This Is A Deal?

I have been getting my daily status report at work about how many spams Postini has stopped and we have crept up to over the 100 mark and pretty much stayed there since early April. I haven’t said much about the spam recently, mainly because it is literally the same old shit, but apparently I was wrong.

One new way the spammers have to grab your attention is to mix a random city with a random newspaper name, i.e. Woodbine Enquirer or Las Vegas Tribune to lend some authority to their junk. I need to get something like that spam title generator for the title of my blog, might give it some internet cred.

And it seems backgammon is the new poker, as I got a half dozen invites to $10,000 tournaments today alone but none mentioning Texas Hold ‘Em. I wonder who Bravo will get to host Celebrity Backgammon?

Here is my favorite email from over the weekend: bnyykpe@doramail.com is offering Wndows Millenium $50. Who would possibly be tempted to buy a 6 year old operating system and arguably the worst version of Windows since version 2.0? For fifty bucks? Don’t they know how much C$ALIS I can get for that much money?

24,000 Kalmias

Donna and I went for a nice little walk in Hitchcock Woods this morning. At first we weren’t going because it was supposed to rain, but radar showed no chance of it for a while, so off we went. For a change of pace we went in a diffrent entrance than usual and we were glad we did. As we came to a halt the odometer turned 24000 miles.

There is a subdivision in town called Kalmia Hills and there is a path in the woods called Kalmia Trail, but for whatever reason (mostly I don’t know flowers from flours) I never put two and two together until today, the darn things are blooming all over the place. I know we have traversed that trail before, but never in the middle of May…

Kalmia

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 149

How Many Minutes Is 692 Seconds?

And just how far will you go at an average speed of 53 MPH? My wife and I weren’t to sure about the answer to either of those questions this morning and that may have been our downfall. We totally blew a turn and had to back track several miles to re-engage the course. It threw off our time and mileage for the first segment, plus it skewed our Fiero checkpoint time so that we ended up losing out on 39 points. That probably would have been enough to put us near the top of the standings.

Our own fault. The general instructions for the today’s Master’s Miata Club TSD Rally said have at least a watch with a second hand… Last year the instructions were turn right at the third opportunity, but this year the instructions were full of: Turn right. CAST to 42MPH. Drive for 800 seconds. Turn left at next opportunity. First problem was all we had for a clock was the one in the dash which just gives hour and minute. Second problem was our rusty math skills in dividing triple digits numbers by 60. Third problem was remembering to remember the next approximate time for a turn all the while trying to find the answers to esoteric trivia questions in the surrounding environs.

We didn’t repeat our last year’s second place finish, we finished totally out of the money, but we did win a booby prize for having the highest score on the trivia portion of the contest. I now have a gift certificate for a free oil change at our sponsoring dealer. I also have yet another hat with Miata on it. This one is almost like the one I won in November except the word Miata is in navy, so it may actually get worn. Matter of fact, if anyone wants a nice never worn hat, cream colored with a navy blue bill with the word Miata embroidered in bright purple script, drop a comment in the box, cost is just a couple bucks to cover postage.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 149

Shiny & Quiet

Took the afternoon off to do some car stuff. First up was to try and get rid of my gingling sound when going over bumps. I removed the brake caliper, its mounting bracket and the rotor. This was as far as I had gone before and sure enough the noise was still there. Here is where I ran into a bit of trouble. The next thing that needed removing was the nut on the axle, I don’t have a wrench big enough to tackle the job, plus once I got it off I would have totally exhausted my knowledge of car guts. What the heck, I have all afternoon, buttoned it back up and took it back the the local tire store which caused the noise and let them have it. I took one of the technicians for a ride and pointed out the sound. When we got back he pounded on the tire with his fist and could get it ringing, he said, “Give me a few minutes” and disappeared into the shop. 20 minutes later he came back and told me that when the last guy replaced the lug he didn’t get a shim in the right spot behind the bearing and it could move around causing that noise. He fixed it up and now I am noise free again.

After I got back from the LTS I washed the car. It wasn’t real dirty, but there is a Master’s Miata Club event tomorrow and I couldn’t show up in a dull car. I had intended to wax the car after the last washing a couple of weeks ago, but didn’t get to it, so today I did. As it happened at the end of December when I last waxed with Black Magic Wet Shine Liquid Wax it went on real easy, but came off a lot harder. When I was using my old skool paste carnuba wax it came right off with a towel. I’m actually thinking of getting a random orbital buffer to take this new fangled stuff off. The gurus over in the Car Care Products section of the Miata Forum swear by the Porter Cable 7336 which is about a hundred and a quarter. A can of paste wax would be a heck of a lot cheaper…

Started down, went up, back down, back up, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 147

Not Lipitor, but Crestor

After 4 months of doubling down on my Guggul & Red Yeast Rice herbal supplement, my lipid profile shifted slightly about center, but when you look it, it really got worse. I had no argument to give the doctor, so I took my Crestor sample packs and said, “See you in 6 weeks.” Let’s hope this drug works, or heaven forbid, I have to change my eating habits or exercise….

  Chol HDL LDL Trig
Goal <200 >40 <100 30-150
09/21/04 209 24 131 271
01/10/05 176 33 110 167
05/06/05 174 27 108 194

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 143

Ching Ching, Ching, Ching Ching

Ever since I had to have a lug replaced I have had a chinging sound coming from that wheel. It is not a very loud sound and is high pitched. It occurs every time I hit a bump or rough spot of road and also when making 90 degree corners. Sounds kinda like brake chirping, but it does not seem brake related, i.e. it is present whether braking or not.

I pulled off the wheel, caliper and caliper mounting bracket over the weekend to see if the new lug was hitting the backing plate and it looked like there was plenty of room.

Could it be in the wheel that was rotated there? Unlikely. A family of small bats has nested in my wheel well? Highly unlikely. Is it something they did when replacing the lug? Likely.

I have borrowed a rubber mallet and plan on jacking up the car this weekend and pounding away while systematically removing car bits until the noise stops. Hopefully once the noise has stopped, the last item removed won’t be too important…

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 143