Golf GTI

Magic

Grandpa’s Old Truck


The GTI returned today from the wizards at PDX Wraps, where they were repairing my “backing into a post” bump in the night smoothed over. They said they were going to have to rewrap the bumper and patch a spot near the spot where bumper and body meet.

Unlike Grandpa’s Old Truck above, the GTI looks like it did when it came out of PDX Wrap’s garage the first time. When I got home I took a look at where the patch was supposed to be; there was nothing there. Did they manage to heat that area up and stretch the vinyl to cover that spot up? Or was it sorcery?!?

Sorcery

I Made The Cut

 I really tried to go for a walk today. I got my usual hot Salted Caramel Latte and went over to walk around the Salish Ponds, which I haven’t done in a couple months. It was a sunny day, but the temps felt like the low 30s because of the 10 MPH winds (gusting to 15), and now that the leaves are off the trees, there was no respite from the winds. I lasted a whole 1/2 mile before getting back in the car and coming home.

The highlight of the day is PDX Wraps posted a yearlong recap of some of the stuff they have done in 2025, and I’m proud to have made the cut. Go watch it on Insta; they do a wide variety of stuff besides my humble GTI.

That Was Unexpected

When I brought the GTI home back on October 11th, I realized it didn’t come with an owner’s manual. The first thing I did was find a PDF of the manual online, and then I headed over to eBay to buy a physical copy of the manual.

Today while running errands I went to put something in the glove box, and it wouldn’t close. There was a kind of shelf at the top of the inside of the box; I took a closer look, and there was something on the shelf. I reached and got ahold of something thick that was bound in leather.

You guessed it, the original owner’s manual…

Typical male behavior: if it isn’t visible front and center, it doesn’t exist.

Close To A Typical Friday

Weekly grocery shopping because Fred Meyer offers 4x the points on Friday if you clip the coupon. Free donuts at the community coffee klatch.

Not typical was the annual visit to the PCP for the Medicare-mandated checkup in between. “Have you fallen in the last 2 months?” “Do you worry about having enough food?” “Do you need help with bathing?”

This is almost typical in that it was the 3rd time I have removed the front grill and bumper of the GTI. I ordered some LED high beam bulbs to match the low beam ones. So, off came the front of the car to get at the headlights. I removed the existing halogen bulbs, and that is when I noticed the slot was nowhere near big enough to slide the new LED unit in. I suppose I could have made the hole bigger, but that would be modifying the reflector portion of the high beam, and that might create an unknown or weird light pattern.

I headed over to Advanced Auto and bought some higher-intensity and whiter-colored bulbs. They aren’t perfect, but they do match better with the low beams. I’ll return the LEDs to Amazon tomorrow.

I also finished the puzzle that was about 75% done when I left.

A Different Day In The Life

Today I did two of the things I did yesterday: Stomping Grounds for a latte and a visit to Harbor Freight. The Harbor Freight trip was to get a set of 3/8″ drive metric deep sockets. I needed just one size, 13mm, but they only sell sets, so now I’ve got a set of 10 that range from 10mm to 21mm.

I bought a Hatch Pop Kit from ECS Tuning so I could open the hatch with a press of a button on the fob, and today was install day. First you remove the old struts, one at a time, but before you do that you have to prop up the hatch because even with just one strut removed the hatch will sag to close. It was a straight forward job and took all of 20 minutes to swap the struts. Closing the hatch now takes a heavier hand to shut it, but the magic will be in the free lift up.

Here is where it would have paid to read the whole page before ordering. Down in the notes section was “Coding may be required— To determine if coding is needed, hold your hatch pop button on your key fob and if you hear the hatch latch operating you DO NOT NEED CODING. Please reference our installation PDF for coding instructions as needed.” I thought I heard the latch, but the hatch did not raise under the power of the new struts. So to code this, I need to buy a Volkswagen Auto Group-specific OBDII scanner and some software too.

To get the functionality I wanted from the $100 original purchase, I have to spend another $40 +shipping and $25 for a month of the software… I’m almost leaning toward returning the Hatch Pop Kit; I’m not really liking the force required to close the hatch. I’ll give it a week.

A Quiet Corner Of The Loudest State

K Falls Morning


 
Started the morning in Klamath Falls and ended the day in Reno. From Klamath to the California border is 25 miles, and from Reno to the border is 20 miles, leaving a little over 200 miles of the quietest part of California to drive through. Most of the “towns” you pass through on this route have just double-digit populations. The largest town on the drive is Susanville, with a population of 12,000, but on the route I took I never went through it.

Everyone Wanted To Go

All Aboard


 
For today’s walk, everyone wanted to go. Bonesy always sits up front, so roomie had to sit in the back. He was none too happy, but dogs rule, so he sucked it up. I’ll hear about it later.