We’ll Be Fine

We got up this morning and Donna asked if we wanted to head over to DD and get some breakfast. “Awesome,” I said. The reason this was such a great idea was we both enjoy our usual meal there and secondly we needed to get a couple of bagels for Friday’s breakfast, because we were riding the tandem to work.

As we prepared to leave I eyeballed the radar and wondered out loud if we would make it over there before we got slammed with a line of thunderstorms. The very tail end of the storms that wreaked havoc over the rest of the south on Wednesday afternoon/evening was making its way through the CSRA. Donna asked, “Should we stay home and eat?” “Nah,” I said, “We’ll be fine.”

As we loaded up the Sonata it was just starting to sprinkle. That was fine, I stayed dry, because the car was under the little tarp over metal frame “carport” we put up for Donna’s mom’s Civic when she moved in with us back in 2000.

About 4 miles into the 6 mile trip I started to regret that offhanded, we’ll be fine, comment. The bottom fell out and it poured and poured and poured. The wind whipped around and driving was limited to under 25 MPH with your fingers crossed that you wouldn’t run off the road.

We did arrive safely and ate our meal while reading the paper sitting on some stools at a counter near the front window. In hindsight this was probably not a good idea as it turns out we were in our own little tornado watch. We dallied long enough that the main part of the storm passed over us and it was raining just enough to make me keep the wipers on intermittent during the drive to The Valve Store(TM).

The wind and rain kept up for most of the day, but by the afternoon the sun was out making for an uneventful drive home. As I pulled into the driveway and headed for the “carport” I noticed a decent sized branch had pierced the tarp and was standing straight up. It was held up by the foot or so of the branch sticking out of the top of the tarp though large tear it made on its way down.

Had the Sonata been parked under there, the branch would had hit the edge of roof and slid down the side of the car along the door and rear quarter panel, maybe busting the little opera window. Yikes.

So now the question is when did the branch fall, during the storm? If it did and if we had stayed home for breakfast, we could have been sitting at the table and heard the crash, bang noise of our 8 day old car being skewered…I guess that, “We’ll be fine,” comment meant us and the Sonata.

Old School Fish Dinner

A while back on a Wednesday evening we decided to go to Captain D’s for dinner. Turns out Wednesday is senior night where the local restaurant offers several options for meals at the $4.99 & $5.99 levels, including a drink. Needless to say we came out happy for around twelve bucks, telling ourselves that we needed to remember that on haircut night.

Tonight was haircut night, so guess what we had for dinner? And, even at 55, guess who were the youngest folks in the room?

Night Riders

There was a barely audible clunk as the stuck pad released its grip on the rotor. Twenty years of recall memory allows a smooth clutch engagement as we back out of the garage. At first, the air feels heavy and stagnant, but as we turn the first corner, the nighttime cool surrounds us. We are lucky that in less than a mile we are are barreling down some lightly traveled two lane blacktop.

On the final leg of our journey Donna, says, “I’m sure glad we didn’t trade this in.” I replied, “That was really never an option.”

While the Sonata is an awfully nice car, it will never be able to hold a candle to the Miata in pure driving fun.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1006

Love Shack Bay-bee!

With appologies to the B-52’s:
I got me a car, it’s as big as a whale
and we’re headin’ on down
To the Love Shack
I got me a Hyundai, it seats about 20
So hurry up and bring your jukebox money

The dealer is taking care of titling and registering the car, but I have to pay the Personal Property Tax on the car in South Carolina. I called the Tax Auditor this afternoon and asked how much the tax would be and after I gave him the VIN number he told me it would be $420. Which is about what I expected (the last record I have for the Emperor is $303 in 2006.) When we got down to the Auditor’s office after work the Clerk who entered my information and generated my bill, said it would be $330 and pointed me down the hall to the Treasurer’s office to pay it. Why the $90 discrepancy in my favor? I didn’t question it, but had it gone the other way…

After dinner we drove over to Augusta to drop off the tax receipt at the dealer so they can do what they need to get me a plate. When I got back in the car I noticed my zipper was down. Fortunately my un-tucked T-shirt hung low enough. Donna asked did I think anyone in the dealership noticed, she was worried that they might have thought we were fooling around in the car. Maybe I will call the Sonata, Love Shack instead of Purple Whale.

Wash Day

We did three loads of clothes and I did two cars. The Miata has needed a good washing since before pine pollen season, but I put it off until everything pollen-wise has dropped or drifted around. Then I washed the Sonata to get the north Georgia (where it is still spring) pine pollen off of it. Thankfully there is that shark fin satellite antenna in the middle of the roof so I could judge if needed longer arms or step stool to get the whole car clean.

And while that should have been today’s ?Holy Crap This Car Is Big? story, it was trumped by our filling up the gas tank tonight. We had filled it up Friday when it was still half full, but it was now getting down to under an 1/8 of a tank. It holds 17 gallons which is 1-1/2 Miata tanks, so this time it was the most we had ever spent of gas ever. The 14.77 gallons that went in there came to over $50.

I didn’t pay attention to the mileage at Friday’s fill up, but today I did. It took 10.1 gallons then and now it took 14.8, there were 753 miles on the car, and I’m going to assume that they topped the tank when they sold it to us at 29 miles, so the gas mileage was 29 MPG. Not bad for a car rated at 22/35 (26 combined) considering it spent quite a bit of time being slogged through curvy mountain passes.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1005

Georgia State Park Geocaching

On the trip back from Robbinsville, North Carolina today we knocked off three more Georgia State Park caches, along with 2 Georgia Counties and one DeLorme page. We walked a little over 6 miles total in the three parks and in one place I thought for a minute we were in an Enchanted Forest. The trail kept going up and up and up, so it seemed like they had figured out how to make a loop trail uphill for the whole length.

We’ve had the Sonata now for a whole three days and there are 731 miles on it, 702 of which are ours. At this pace in the first year of ownership we will accumulate 88,938 miles.

Today’s “Holy Crap This Car Is Big” story came at a driver exchange in a Burger King parking lot in Commerce, Georgia. At the previous driver change when Donna gave up the driver’s seat to me, she didn’t move the seat at all and I had to squeeze in. So this time she thought she would do me a big favor and move the seat all the way down and back. Trouble was, once she got the seat in that position, she couldn’t reach the door handle anymore to let herself out.

Ain’t No Miata

But it ain’t half bad. After a brief visit with my sister and her husband in Hendersonville (where the temperature was 48°) and eating at our favorite pizza place, West One, we headed west to do a little research for our fall Gap Trip with the Miata Club. When we got to Robbinsville it was 30 degrees warmer than H-ville. After reconnoitering a couple restaurants, eating dinner in one, and a couple of motels, we decided to take an evening drive in the mountains.

The Sonata handles pretty well for a big front wheel drive car, the 45 series tires help, but being an automatic transmission it isn’t nearly as responsive as the Miata in the twisties. We didn’t attempt Deal’s Gap proper, but did run up 129 to the Tail of the Dragon Store, head back south on 28 past Fontana Dam and then cut across 143 back into town. The Sonata has a slap stick shift lever that you can use to manually shift the 5 speed transmission, but its placement is too awkward for good functionality. But the SE version we bought has paddle shifters on the steering wheel, so I thought I would try using them on 129 when the road turns sharply uphill at the Fugitive Dam. It lasted maybe all of 3 minutes. Donna told me she wasn’t so distracted by my activation of the turn signals when down shifting, so much as the wipers swooshing by on the dry windshield when I hit the stalk instead of the paddle when attempting to shift up a gear. I think I’m going to need more practice at that…

Don’t be alarmed at the lack of atop count, I’ve decided to not add it to the bottom of the post when the Miata hasn’t been driven on that day.