Smooth Ride

Took advantage of the frighteningly scarce sunny afternoon weather we had today and went for an aimless drive around the back roads of Aiken County. After about 150 miles of driving, I’m liking these Toyos more and more. Haven’t really had a change to challenge any serious twisties with them, but from the few tight curves locally I’ve attacked, they seem to grip very well. Plus, even pumped up to 35 PSI, the softer side walls smooth out the rough roads nicely. The old Bridgestones were rock hard at 29 PSI and had a tendency to trammel all over the lane at the slightest provocation from any slant in the pavement surface.

Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $705.02
Started up, went down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 124

Jacking Up

Washed off the car in the garage using some Mequiars Quick Detailer. Vacuumed the car out. Washed the windshield. Even touched up the scrape marks on the front air dam with some semi-gloss black paint. Why you ask, because we were going over to the Sno-Cap Drive In for a Miata Club gathering. About 15 minutes after we got there the rain started and didn’t quit until about an hour after we got back home.

Money spent today was for a hydraulic jack at Wal-Mart. A 2-ton unit with two jack stands, 2 wheel chocks and a shiny chrome cross lug wrench. According to the instructions on Miata.net I’ll need to put a groove in a length of 2 x 4 so I can lift one whole side of the car at a time. Downside to this is I may have to drive up on some 2 x 6 to get the required clearance to put the jack under. It is a step in the right direction, maybe after 5 or 6 years I’ll be ready to step up to the $200 aluminum race jack.

Purchased Today: $31.55
Money spent since 03/03/03: $705.02
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 123

Petsmart

A couple of years ago they opened a Target store in nice strip shopping center on the south side of town. There is a Goody’s, Michael’s and a year later they built Pier 1 on the end. Plus there is also smaller strip in there with a few more stores. About a month ago they started building something on the end of Pier 1. This store was bigger than everything in the shopping area, but the Target. There were rumors of a Best Buy awhile back, could this be it? Tonight while in Michael’s we asked the clerck what was coming and she replied, “Petsmart.” Both Donna and I sighed. The clerk laughed. She said that our response was typical of all the responses she got when giving that answer. I guess we would have answered differently had we been pet owners, but there already is one of those stores (Pet Warehouse, maybe) a mile up the street. We really need a Best Buy or Circuit City. The closest place to find those kinds of stores is in Augusta, 25 miles away. The only place you can buy any computer stuff is Staples for crying out loud.

New Tires Get Mounted

$50 was spent on getting the new tires mounted and balanced. For future reference the mileage was 116,050 at the change. Fourteen twenty-five was for petrol. Made a lot of transitions today. Rain was all about and there were extended stops for work, tires and shopping. Sears had a 2-1/4 ton hydraulic jack on sale for 50% off making it just $19.99. I finally decided to break down and get a nicer jack. For ever I have been using the scissors jack that comes with the car and when I did the brakes a couple of weeks ago I decided that that was enough. They were all gone when I got there. This started me on a hunt for a jack. The first place I looked was for advice on the Miata.net Tool Talk forum. Lots of advice there, so much so that I’m now convinced that I should buy an aluminum race jack for $170 from Harbor Freight. Or I should just go to Wal-mart and spend $60 on a jack and some stands – Jeez, thanks guys.

Purchased Today: $64.25
Money spent since 03/03/03: $673.47
Started up, went down, went up, went down, went up, back down, up, down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 122

Just Give The People What They Want

And it ain’t Hillary Rodham Clinton. According to this morning’s paper around 13 million people watched Barbara Walter’s interview with the Senator. Which is approximately half the 25 point something million chuckleheads that tuned in to see Barbara Walter’s interview Monica Lewinski a few years back.

Master’s Practice Round Tickets

It is really tough to get tickets to the actual tournament unless you know somebody with an in or want to spend big bucks on scalped tickets. When Donna and I moved down here practice rounds were sold on the day of in unlimited amounts. We are not golfers, but not going to Augusta National when you have a chance would be like living in Indianapolis and not attend the 500. We went for the first 3 years on Monday because it was always the least attended day. After the third year the crowds were getting so big that they decided to limit the practice round tickets to a certain number (they’ve kept that a secret) by having a ticket lottery. For the next 3 years we got tickets, but for the last 7 we have been shut out. A lot of other locals that used to go regularly have also not gotten tickets in a while. There is a lot of speculation that out-of-town applications get special treatment because that way more money is pumped into the local economy. There have even urban legend type talk of people putting their out-of-town relatives addresses on the applications and they have gotten selected for tickets.

The reason I’m ranting about this April event now, is that in today’s mail, I got my application to get in the practice round ticket lottery. I am seriously considering putting my Mom’s Connecticut address on there to test the theory. It is not that I’m really desperate to get in and see the golfers or the course again, but I need a new hat. My hat from 7 years ago is getting disgusting looking. I’ve checked eBay and can’t find the right one – just the word Masters in script with no flag or year.

Missed Me

Went I came up back up front to my office this afternoon I was met by a friend who said, “You better go put your top up. Russ already did.” (Russ is the other Miata owner where I work) I went to my desk and fired up the Weather Channel’s radar and after watching the radar loop for a bit almost decided not to go out. But something told me to go ahead and do it, just in case. Good thing I did, about 5 minutes after I did, it rained big time. Too much for the cockpit cover to have held back.

While rummaging around in a draw looking for something, I stumbled onto some Miata logos in blue reflective tape I had hand cut out a few years back. I already have some on my car, so if you would like these (two 7″ and one 4-1/2″ long) let me know and I’ll mail them to you.

Purchased Today: diddly
Money spent since 03/03/03: $609.22
Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 112