Miatatude

The Miata Caricature is somewhere in the postal system, the Scottish or American I don’t know, but who knows it might be held up in some postal inspector’s back room. It comes in a mailing tube 2 inches in diameter and 18 inches long that might be misconstrued as a weapon of mass destruction and what with Glasgow being a hot bed of El Quida terrorists and all….

I know it is in the mails, as yesterday I got a key chain and a mouse mat with the image on it from CarArtz. Dave said he mailed both packages, envelope and tube, at the same time. The envelope made it here first.

[shameless plug]
Everyone reading this blog, go buy a bit of art from Dave from CarArtz.com, he is the best.
[/shameless plug]

I don’t really want to blog this out loud for fear of jinxing it, but I think spring is on the horizon. Got into the low 60s today so we got to ride home with the top down. Daylight is lasting a little longer too, even had time to wash the car after supper.

Didn’t hear the antenna whistling on the top down drive, so I guess that it good. Of course it is now on my side of the car, so it is behind my seat. Last generation Miatas had it on the other side so it could be heard out of the driver’s right ear. Now it would be heard out of the passengers left ear, but she didn’t complain…

Speaking of the passenger, she was a driver today. Donna had a dental appointment at noon and her mom needed the Civic, so she had no choice. After 2,600 miles and 85 days, Donna drove the Miata today. She didn’t want to because I hadn’t put a scratch or dent on it yet and she was terrified she would be the one do it. Not that I would get upset with her, because it is bound to happen sooner or later, but she would be upset with herself. If those numbers repeat the next time Donna will drive the Miata will be the middle of June. 🙂

The non-powered antenna mount arrived from Trussville today, so right after work I spent the next hour or so tearing apart the trunk to swap out the powered one for the fixed mount. I had to undo the CD Changer from it’s base and various other trunk trim bits, so I could remove the plastic pocket for access to the antenna mount mounting.

I coughed up $45 for the OEM Mazda unit because of where it is mounted in the fender. If I bought a generic one and just clamped it to the fender, then someone pulled or bent at the antenna it would do the same to the thin metal fender below. The OEM mount is basically the powered one without the motor that clamps onto the fender and is bolted to a metal piece making a very rigid system.

While I had the unit apart I painted the shiny bit that is the nut on the top semi-flat black to match all black plastic mounting base and the antenna, which I still don’t have. With a deck full of MP3s, who needs the radio? I may want to get one before Saturday though, that is the next possible time I would be using the radio, Car Talk comes on at 10:00AM.

After just 2-1/2 months the tan mats in the car are turning dark brown in spots and dingy looking. I think it is time for some new ones. The last set of mats I had in the Laguna were a set of Coco Mats in black with gray dots in them. I bought the generic fit ones from a place on the web called AJ Prindle at a real bargain price. The fit was so-so, but the mats themselves looked great, stayed put and hid dirt real well. This time I decided to bite the bullet and get the custom fit jobbies at a substantially higher price. They have a tan herringbone that would probably look super, but to spice things up a bit, I opted for the black with tan dots (hoping they will hide the dirt better factored in as well.)

We’ll see if they look as good as my mock-up. I downloaded the image sample from their site and used PaintShop Pro to turn it into a seamless tile. I then created a 16 x 28 image and filled it with the pattern. Printed it out on my HP650C plotter at work and laid it in the passenger footwell. I was worried that Donna wouldn’t like it, but when she said she did, I went right back in, got on the web and ordered some. Site says there is a three week wait on custom orders, so hopefully I’ll get them in time for the Master’s Miata Club Tech Day so I can have a project to work on. 🙂

The Miata was kind of filthy after the rains of late last week and needed washing. (probably wouldn’t have been as noticeable on the Laguna Blue.) It was dry and sunny both weekend day afternoons, but the temps were close to 50, and not really warm enough for car washing. I couldn’t stand it anymore so, this afternoon I “washed” the car in the garage with Meguiar’s Quik Detailer and an old towel. Looks a whole lot better now.

Dave Scott of CarArtz.com has got my new caricature almost finished. He sent me some sketches this morning to show me he was hot on my job. Last time he just sent me a completed proof before we ironed out the details. Really interesting stuff to kind of see the process. Here is the first step, a pencil and paper sketch.

From there he scans it in to the PC and gets the major lines on, then throws some color at it.

Next comes adding the details and then the highlighting. (I asked him to make the car face the other way so when I hang it on the wall the new car caricature and the old car caricature will be facing each other.)

I ask for some color changes in the car and seat color. Plus I want the carartz logo smaller and near the bottom. Here is the 99.9999% completed image. (I asked for a little more brown in the car color.)

I’m stoked. Think I’ll go wait by my mailbox for the tube….