Miatatude

Mx, Sports Car #83

The Mazda Miata on Car and Drivers Periodic Table of Sports Cars.

We went Christmas shopping in the cold drizzle this morning and purchased several things off everyone’s list. Donna got a couple of pink shirts and I got a pair of khaki cargo pants. The futon got a new set of sheets and the dining room table got a new set of cloth Christmas napkins. The afternoon and evening was spent gathered around the dry warmth of a yule log that is the Panasonic Viera HDTV and plotting geocache stepping stones between here and St. Augustine, FL.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 915

Zoom Zoom Magazine

Somewhere along the line I left my name and address in the hands of Mazda operatives and as a consequence of that action I now get a glossy magazine (AKA advertisement) three or four times a year. The latest edition of Zoom Zoom magazine arrived in my mailbox the other day.

Included in this issue were stories about the new Mazda2, a history of 90 years of Mazda vehicles (with a nifty poster) and a story about all 3 generations of Miatas in Hawaii. The reason for Hawaii was that is where the press was first introduced to the latest version of the car in 2006. They rounded up 3 local Miata owners and their cars to drive the same route as they did back during the introductory press drive.

When they wrote the blurb on the 1999 2nd generation car, I guess they took the owner’s description as gospel, because they wrote that the color was British Racing Green, but that color was not available in 1999. British Racing Green was only available on the Miata as a special edition in 1991 & 2001. His car was really painted a similar color called Emerald Green Mica. Doesn’t anyone with Mazda fact check this magazine?

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 911

Whatever Post #1000

When I installed WordPress all those years ago I cleverly renamed the the default category from Default (duh!) to Whatever. Because for the longest time I had two separate blogs running concurrently where in one the main category was Miatatude and the other was Rants I didn’t ever think that the newfangled category of Whatever would ever catch up. But it did, possibly hinting at my lazy categorization habits, and now Whatever is the king of the categories and this post marks its graduation into the 4 digit range.

Stumped as to what to get your favorite SciFi geek for Christmas, io9 has a guide for you. The item that is on the top of my Star Trek wish list is the Enterprise Bridge Full Size Wall Mural. 15′ x 9′ of marvelous-ness, but way out of my price range. More my speed, Expendable Red Shirt T-shirt…

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 911

Free Floor Mats

They are building an office addition on the back of the plant and this where my department (Fabrication Engineering) and another (Product Engineering) will be moving into when it is complete. We were supposed to be in the building this month, but some of the HVAC units arrived well behind schedule, so it is looking more like January before it happens.

Yesterday and today they installed the new carpet on the floor. When I saw the color, I thought, “Hmmmm.” So this afternoon as the installers were wrapping up I went back and grabbed a couple of 24″ x 24″ squares of the industrial grade carpet. Because they just didn’t look big enough I also took a couple of 10″ x 24″ scraps. Good thing I did that because the Miata floor mats are about 18 inches wide and about 28 inches long.

I came home and used some duct tape on the back of the two pieces to hold them together. I then flipped the existing mats over and traced around them with a Sharpie to create the cutting pattern. Using a box cutter and a pair of tin snips I cut out my new free floor mats.

Because I traced around the outside the new mats are a little bit larger than the stock ones so maybe they won’t slip around as bad even though they don’t have a thousand little nubbies on the bottom. If they do move, my cubicle neighbor suggested getting some male-side Velcro to put on the bottom, that ought to grab a hold of the fuzzy OEM carpet (thanks for the tip Jim.)

I don’t even think they will need any binding around the edges. A cross-section of 3/16″ thick carpet reveals the bottom half is some sort of plastic/rubber material with short fibers embedded in it. It’ll shed a bit, but not enough to unravel unsightly. If anything, running a match quickly along the edge, would be ll it needs (Jim again.)

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 910

The Emperor’s Repose

The Emperor got to laze around the garage today as Donna and I took advantage of the nice weather and the reduced traffic of a no-school day to ride the tandem into work. This was the first time in a while that we have ridden on just two days rest and my sit bones were a little tender when we started out this morning, but I forgot all about them by the end of mile one.

Speaking of sore, I am going to have to give up raising the Miata’s top while seated in the drivers seat for a time. Monday morning when putting the top up for the cold drive to work I strained something in my right shoulder and it still hurts a bit when raising it up over my head.

I am one of the lucky ones because I sit with the seat all the way back and my arm length was just right for hoisting the roof up with little effort. Both shorter and taller drivers didn’t line up well for doing the over the shoulder flip up routine. The folks with roll bars or style bars were usually out of luck doing that procedure too. All and all, a lot of Miata owners had to raise the top while standing outside the car. Hopefully after a couple weeks of rest I will be able to return to my previous ways.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 904

Let’s Do The Time Warp


Hitchcock Woods Simplified*

This morning I got up and blew the dust off the single bikes and filled their tires with air. Donna and I had decided we were going to see what it felt like not to ride the tandem. At the last minute I realized that the cyclecomputer clocks were one hour ahead. Dang, I forgot about those a couple weeks ago when daylight savings time ended. As I was breaking out the instructions on how to change the clocks, Donna said, “Forget about them, let’s go.” Try as I might I felt slightly askew in the space time continuum the whole time. The weather was so nice that by 10:00 AM (possibly really 9:00 AM) we had our breakfast at an outside table at the Atlanta Bread Company near the end of the ride.

As if the 16 mile bike this morning wasn’t enough, Donna, I and a friend went for a 2-1/2 mile walk in Hitchcock Woods in the afternoon. It was pleasant enough that I walked in shorts. Because of the nice weather the woods were busy, we saw a group of two horse riders and then a group of 4 more as we were standing where the above photo was taken. There were also several people walking their dogs, including one woman who was talking on her cell phone while her dog was checking us out about 50 yards away from her. As we exited the woods a truck slowed and the woman behind the wheel asked if we had seen a muddy border collie. I said no. After she drove off my mind kicked in gear and I remembered something. I should have told her yes, the last time I saw that dog was when he was way ahead of you on trail while you yakked on your phone.

*a photo from an overlook near the Chalk Cliffs in Hitchcock Woods post processed with a filter called Simplifier by AmphiSoft in Paint Shop Pro

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 902

115,000 Sharpies

It started 22 days ago as a white spec Miata racer, $100 worth of Sharpies later and Mighty Mike has a masterpiece of Dude Craft.

On the way home from work today Donna and I stopped in and checked on one of our caches. Someone had DNF’d it on Monday and we wanted to see if it was still there. Even though we knew where we hid it, it still took us 5 minutes to find the thing. Probably because there were around 115,000 pieces of pine straw on the ground since we hid it back in April. Also the GPSr read 18 feet away when I was standing right over it.

A couple miles away from the cache the Emperor passed through the 115,000 mile mark and as if to put an exclamation mark on the event the low fuel light lit simultaneously.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 896