Sunday, August 31, 2008

I rotated the tires on the Charger today.

Odometer: 14,839
Doh!

Yesterday afternoon around 2 PM I drank a Monster Loca Moca. Mystery solved.
Time to catch a few Z's.
990

Occasionally I wake up during the middle of the night and can't fall back asleep for a few hours. When it happens I usually get up and find something to read on the internet. I don't ever watch the tv because I don't want to wake anyone else up. I use to just lay in bed but that gets restless after a while. I will start to get drowsy again in a few hours. Probably around 5:30 am, within a half hour of the time I normally wake up. I have started keeping track of when this occurs. For a while it seemed like it happened about weekly. The last time it happened was twenty days ago. This summer I have had the luxury of not having to get up at 6:00 am, but the internal clock is still wound pretty tight so most days I still wake up within a couple of minutes of 6, plus or minus.

Tonight we had takeout from Rosie's for dinner (Mexican). I woke up thirsty, but normally when that happens, I drink some water or tea and go right back to sleep.

My seester made a delivery in HSV today. We had lunch at Casa Blanca (also Mexican). She let me sit in the big rig. Nope, I didn't get to drive it, though I did wonder if I would have been able to break it loose like I did Danny's dually. I bet I could!

After lunch I drove by the Dodge dealership so that she could take a gander at the new Challenger. On Wednesday they had two on the lot. One black, one Hemi orange. Today they also had two, but they were both orange. The window sticker's MSRP was about $41,000 before the additional dealer markup of $15,000 was added. I guess the guy that bought the black one wanted it pretty bad. The engine is a 6.1 liter, 425, and it gets something like 14/18 MPG. Sweet. To me, it appears that Dodge doesn't really want to sell many of these cars. While there is a lot of interest, this car is priced to high for most folks. I suppose all the numbers will be more reasonable when the non-SRTs reach the dealerships. The Dodge website lists the starting price at $21,995 for the base model. The R/T will have 370 HP. I forgot to ask for a test drive. To borrow someone else's slogan, Zoom zoom zoom.

This afternoon I trimmed all the trees in the front yard. All four had many limbs that needed to be removed to ease mowing. I have been told that these butcher jobs should wait until the fall though I seem to always do it during the middle of the summer. It is easier to see the shape of the tree when it still has leave on it. That of course is not the real reason. The real reason is that tree trimming is usually a spontaneous event that follows having a tree limb whack you in the head while your minding your own business.

Planning for the fall camping trip is under way.

Last week I spend a few hours on a couple of days working on the differential for the old GMC. I was on the home stretch last time I touched it. Perhaps I will finish the diff up this week. School comes first though. I hope to not get too far behind too often this semester.

I recently signed up with the county school system to do some substitute teaching on the days I am not it class. Friday I sub'ed for the band director at a nearby HS. I lined up a couple more jobs while I was there.

Friday evening I helped the inlaws unload the moving truck. They bought a house nearby.

It is now 3:20. Only a few more hours to go.

This is post 990. I plan to celebrate post 1k with the mundane label also.

Friday, August 22, 2008

I recently read that the new U2 album was schedule for release in October. And then it was changed to November. They have a working title which I have inconveniently forgotten.

This week I picked up 3 lbs of okra at the big garden down the road. Mmmm. Fried okra is good. I boiled a few pods too, just to gross you out. It never occurred to me to try to steam it. I read about that here: Okra and Proud of It.

I have used some of my free time this week to work on rebuilding the differential out of the GMC. I was very lucky during the assembly process. I got the backlash within spec on the second try and the pinion shim was already correct. All that is left is to get the pinion pre-load set by crushing the crush collar and then button I can button it up.

Sunday, August 17, 2008

We are home from the beach and I resolved the problem with my IP address.

The trip home took about six hours and twenty minutes which included three stops.

Before leaving the beach this morning, I went out on the balcony early enough the see the sun rise. Again, I missed it, not because of clouds this time, but because the sun rose to far to the north. Instead of being above the gulf, it rose behind the condo next door.

Last night we dined at the Crab Shack. The crab dip was excellent.

Some folks staying in the same condos, had their wedding ceremony on the beach Saturday evening. Seems risky to me, what with the possibility of sunburn, seaweed, jelly fish, sharks, thunderstorms, and sand in your shorts.

It is good to be home.

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Assuming you count the day we arrived, today is day three at the beach. The Ada guys would all count that as Day One; the C guys count it as Day Zero. Big Bird would simply increase the array size by one and not worry about what he doesn't understand.

Day two went very smoothly, no jumper cables were required. The kids (and Seester) all awoke before me. I think she was actually a victim. G' prepared pancakes and bacon for breakfast and then we all headed for the beach.

After a brief interaction with the omnipotent god of the beach umbrellas, we set up shop and began to make a sea wall of sand to hold back the waves. (I thought I was going to let it go with just that single statement, but it appears I was wrong. As I can imagine iMike saying "Hey buddy, there is a reason there is only one dollar in your tip jar." ) The sea walls eventually collapsed.

We have watched two movies so far. Juno and Thankyou for Smoking. Juno was definitely the better of the two.

The dinner hour last night consisted of a trip to The Light House restaurant. The place was huge though practically empty. The food was good, the prices reasonable, and absolutely no wait at all. I decided the reason the place was empty was simply its location; it was not on the beach, and not directly on the main road.

Time to head back inside. The thunder and lightening are getting closer and the sunrise will be obscured by the clouds.

We have enjoyed having Seester here with us.
I woke up early this morning. Good thing I didn't take a nap yesterday or would have probably been up all night. I am sitting on the balcony in a fairly comfortable chair with my laptop waiting for the sunrise. I am equipped with a camera in case I decide the moment needs to be captured along with a small Starbucks coffee Frappuccino.

A small Ford tractor just passed by on the beach below with its headlights on. It was heading west dragging some sort of beach grooming device behind it. The clouds to the south above the water appear dark and occasionally I feel the rumble of thunder coming from the west, obviously further down the beach than the current location of the tractor. The waves are large this morning keeping the scavenger birds along the beach on their toes. The flags will definitely be red today.

As the sun approaches the horizon, a few adventurous souls head toward the waters edge. From the east a woman approaches carrying a coffee cup, probably almost empty. Directly below me, a family of three emerges. The son appears intent on crab hunting, the mother on seeing the sunrise, and the father on ruining the moment because he would rather still be in bed. Lightening appears to the southwest followed several seconds later by a mild clap of thunder. Or two. The small family turns around and heads for the boardwalk.

Friday, August 15, 2008

Life's a Beach (again)

I went to sleep Wednesday evening at home and woke up this morning in Florida. Yeah, I know today is Friday and I failed to mention Thursday.

Thursday consisted of a quick 6 hour trip from HSV to FL. We arrived about 2:30 pm, 30 minutes early for check-in. I shall not elaborate about the next hour and a half other than to say I need to buy a set of jumper cables for G's 4x4.

Seester also drove down from ATL, GA so we have a whole condo full of fun here.

We went to the Back Porch for an early dinner consisting for fried seafood goodness.

Due to my bouncing Internet back at home, my IP address has changed and this entry shan't be seen by you until after I return home. Probably.

I brought a wireless router with me so that we could all share the network connection here. As I look around me, there are 4 laptops being used for various purposes. What a bunch of nerds. It's good to be king.

Monday, August 11, 2008

My internet connection has been bouncing a lot in the last few days. The cable guy dropped by this evening and replaced the cable modem. Things appear to be OK now. With crossed fingers.

Saturday, August 09, 2008

Even though the temperatures was down about 20 degrees yesterday compared to the day before, I believe everyone is going crazy due to the heat.

My last final exam for the summer was this week so the Summer of Rick is now officially here.

Unfortunately Ginger has started making noises regarding a list of things that need to be done. How droll. [Go ahead and look it up, I can wait. I first heard the word as a kid while watching Disney's Robin Hood. Good times, good times.]

iMike has lost it just like Sean Connery. I realize it is not funny if you have to explain it. Make sure you use the accent when saying it. "And now I've lost it!" Yeah, anyway, iMike it talking about raising chickens in his back yard. Times must be hard.