Author: Andy

Yoda struts its stuff

Why, when I have new struts, suspension, linkages and a rebuilt power steering cylinder and I’m driving over a windy hilly road, do I have to get behind a Volkswagen beetle with Jesus fish?

Anyway – the Yoda now has it together again and drives like the ELUV (egg-like utility vehicle) that it is. Typical though – We get a little money and the first thing we do is blow it on much needed car repairs.

Its kind of weird though – there has been play in the steering for nearly 5 years. Now it does what its supposed to. I’ll have to get used to not having an inch or two of float on each side. Oh, and the shocks react differently.

One Frozen Night

Last night I borrowed Hilly’s camera to shoot some night pictures of all the ice. With her tripod in hand, I wandered the streets looking for things that would look cool with the aid of an open shutter. I took a number of crappy shots, but managed to take some that I like as well.

Finally, cold and tired, I started walking home. Just shy I slipped and fell. I’d been holding the tripod away from me so if I did slip, it would remain upright. Sadly, we were on a hill, and shortly after I hit the ground, the tripod tipped and the camera came crashing down as well. A quick inspection made it look as if only the lens cover had been chipped. The camera worked, so I was able to sleep some. When I looked at it again in the morning I noticed a rather nasty crack in the body with the plastic bent into the camera. Damn. With any luck she can get just the plastic body piece replaced. Otherwise I’ll be camera shopping soon.

The Ice Storm

Icy walkway

We’ve had a work-closing ice storm in Portland. Well, freezing rain anyway. We’ve developed nearly half an inch of solid ice on top of the streets and cars. Its been excellent as many businesses have closed so there is little going on.

Normally this would be fine, but we had errands to run, and Hilary was kind enough to brave the roads and come pick me up so we could do some shopping. The big score of the day was a vacuum sealer, but details on that are on rooftop brew.

The real joy of the day was driving in winter conditions. I love snow and ice, and Hilly’s Toyota all-wheel-drive wagon (with studded tires) performs admirably on ice. She let me drive and I had a blast. I even did an almost perfectly executed fishtail into a 180 to park the car.

One of my favorite things is to humble SUV drivers. Especially when we’re in a small wagon. Slowpokes. We did help a young fellow from Ethiopia or Eritrea who slid off the road into a mechanic lot full of cars.. He was probably new to ice, but seemed rather happy to be back on the road and on his way home. We also tried to help someone in an IROC Z-28 who was flooring it trying to get up a hill. By the time we finally got to the car, which sounded like an alien being dissected, got some traction and started moving forward. I love winter. And I love these inept drivers.

First Post – circa 1901

First Post - 1901

I got an e-mail from Friendster begging me to see what’s changed and generate advertising revenue for them and they used a rather brilliant hook by using examples of updates by friends in my network to lure me in.

I logged in and found very little different other than more surface area dedicated to ads. But I did notice that on my testimony to another friend, the date on which I posted the comment was way back in December of 1901. First Post!

Looks like there might be some Y2K issues? Or maybe they’re using old clamshell ibooks to host the site? My sister’s first generation iBook had logicboard problems and the clock was always resetting to Jan 01 of 1901. Bizarre.

Still, I’m going to keep the image and use it for nerd-clout. “Why I was using the internet back before it existed.”

My Victory Sub

I cashed in the first of my “victory subs” yesterday. The spoils weren’t as spectacular as I’d expected them to be. In fact, by the time I actually ate the sandwich, it has been mashed by a water bottle and all the oil & vinegar goodness had settled to one side of the sandwich, leaving the other side dry and flaky.

Still, it was pretty good. Its hard not to be good when its a Spicy Italian with nearly everything on it. (pickles, mayo and mustard on an italian sub – nasty!) I’m not the biggest fan of subway, but they do a good job fitting a lot of veggies onto their subs, and the spicy italian is a great sandwich. Now if only the artists that work there wouldn’t be so stingy with the oil and vinegar…

Apple stuff

I still get tingly during MacWorld events. This one is supposed to be as big as others in the past, and I’m kind of hoping for the headless iMac/PVR thing. I don’t need office software.

Also, timed with the event was a protest over Apple’s e-waste policies. I agree whole-heartedly that companies should be heavily involved in cleaning up after themselves, especially those who profit so greatly on disposable products (fast food?). But I’d also like to point out that my macs haven’t needed trashing yet. My 1997 Power Computing clone was shelter bound, and my G3 (circa 1999) is still humming along and hosting this site. If absorbing the cost of waste helps Apple make their computers last even longer, I’d be all for it. But I wouldn’t mind getting something a little faster.

Mutts against Hate

Not in my dog park!

Barley was all about the anti-fascist rally today. Sporting a NIMDP (“not in my dog park”) sign, we all strolled around the park in attempt to make clear that we don’t really want neo-nazis in our neighborhood. We had some trouble picking out slogans for Barley because we didn’t want to make them seem like they were making light of a serious issue, so we settled on NIMDP and Mutts against hate.

Hair is cool and Mutts against a master breed were both nixed. But I think Elwood Blues was right when he said “I hate Illinois (or Oregon) Nazis”, not that we saw any.