Category: Miscellaneous

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Everett Moore comes to visit.

Low and behold, out of the blue, our old neighbor Everett stopped by for a visit today.

He used to live across the street and his life long goal in life was to own an ecstacy trike. I remember years ago when I first met Everett, he had a photo of one in his barn. Now, this type of trike isn’t my pick, but there is some logic here.

After Everett’s wife died, he moved to Florida, got all set up and eventually picked up a Goldwing trike. It was the bee’s knees. The problem though as Everett would explain it is that it will nickel and dime you to death. The starter went out and it was $800 to get that fixed. You’re dependent on a Honda dealer (although they are just about everywhere). But the cost of anything repair wise for one of the big jap bikes is just too much.

With this trike, it’s a Chevy V6, gets better gas mileage than the wing trike, and if he needs a part, it’s off to the local auto parts store. A starter for this is $65 dollars and it’s not a major surgical procedure to put it on.

Ok, so some of that makes sense.

Anyway, he’s in great shape, looks good and is happy as can be. It was good to see him again. He took all of the kids (including me) for a ride. Then we went to dinner.
 
From Everett Visit…

More photos in the Google/Picasa Web Album.

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Question for the day.

When was the last time you backed up your personal machine?

Your home machine. You know the only place you have a copy of your finances (quicken), your precious family photos, and of course those all important tunes.

When was the last time? Did you check that your backup was good?

CD’s as much as we’d like them too, don’t last for ever. Backup often. You’ll never be sorry you had too many backups. You will be sorry when you don’t have one and you need it.

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Tarski, WordPress and busted comments.

Yes we are aware that the comments portion of this site is messed up.

We’re working on it 🙁
As a result we have temporarily reverted to the classic theme which seems to work.
Grr….
We’re still working on unbreaking this, but most of the site works. :/

It seems to be a combination of WP/Theme/Plugins, blah, blah, blah.

**We seem to be back to normal, although I cannot tell you why.  I cannot get the same combination that is now working on this site to work on the development site on my home computer.  It wasn’t busted, but now it is.

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And the Cirrus Lives on…

About 4 years ago we purchased this 1999 Chrysler Cirrus:

Cirrus

It had roughly 40k miles on it. It was a direct replacement for the Honda Wagon that we had, which was stolen. For some reason we didn’t want another wagon, which, in hind sight was a bad idea.

We were a tad hesitant to buy a Dodge/Chrysler product, especially after coming from Honda’s, but it was newer than what was stolen, had far fewer miles, and was in some ways an upgrade, leather seats, CD player, v6, cute gauges, etc, etc. It also fit nicely with-in the budget from the insurance check.

It now has 117k miles and still runs pretty good for what it is.

The only real repairs it’s needed to date were brakes, and tires (both consumables).

We did go through one episode where the speed sensor died (apparently common on these). The speedo quit, and it shifted down into first and stayed there. This repair was $20 and about an hour and a half of my time. Locating the dang thing was the hardest part, this sensor isn’t easy to get too.

We had the regular transmission flush and fill around 75k because it wasn’t shifting as smooth as it should. Shortly there after it started acting as though the transmission was going to die. Really rough shifting, etc. But that simply passed and, well, it’s chugged along for another 30k miles.

The check engine light came on around 100k miles. But the car still ran perfectly fine, so no rush to fix that.

Last week however, it hiccupped and went into limp mode. It would start up, shift up through the gears one time then back down into 2nd gear when you came to a stop and then stayed there. Ugh…

Transmission problems just suck. The fluid was still red and clean, not burnt. So I was fairly certain it was something electronic. Of course the Chiltons manual in this regard was no help.

After a trip to the dealer, the results are in. $180 for a different speed sensor (apparently there are two). $250 for the EVG valve replacement, and it’s as good as new. Or as good as it was 60k miles ago.

It needs a tune up. No doubt about that, but the dealer cost for that is a whopping $450 dollars. I think we’ll wait a bit. It can’t be _that_ hard, or can it.

We’ll see if we get through this summer with this car and a young driver before we put another $450 in it.

The bottom line though is that this car has been very, very good for us. Will we rush out and buy another Chrysler? Probably not, but it has served us well.

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Drug Problem?

I didn’t write this, don’t know who did, but it’s oh, so true.

Read on:

The other day, someone at a store in our town read that a methamphetamine lab had been found in an old farmhouse in the adjoining county and he asked me a rhetorical question, ”Why didn’t we have a drug problem when you and I were growing up?” I replied: I HAD a drug problem when I was young: I was drug to church on Sunday morning. I was drug to church for weddings and funerals. I was drug to family reunions and community socials no matter the weather. I was drug by my ears when I was disrespectful to adults. I was also drug to the woodshed when I disobeyed my parents, told a lie, brought home a bad report card, did not speak with respect, spoke ill of the teacher or the preacher, or if I didn’t put forth my best effort in everything that was asked of me. I was drug to the kitchen sink to have my mouth washed out with soap if I uttered a profane four-letter word. I was drug out to pull weeds in mom’s garden and flower beds and cockleburs out of dad’s fields. I was drug to the homes of family, friends, and neighbors to help out some poor soul who had no one to mow the yard, repair the clothesline, or chop some firewood; and, if my mother had ever known that I took a single dime as a tip for this kindness, she would have drug me back to the woodshed. Those drugs are still in my veins; and they affect my behavior in everything I do, say, and think. They are stronger than cocaine, crack, or heroin; and, if today’s children had this kind of drug problem, America would be a better place.

~author unknown~