Miatatude

It was raining for the ride in, it was beautiful during working hours and after. Hurried home because 2/3 of my new PC was delivered. Got speakers and the CPU, the monitor made a sight-seeing trip to Greensboro, NC in the back of a UPS truck. It is on its way back now, last I checked it was back in West Columbia, SC. It should get here tomorrow. We are going away for the weekend to Hilton Head, so I won’t even get to unpack it. Sunday. I am running on the new CPU now. I started it up in XP just to see what it looked like, but then promptly fdisked it, partitioned into a 12 and an 18 gig drives and loaded Win2K back on. I’ve got just the bare essentials on now, I’ll load the apps as needed. (I haven’t loaded the spell checker yet, so if this is spelt a little rough….)

Purchased Today: Zero
Money spent since 03/03/03: $31.75
Started down, went up, went down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 44

Ran the gage down until it was right on “E”, so I spent the most money on gas in recent memory. 10.24 gallons @ 1.659 per equaled $17. I went 271 miles on that tank so I got about 26 MPG. Glad I don’t drive an 8-cylinder SUV or live in California.

Purchased Today: $17.00 in petrol
Money spent since 03/03/03: $31.75
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 42

Washed the car this morning, man was it dirty. The inside was filthy too, but that has all changed, it is now mostly clean. Needs a real intensive spring clean and waxing, but that will have to wait until April sometime, as the next 4 weeks are out of town trips and a vacation to New Orleans. I washed it because the Master’s Miata Club was asked to show up for an elementary school’s spring carnival. The way it was presented it sounded like we were going to be parked at the center of attention for an hour, with other hours assigned to other vehicles. As it turned out we were there at the same time as the fire truck, the mustangs, the hot rods, etc. Not only that we were parked way off to one side and it was hardly worth our being there. So the seven of us mingled around the parking lot and chatted away an hour and left. As Elaine of Seinfeld would have said, “Definitely not sponge-worthy.”

Purchased Today: nada
Money spent since 03/03/03: $14.75
Started up, went down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 40

Well my dilemma as to what to buy with the $200 is over. The fire extinguisher used to put out the fire in my pocket is a new Dell Dimension 4550 Pentium 4 Processor at 2.53GHz, 512MB DDR SDRAM at 333MHz, 18.1 in 1800FP Dell Ultrasharp Digital Flat Panel Display. That $200 and I forfeit my March’s $100 mad money towards the purchase price and I get to replace my aging 500Mhz Gateway with out guilt. I say guilt, because I really do not need a new PC. This one here still accomplishes everything I ask for of it. The only time I notice that it is ancient technology is when I save an hour long MP3 of Echoes. Well the 4x CDRW is a dog, but I don’t do much burning. Ships on the 13th, should be here 3 to 5 working days later…I’m going to go wait by the mailbox.

Purchased Today: nada
Money spent since 03/03/03: $14.75
Started up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 39

Big turnout for the Master’s Miata Club meeting tonight, 21. In an effort to mix up the meeting locations some we held this month’s at the Atlanta Bread Company. My wife called last week to reserve a spot for 15-20 people and re-called this afternoon to re-confirm, when we got there was nothing set aside for us. fortunately the corner we asked for was empty, so we moved a bunch of tables together and marked our territory. It was OK, but probably won’t be in the regular rotation.

Purchased Today: $14.75 in gas
Money spent since 03/03/03: $14.75
Started down, went up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 39

This is the busy week. First Wednesday of the month is the Aiken Bicycle Club meeting and the first Thursday is the Master’s Miata Club meeting. At least all I have to do at the Bike Club is sit and listen, at the Miata Club one I am the Secretary so I have to write stuff down. Which means I have to sorta pay attention. The bike club meeting was neat as we had some folks come speak to us about an upcoming bike race that is coming to town. Rich Hincapie (brother of George, Lance’s main man on US Postal) of Hincapie Sports and Tim Farrar from the SC Heritage Race Series chatted about what was going to happen on May 2nd when the bicycle circus comes to town. I would love to be there and help/watch. but we have already made or reservations for the inaugural “real” hike in the Georgia mountains that day.

Purchased Today: nothing
Money spent since 03/03/03: $0.00
Started up, went down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 38

Can’t decide what to mod to buy next. I am torn between some new Gage Faces or some Real Aluminum Trim. I’ve $200 burning a hole in my pocket….

Purchased Today: nothing
Money spent since 03/03/03: $0.00
Started down, went up, went down, went back up, still up.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 37