that show on each side, they’ll probably make a nice spot to catch falling leaves.
They had a new black car parked right next to a black ’05 Mazdaspeed and you can tell they are related, but the newer one is larger looking. Not MG Midget to MGB larger, but more like a younger brother who grew up with better nutrition. It is still very much Miatalike, but with each passing generation of the car it creeps further from its roots. When we went from the first generation car into our current 2nd generation vehicle it seemed more grown up. It had a little more power and a little more torque. It was quieter, both inside and out. The interior was much nicer in looks and materials. Plus they added all those power goodies that we take for granted in cars now days. The new Miata is probably about the same incremental step up from our current car, as it was from the first generation Miata we used to own before. I’m not so sure that is a good thing.
Donna may have said it best. While chatting with the salesman afterward, she told him she didn’t like it, “It felt a lot like riding around in that Mustang convertible we rented a few years back.” If that is the case, it spells doom for us lovers of raw rear-wheel drive sports cars, but maybe success for Mazda as the car may attract a more mainstream buyer.
I have been forgetting to put it in that is all. Last time I remembered was last Monday, well you didn’t miss much, it hasn’t changed.
It might change this week though, forecasting upper 30’s for a couple of overnights.
I’m off for the next couple of days. Going to the tourist hot spot of Albemarle, NC and will be without internet access, so there may be an empty spot in your internet life until Thursday. Only I won’t be visiting the Reed Gold Mine, myself and ASCO’s CNC Programmer will be going to school to learn GibbsCAM.
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335
The Holiday Inn Express here has got a “Business Center” that has free access to the Internet. Don’t tell ‘em that this ain’t business, OK? I’ve even got Radio Paradise playing in the background.…
Bad news is that they also have MS Word installed, so I really have no excuse for not finishing up the Master’s Miata Club November newsletter.
But first I have to tell our dining out stories.
Last night for dinner we ended up eating a lot later than planned because as it turns out after you get north of Rock Hill, SC (unless you into Charlotte, not take the by-pass like we did) there isn’t anyplace to eat until you get to Albemarle. There was a Sagebrush steak house a block past the motel, so we ate there even before checking in. The food was better than the one that went out of business in Aiken, but nearly as good as the one in Rock Hill. Topping off the experience was the least personable waitress known to man. Seemed almost a shame to leave her a big tip, but what the heck ASCO was paying for it…
Today Mark and I asked the instructor where we could get a good hamburger (ie. not fast food) for lunch, he recommended 2 places as possibilites, Kathleen’s Kitchen or Rosebrier. Directions were given and they sounded similar except (I thought) one was left and one was right at a light about a half a mile down the road. Mark was driving at I was navigationg. We made the first few waypoints just fine but went straight where we supposed to turn. I noticed Kathleen’s Kitchen on the left as we passed it. Mark made a circle around the block to get back to KK, but after all that, it wasn’t open! Well, if Kathleen’s Kitchen was left, the other place was to the right. We headed right on the look out for the Pizza Hut that we were supposed to turn at to find Rosebrier. We drove. And drove. And drove some more. When the speedlimit went up to 55 and civilization (as much as there is in Albemarle, NC) faded we decided to hang a U-turn and go back. For grins we drove on by Kathleen’s Kitchen and maybe a 1/4 mile past was a Pizza Hut. Woohoo. We found Greenbriers. The hamburger was good, not great, but a lot better than Hardee’s, et al. So much so, that maybe that is where we will have lunch tomorrow. They had a decent choice of other snadwhiches to choose from too.
One good thing came out of our extended wrong turn though. We drove right by the place the motel clerk said was good for seafood which had planned on getting tonight. And it looked like they were doing a good lunch business.
 I apologize for last night’s entry. I started typing out the story when I realized I didn’t have a spell checker built in to the browser like at home. I copied what I had so far in to Word and finished the story. I then corrected the spelling and any of the suggested grammar errors. A quick copy and paste into the browser, followed by publishing.
I never did read what I posted on the web, until tonight when I got home and told my wife what I had written and she wanted to see. We I called up the web page and started reading along with her, I noticed a mistake, then another and another. When I noticed the misspelling of sandwich was exactly like what it was before I corrected last night I knew something was amiss. The fact that there were several paragraphs missing on the end made me realize that when I thought I pasted the complete and edited story back in from Word, it didn’t get there because that is exactly where I was before trying to fix things. Oh, well, I guess I’ll leave it alone as a testament to my scattered thoughts.
On one of our wayward wanderings in search of food yesterday we passed right by a auto repair shop with this interesting bit of Roadside America parked outside. Today on our way to lunch I made sure I had the camera.
Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 337
Donna and I have an occasional need for a cell phone, so last year we started looking about for the cheapest way to get a cell phone that met our needs. We really didn’t need to sign up with one of the big guys for $30 a month and a hundreds of anytime minutes. Nor did we want a two year commitment with substantial penalties to bail out earlier. After doing a bit of internet research on the pay as you go type phones we settled on a company called Tracfone.
The smallest minutes card you can buy is 40 for $19.99 and it is good for 60 days. If you don’t use the minutes they just roll over, but you have to buy another card in 60 days or your service will be discontinued. Because we use so few minutes our bank of airtime is up over 100 minutes. So no matter how you shake it, it’ll cost us about $10 a month for a cell phone.
Recently Donna’s mom decided she wanted a cell phone too. Her use will probably be less than ours so we bought another Tracfone. For $30 you get 20 minutes and a Nokia 1100 phone. It arrived last Thursday. I went online and activated the phone. Unlike the last time for us, this phone didn’t get up and running with in an hour. The support section on the web site said give it 24 hours and if it doesn’t come up call. I left it on overnight and hooked to the charger. By morning the battery was full up, but the signal strength meter was flatlined. Being a good boy I decided to wait out the 24 hours, even though there was surely something wrong with the phone. (Our phone is the same model and when they were side by side, our signal strength meter was full to the top while the new one showed nothing.)
Friday evening I called the support phone number and explained that my phone was not working. She could see on her computer that I had activated it, but told me it hadn’t been 24 hours. When I said sure it has, her response was not 24 business hours. Huh? “What’s a business hour?” I ask. There are 8 business hours in a day she replied, so according to them I had only been waiting for my phone to start working for 8 hours. WTF? Knowing what the answer would be before I asked, I said, “I suppose Saturday and Sunday don’t count?” “Right,” she said. I tried to explain about the lack of signal strength so there was zero possibility that my phone would be receiving any kind of power up codes, she would have none of it. When I put on my most exasperated voice and said, “I’d like to say thank you..” Before I could finish with, “But I can’t.” She promptly replied, “You’re welcome. Have a nice day and thank you for calling Tracfone.”
Sixteen business hours later — now it is this past Tuesday evening. I call the support phone and get a recording saying that I should try back in 48 to 72 hours due to problems associated with Hurricane Wilma. Sheesh. I’m calling them tomorrow.
Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 339
Called Tracfone customer service today at lunch and was lead through a series of steps, one of which was restoring factory defaults, and when nothing worked the barely understandable CSR said I am turning this over to our tech department. If it doesn’t start working by 1:00PM call back. Here is your case number. Tonight, still nothing so I tried to call just now and got a busy signal. Waited a few minutes and tried again. This time the phone rang and it was answered by a recording that announced, “Due to high call volume, you call cannot be completed, please try again later.”
Last weekend regular gas was going for $2.42 a gallon. Yesterday it was $2.29. In the business section of today’s paper there was an article titled, “Oil Companies See Record Profits in 4th Quarter.” Do you think that the sudden drop had anything to do with public relations?
Is it just me or do the new GM minivans look an awful lot like the Mutt Cutt van from the movie Dumb and Dumber?
 
Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 339
Daylight Savings Time ends (or is it starts) tomorrow morning at 2:00AM. So tomorrow at this time it will be this time.
Don’t forget to set your clocks ahead 23 hours tonight before you go to bed or you will be late (or is it early) for church on Sunday.
 On last night’s trip up to the mountains to spend the night, there was construction on US441 between Clayton and Dillard, GA. We must have past 30,000 of those orange construction barrels as the Emperor past through the 30,000 mile mark.
Yesterday morning I washed the car because we had a MMC event in the early afternoon. This was our Senior Drive. One of the Club members is the Administrator of the Elmcroft Assisted Living Center in Martinez. He and I concocted a scheme in which the Club would come over and take the residents who wanted to go on a top down Miata drive instead of their usual Saturday 8-passenger van ride. We had a perfect day for it too, lower 70’s and a cloudless blue sky. We had 5 cars and 5 passengers for the first trip and when 4 more people showed up, we did a second slightly shorter trip for them. The one fellow who I drove was so appreciative that I was embarrassed by it. This is definitely an item we should do at least once a year.
When we got up this morning in the north of Georgia it was in the lower 30’s and there was a layer of frost covering the car. We wimped out for the first couple of hours of driving. The leaves didn’t cooperate in the whole picturesque, blazing fall color, Norman Rockwell painting we had hoped to see, but you take what you can get and we got extremely patchy color. We even did a 20-mile segment of the Blue Ridge Parkway in hopes, but the colorful vistas never materialized. There was one short stretch of NC 215 coming down off the parkway that in a matter of minutes we went from bare trees to patchy color to green. Never the less we had a wonderful time in our 24 hours of the mountains. We got in a night away from home, a short hike in the woods, a look at a beautiful twin waterfall and miles of twisty roads.
Started down, went up, back down, back up, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 343
On Friday night I did finally get through to a CSR and finally got my point across that the phone was broke as I have had it for a week now and the signal strength meter has even twitched off of nothing, zero bars, nada, zippo. Of course the warehouse was closed, so it was too late to get a new phone shipped out to me. They are going to send it FedEx overnight on Monday and it was to be here next Tuesday.
The reason I say was is because tonight when we got back from the mountains, I had to set about a dozen clocks in various rooms and to make them match as close as possible I needed a correctly set timepiece to carry around with me. Since neither Donna nor I own a watch the only thing I could think of to use was the worthless cell phone. After syncing the time on the phone to the time on the PC, off I went. Somewhere about mid job I noticed something strange on the phone display, bars on the left side indicating that I was getting a signal to the phone! I dialed it’s number from the home phone and it rang. I couldn’t answer it as the CSR had emptied the minutes in preparation for adding them back to the new phone when it got here.
I called the Tracfone customer service number and after a short wait I was hooked up with my minutes and held in my hand a working cell phone (a week late.) Now there are only two questions remaining: 1) Will I get a phone via FedEx on Tuesday? and 2) How long will this phone work?
An elderly man entered into a confessional booth:
Man: “I am 82 years old, and have a wonderful wife of 60 years; many children; grandchildren; and even a couple of great grandchildren.
Yesterday, I picked up two college girls, hitchhiking. For some reason, they thought I was kind of interesting. One thing led to another, and we ended up at a motel where I had sex with each of them twice.”
Priest: “Are you sorry for your sins?”
Man: “What sins?”
Priest: “What kind of a catholic are you?”
Man: “I’m Presbyterian.”
Priest: “Why are you telling me all this?”
Man: “I’m telling everybody!”
Back in Albemarle for another couple of days of GibbsCAM training. This time it is three of us, Mark from last week plus another Mark from the Tool Room. Once again we are staying at the Holiday Inn Express and I’m conducting business on their communal PC near the lobby.
Like last week, I got the guys checking in to use my Priority Club Card number, so this trip I’m racking up triple points towards future stays at a Holiday Inn. Trouble is to agree to it this time I had to promise to take them along on Donna and my next free stay. We’ll get a room with two double beds, one for us and another for the two Marks…
Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 344
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You know you are in trouble when the ace of your staff is a knuckleballer. Today Tim Wakefield fooled some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time. Even though the Red Sox didn’t win it was not entirely Tim’s fault. Randy Johnson pitched well, but he was beatable and even though Manny smacked a couple of monster home runs, they never got the offense going against him. I think it was more the sputtering offense and stupid base running that doomed the FRS to an 8 to 4 loss. 
