Month: May 2008

Working Vacation

We have taken next week off from work and unlike the past few years we are not flying or driving off to the opposing corners of the lower 48 states — we are staying home. When asked where we are going, I have been half kiddingly telling everyone at work that we are going nowhere because we spent all our money on remodeling the bathrooms.

The truth is we are going nowhere, we’re staying home, but it won’t be all pina coladas by the pool for me, mainly because we don’t have a pool, but because I have rooms to paint, the two “new” bathrooms, two bedrooms and the hallway between them.

Plus the outside of the house needs a spring cleaning. I need to blow all the oak pollen clusters off the roof and the siding needs to be pressure washed. I’ve got a bottom-of-the-line pressure washer that I’ve used the last couple of years on the deck and when I mentioned I might even do my driveway, buddy Mark volunteered to lend me his gas powered 4.5 HP Troy Built pressure washer so as to speed up the process. He gave me 2 pieces of advice for using his washer compared to my wimpy unit; 1} don’t spray anywhere near your window screens because you’ll cut right through them like a hot knife though butter (don’t ask him how he knows) and 2} if you have no shoes on and see a spider, poisonous or not, walking across your foot, do not try to spray him off with the washer, trust him, the spider bite would be immensely less painful.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 148

Man of Faith

Tonight’s episode must be Locke centric as it started out with his birth.

Appropriately, or not, I think that John will be my next acquisition. That is, if I happen to bid victoriously.

Somebody needs to beat the snot out of Ben again, all the bruises on his face are clearing up.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 146

The Good Ol’ Days

I’ve had a lot of complaints about my uninteresting posts for the last couple of days, well just one complaint (Hi Mark), but with my single digit readership, one is a lot comparatively, so I’ve decided that tonight I will repeat a post from the glory days. I’d link to the post, but it is short enough to just quote it here.

Happy 2002
New Year?s Day. Cold, maybe mid forties. The Miata sits in the garage all day. The farthest I venture is around the block on rollerblades. Donna goes to the store, but uses the MSV.

That was my first blog post on January 1st, 2002. Now that was quality.

While moving from one bedroom to the other a couple of weeks ago Donna was going through some boxes and stumbled on the bill of sale from our first Miata purchased on November 7, 1989 for list price, $16,639. It was a middle range ‘A’ package car with the only options added being air conditioning and floor mats. We financed the car at an interest rate of 12.5%, so we ended up with 60 payments of $344.63.

Funny thing though, fourteen years later when we bought the Emperor, a top of the line LS, because it had sat on the dealer’s lot for nearly a year they were willing to deal for a below invoice price and with interest rates at 4% we ended up with 60 payments of $311.25.

So maybe the good ol’ days, in both blogging and Miata buying, weren’t so good after all.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 144

Matching Funds

Donna and I have decided to double the contribution to our retirement fund. From now on when we travel to Georgia we are going to pick up a 5 week play on the Mega Millions to go along with our usual multi-week Big Game quick pick here in South Carolina.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 144

Group Shot

To commemorate this fine occasion we all gathered on the porch last night to take a group picture. I had a tripod in the trunk (for those HDR Post Office pics), I was going to be the photographer. With the help of my assistant Donna, before snapping the real thing, I experimented with some exposures and seating arrangements. Here is a composite. And while the real thing came out OK, I’ll never be a portrait photographer.

The other 4 cabinmates were more the late sleeper types so Donna and I packed our car and hit the road at around 6:30 this morning. The only disadvantage to this move was that we spent the first couple hours driving with the top up because of the cool temps. The big advantage and what made it all worthwhile was the fact that we had the roads all to ourselves. No Sequoyas to slow us down on the Snake, no nobody. We didn’t even come across another vehicle in our direction for any of the twisty stuff at all. We barely saw any cars going in the opposite direction either.

We got home at noonish and after lunch I washed the Miata even though it hasn’t been very long since the last one. We are long through with spring here in the flatlands, but in the Georgia mountains it is in full swing with both the pine and hardwood trees throwing off pollen, combine that with the 1/2 mile of gravel road to access the cabin and the Emperor really need a bath.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 144

I Thought I Had A Corrupt Database For a Second There

When I went to blog on Friday night I tried several times to upload the image you see in Friday’s post. It would never finish uploading, always timed out. So I wrote the words out and guess what? I couldn’t save the post. I used the repair tool in Cpanel but that made no difference. I backed up the database with a plugin and I exported it using WordPress’s built in feature. I considered upgrading to 2.5.1. I tried again this evening and couldn’t get it to work again. I tried adding a comment to a post. That worked. I triedto post by adding a chunk at a time. That worked for one chunk, any more that 10 words and it wouldn’t save. I gave up. Wait ’til I get home and then I’ll try and post stuff.

In spite of the rain, which was mostly light, we enjoyed spending a couple three hours shopping and eating in downtown Blue Ridge before heading back to the cabin for the rest of the day. Later in the day the skies cleared and the sun came out, but by then we were to settled to go back out. There was a game room with a foosball table, an arcade game console with several vintage games and a pool table. I was reminded that I sucked at pool when I was younger and that 30 years away from playing hadn’t improved my game any. Fortunately most everyone else was as sorry at it too.

My guaranteed to please everyone movie was not a total success, one person didn’t even watch and another got up and went to bed at about the halfway point. And truth be told I would have rather seen the original version. And probably the other three people were just being polite by staying to the end.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 141