It's a Go!

Looks like I'm taking 2 weeks off and hitting the road with Suzie!

This is exciting on multiple levels--The first of which is the fact that I'm getting two weeks off all at once. I don't think I've taken a two-week vacation since I was in the Air Force. I love driving trips, and the fact that it's an adults only driving trip makes it more exciting. I don't mean it's going to be nasty--I just mean we don't have to consider "kid's stuff" along the way. It's also the first "real" trip I've taken with Suzie. The bike trips are trips, but they were just short ones, staying within this state. This is different.

We went to WallyWorld last night and I bought us an electronic device for the trip: A portable DVD player. Why? To play music of course! The guy getting it out of the case was trying to encourage me to spring for the one with a slightly bigger screen but I declined. I told him I wasn't buying it to watch movies--That was just a bonus--I was buying it because this one plays mp3's. I - excuse me, what was I thinking? I mean WE have tons of music and want to be able to have a portable mp3 playing device. I know that most car systems you buy nowadays will play them, but not my 14-year-old-no-frills Neon. This way I've got a multi-use device that I can use most anywhere I want to, and it was under $100. There I go again, I mean WE have a multi-use device that WE can use most anywhere WE want to. (Sheesh, I wish I'd stop doing that "I" thing!) We're using an interface that will plug it into my existing car sound system (such as it is).

Lotsa planning to do!

My Turn to Catch Up

A lot has been happening lately, and that along with my not feeling like blogging when I do have time has created for quite a backlog of news items. Well, news in my little world anyway. I don't know where to start...

Suzie and I have been sort of planning a 2-week road trip. Not much planning really, but we're hoping to do a similar loop around to what I did with Sarah a while back--Down to Utah and over to LA and back up. The difference will be that we want to spend some more time in lower Utah than I did when I was there. There are opportunities for photos galore down there so we should probably take our hiking boots too. We are going to be seeing relatives on both sides during our trip, but the majority of our "family visits" will most likely be at the home of her recently deceased uncle. Her parents are both there cleaning things up and settling his estate details, and because they live in Kauai, it's a good opportunity to see them along with everyone else while they're here.

Our trip really hinges on whether or not I actually get two weeks of vacation. Apparently, it's not exactly a widespread practice for the bosses to grant two consecutive weeks, nor do I actually have two weeks to take. It's kinda weird working for a place where vacation is negotiated, but I am a good worker and don't think I'll be denied. I need to find out today--Time is too short. The fact that I haven't received a NO is a good sign.

We went out last weekend taking pictures of Sarah for her senior pictures. Sue is good with photography, and between the two of us we took a couple hundred pictures of her in various settings, most of which were taking advantage of fall leaves and colors in our area. We'll be going out again too--Just not sure when yet.

It occurred to me the other day that I need to change my voting schedule if we're going to be out of town during the big upcoming election. I got online and found the closest place to pick up an absentee ballot and did so yesterday. I have to say, it's pretty handy to sit at the table poring over the voter's guide and filling in the little circles at your leisure while drinking a beer. It's like having the answers to a school test as you're doing it. I may have to make the absentee ballot thing el permanente. I like it when things are streamlined and easy whenever possible.

My new truck has been going fine. I've used it for a truck once already--Helping Teresa's dad move some furniture from his house to Teresa's. That netted me $60 for my trouble. He has been living with his girlfriend (same gated community) and has had his house for sale for a little while now, but needed to get these last few things out of there.

I got rid of both items that came on my truck that I didn't want. I got $60 for the aluminum diamond-plate toolbox in the back, and $20 for the CB radio and antenna that I didn't want. That's almost like getting my truck for a thousand instead of eleven hundred isn't it? I ordered a new driver's side window regulator (that's what cranks the window up and down) the other day and that will be here in a couple days. That's really the only thing that needed to be fixed right off the bat. I also did a little buying locally from a guy that had some used parts for sale, and bought a like-new windshield and a couple of door mirrors. My existing windshield is cracked and leaks in the corners (pretty commonplace for these trucks), and the door mirrors are some kind of cheesy, aftermarket things.

Things are slow at work, but still moving. This area relies hugely on Boeing, and when the Boeing machinists are on strike it affects the whole area. Our company is lucky though because we're more diverse than most local manufacturing companies. We do much more than just aerospace products. A lot of the drivers that stop by our place every day to pick up or drop off parts that they paint or heat treat for us have told us that we're one of the only places they're even stopping at recently. There are massive layoffs in our area--Partly due to economic downturns and ripple effects, but probably mostly due to the Boeing strikers.

At least gas prices are down... It looks like a good time for a road trip!

The Sorry Truck

I had a boring day at work today.

I thought it had been a while since I blogged an original poem, so to kill time I let my mind flex its powers of rhyme:

The Sorry Truck

My truck of black; it tested me
it's mood I always guessed.
Sometimes it would start with glee
and others only rest.

Just when I would start to hope
that it was finally fixed,
I'd turn the key, but it said, "Nope"
and my joy would then be nixed.

I never knew on any day
if it would ever start.
I'd turn the key and I would pray
for just a pop or fart.

Usually it was at home
that it would let me down,
but sometimes it would let me roam
then strand me across town.

Sometimes it would toy with me
to see if I would tire.
I'd almost kill the battery
and it might then decide to fire.

That day it knew it went too far
it started instantly,
but I just stared down at my car
and ignored it's last-ditch plea.

Onto the trailer to be towed
it slowly made its way,
and tears from its windshield washer flowed
as it was led away.

Gotta Love Free Stuff!

So let's go back a few days. I bought a radial arm saw from someone on Craigslist. I know I could have gotten a nicer one (after all, they're on there for sale all the time) but the price was right.

Or so I thought.

Sure it operated fine and was mounted on a stand and all that, but I overlooked one fairly important thing when I inspected it at the person's house, and that was everything related to the wood cutting surface, or top if you will. This one had a homemade top on it that was way smaller than the original. That was no biggie, I could just make another one like I had in the past for a saw that I used to own (it's still at Teresa's house in her basement woodshop). Upon further inspection I found that it was missing to support rails underneath, and the two screw clamps that hold the "fence" (that's vertical part of the wood top that you actually place the piece of wood you are cutting up against to saw it) was also missing. The homemade one had the fence permanently mounted. I know, I know--It's all technobabble, but the point is, the homemade one sucked and was missing some of the original mounting hardware.

I felt more than a little annoyed with myself after I found this out. Sure, the missing parts were still available, but that would have totally skewed the price of the saw. The two support rails were $8.95 each and the two clamps at the back were $13.95 each. I was prepared to make all the missing pieces myself for little or cheap (albeit labor intensive) when I found an alternative online.

I was browsing online woodworking forums for dimensions of the original table top and a pdf version of the operator's manual. I was on a help forum site pertaining to woodworking equipment when I saw that someone else out there was looking for the exact same thing. A person on the forum announced that there was a site online where you could get it all for free! What? It seems that the company running the site they referred us to is the one that made the saws for Sears and is involved in a long-running safety recall. They are retrofitting all the Craftsman radial arm saws in a certain year range (I guess it was a pretty large range) with new blade guards. What this also meant was that in addition to the new and improved blade guard, you also got a new table top! Well, I went to the site and sure enough, my saw was one of them. All I had to do was put in my model number, my serial number and my shipping address. That was last Friday as I recall.

A huge box showed up at work yesterday containing all my stuff. I was very pleasantly surprised last night when I opened it up that it also contained two new support angles and clamps--Both updated versions of the very things I was missing. Is that cool or what?

Now all I have to do is give the saw a good cleaning and adjustment, and reassemble it. It should be a very new-looking saw when I'm done, and better than when it was sold.

For anyone out there that owns a Craftsman radial arm saw themselves or knows someone that does, here's the website to see if they can get the complete update package for free as well:

http://www.radialarmsawrecall.com

Poisoning Myself?

I don't know, but I'd bet that's exactly what I did.

Yesterday morning when I got up, I had a horrible taste in my mouth. I'm not talking the usual morning variety either, I'm talking nasty. My coffee tasted bad to where I could hardly get it down. When I got to work nothing I ate would "cut" it--Even my favorite peppermint gum. That's when it hit me as to what it could have been. When the notion hit me, I started drinking mass quantities of water to flush my system. That worked. By about 10 or 11am I was doing much better.

So what happened? Sunday I was out cleaning my truck and was using a new cleaner. It's called Purple Power and it's made by Aiken Chemical Company. It is one of those ultra-strong, kickass cleaners that will clean anything. It's so strong that you have to dilute it 10:1 for some things according to the label. Well I diluted it all right, putting a "splash" of it in the bottom of a coffee can before filling it to the top with water. Using an old sock, I dipped and wrung like you'd usually do when cleaning something, and spent about 10-15 minutes cleaning door jambs and the hood opening to rid them of greenish growth. When I was finished it was very hard to get that stuff rinsed off my hands. I kept rinsing and washing and rinsing and still they felt slippery and soapy. When I finally did feel like I got it all off and my hands were dry they felt like they had been baked dry and felt like my skin was too small for my hands.

So I think I was poisoned by a "safe" product just because I should have used latex gloves (which I have lots of). This sort of thing never used to be a problem you know? We never had anything more concentrated than Ivory Liquid "back in the day" so we never had that sort of thing pop up. I can't help but wonder how many times I've done that in the past and never associated the result with anything. I've messed with some nasty chemicals over the years.

I was on their website this morning and was very surprised that they didn't have an MSDS sheet available for download. For those of you that don't know what that is, it's a Material Safety Data Sheet, and I thought it was required for any chemical product, but apparently not.

Let that be a lesson to you. Gloves. USE EM.

In other news, I stopped by the license agency yesterday and succeeded in getting my new truck put in my name and getting new tabs. I was kinda nervous about it, but it went without a hitch. I send Melinda an email explaining that my title would show up there and to just hang on to it because we would probably be heading down toward her place sometime in the near future anyway. What a relief to have the truck in my name.

When you count all the little things I had a lot to be nervous about: The title was in two names (different last names), had a lien on it at one time (that was still on the title), and had a $200 sale price (for tax savings). Add to that the fact that I was titling it in Chehalis (3 counties away?), and that my driver's license had one address listed on it that I no longer lived at, and my checks had my current address--Neither of which reflected the new address I was using to title it. All those things compounded made lots of things that could have went wrong but fortunately didn't. I had everything going my way I guess, because I own my truck now and it's legal to drive. Woohoo!

Oh, and my coffee tastes much better today. As a matter of fact, it just like usual, meaning it almost tastes like coffee should taste! Almost.

A Truck Weekend

As I mentioned in my previous post, I picked up my "new" truck on Friday evening. Suz and I drove out and picked it up. I took a can of gas with me because I knew it was low on gas, and the last thing I wanted to do was run out of gas on the way to the gas station. After we got all the paperwork taken care of we headed back home, with me in my new "unknown" truck and Suzie following me in my Neon. I never did get a chance to drive it over 35mph the time I first checked it out, but I was pleasantly surprised--It drove real nice at all speeds. After we dropped it off at home we capped the evening with a good meal at a tavern here in town.

We intended to spend Saturday up at her house, with me washing and cleaning my truck and Suz doing things that she needed to do. Before we left though, I needed to address one repair on the truck: The squealing power steering belt. It was horrible. After I delved into it, I discovered that there was an belt alignment issue with the pulley right above the power steering belt, and they had probably purposely left the PS belt loose in order to give it clearance. Well, that may have worked when the belt was new, but it didn't work now. I got a new PS belt and shimmed the other pulley outward to provide the right clearance and alignment. Nice and quiet now just like it should be. It was pretty embarrassing to drive that way...

Suzie had a pressure washer at her place this last week for purpose of cleaning off her deck (which now looks awesome by the way). I started to wash the truck out with the bucket and mitt, but at her urging opted to use the pressure washer instead. I'm glad I did--I didn't know how hard it was going to be to get clean until I started in on it. The people that owned it lived under large evergreen trees, so I doubt if the sun ever did shine down on anything they owned there. It's no wonder that my truck had green all over it here and there, and had pine needles in every orifice. It even had a couple of rodent nests in it under the hood.

After spending all afternoon doing that, we switched gears. Sarah's school was having their Homecoming bash that night, and Sarah asked me to come down and take pictures of them. Her and a few of their friends were meeting at a local park for the purpose of taking pictures before they jetted out on their evening of fun. Sue and I both went down there and took about 100 pictures of them all. They were sure decked out nice! I uploaded all the pictures on our picture site for everyone to enjoy. Teresa was there also and spoke with Sue freely here and there. It's good that everyone (i.e. Suz and Teresa) gets along, but I have to say it's weird--I don't know anyone that can relate to that happening to anyone they know. We spent the rest of the evening up at Suzie's house. I bought a giant Papa Murphy's stuffed pizza and we had a few of her family over for a pizza and beer fest. After they all left we were bare-assed in the hot tub for the rest of the night. It was a great day!

Today? What else--More truck stuff. I spent all day out here in the driveway with it. Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. The more I dive into this truck the happier I am with the condition it's in. Noplace I've opened up has any evidence of rust. Sure, there's some surface rust here and there, but no rust-through of any kind. I had to really do some digging today too just to get all the pine needles out of everywhere. Under the floor mat (it's mat instead of carpet) and inside the cowl under the windshield area were the worst. I really wanted to get the floor mat out badly though because that is an area that, left neglected and wet, will surely end up rotting a floor. Thankfully, mine has no rot anywhere on the floor even starting. There was plently of moisture though, and it's all drying out now as we speak. I also listed the tool box that it has on Craigslist today. It's a pretty nice tool box, made out of aluminum diamond-plate. Here's a pic:


Tomorrow will be my attempt at getting it licensed. I drive right by a license agency in Kent on my way home and I like that one better than the one here in my town. I'm going to at least get it put in my name, but I'd like it licensed too for obvious reasons. I'm going to use my cousin Melinda's address as I previously mentioned because she's out of the inspection area. The owners gave me a copy of the emissions test they got last time they tried to take it and it failed so miserably. The gal said she was mortified at the time because it even set off some alarms or something when she was there it was so bad...

It was a fun and productive weekend!

Truck Shopping

You know, it's funny how people have a different perspective about what something is worth. No, maybe different isn't the right word. Skewed, stupid, idiotic, screwy... Yeah, now we're getting closer...

Anyway, on to the truck search.

I was hopelessly living in the past apparently, because I chose to narrow my search to a particular range of Chevy and GMC pickup trucks: 1967 through 1972. I always liked those body styles. Well, the problem is obviously age. As I grew older my love for that range of truck didn't age, but the trucks most definitely did. I stopped looking when I investigated 2 trucks last week--Both advertised at $1000 each--Finding trucks that literally should have been in the junkyard.

The first one was over in Port Orchard. No problem I thought, I could go over on a Saturday and that would also give me the excuse I needed to visit my sister and her husband. When we found the place and I walked up to it, the first thing I notice (obviously) is how much worse it looked in person. Then I open the driver's door, noting the obvious age when it immediately dropped down about an inch and a half after I opened it. My experience told me that any door that was worn that badly meant it had a good 200k of miles on it. The next thing that greeted me was the lovely aroma of essence of cat. One quick walk around it and away we went.

At least I got to see my sister. Unfortunately, it was not a great day at their house because Gary's dad had died earlier and their phone was ringing off the hook. Oh well, at least Suzie got to meet him and see their interesting home.

Okay, on to the final investigation of trucks in my chosen year range. This one was a 1971 and was nearby up the hill from me in Covington. It was out in a lot behind the owners' house, and as I neared it wondered why I kept going. Curiosity? Maybe. I had to make a path through blackberry vines, grass, and other assorted overgrowth just to get near the truck. Yes, it was straight all right, which is no small feat for something that old. There was a thick carpet of moss lining the entire bed of the truck. I mean thick. Moss grows everywhere around here, but it takes a long time for moss to grow to over 3" thick. The windows were so greenish that I couldn't see through them. When I tugged on the door (afraid of what I might find) it refused to open, even though she insisted it was unlocked. She couldn't open it either. Everything that wasn't painted white, which meant every speck of bare metal, was a lovely shade of orange rust.

No thanks.

It was after that truck that I opened my eyes and threw out the desired year range of truck that I had been looking for, instead opting for a certain price/feature range. I wanted a lot of things in my "new" truck, among them simplicity--Not too many features to go wrong, I wanted it to be a half ton, I wanted it to be old enough to be "pre-emissions", and I wanted something in decent shape.

I found one. It's a 1984 Chevy half ton "plain Jane" pickup. The guy wanted $1500 for it, but we did some serious haggling and I got him down to $1100. The main bargaining thing that was in my favor as the buyer was the fact that his truck still required an emissions test and wouldn't pass it. It would be it's last one because it would be over 25 years old when the next test time rolled around for it. The reason it wouldn't pass? He had put a V8 in it when its original 6-cylinder engine died. What that does is this: When you go to take your emissions test, the first thing they do is punch in the VIN of the vehicle you're driving. That loads all the baseline test data for your vehicle. The bottom line: The emissions test station thinks your truck should only be emitting the pollution of a 6-cylinder engine, and in actuality you're way over that because of the bigger engine.

So what will I do? I've talked with Melinda about it, and I'm going to title it using her address down in Chehalis. Maybe some day I'll get it changed, maybe not. Hell, I never know how long I'm going to own a vehicle anyway.

I haven't picked it up yet. Suzie and I will go get it tomorrow night. It's been weird (but kinda nice) having the extra driveway space, but it's already been somewhat of a problem not having a truck when I want to haul things. Even though the old one didn't start all the time, when it did start I could use it. I had the need for a truck a few days ago when I bought a used radial arm saw. Because we moved it using Suzie's Camry wagon, we had to disassemble the legs to get it to fit. What a hassle. I hate hassles.

Anyway, here's a couple of shots of the truck. I think it's a pretty fair deal considering the condition it's in.





When you've owned a truck it's hard to be without one. Funny too--When you own a truck everyone wants to borrow it. Oh well... Maybe I can keep it's gas tank full that way...

Another Part of American Life

Last night Sue and I climbed another rung in the ladder of American life: We became Costco members.

For the longest time I considered Costco as just a place to save money by buying in bulk, and for the most part that is still true. While I would still consider them for bulk purchases if they had what I was after, that's not what made me want in. They have items of quality that other stores don't have. Certain things have their name on them (Kirkland brand) that are very good deals, and some things they carry may be fairly standards items but the way it's made is just for them. There are a lot of things they have going for them. At any rate, while it used to be, "Pay for a membership and we'll let you buy our bulk products," now it's become, "Pay for a membership and we'll let you shop our select products."

A lot of times their deals price-wise aren't any better than the typical store, but some aspect of the deal has been slanted in our favor by the folks at Costco. For example, if you buy a Dell computer from them, they double the manufacturer's warranty. In some cases they even have a better "package" of options inside as well.

So what did we buy? The reason I went last night was because I was out of vitamins, and I buy their Kirkland brand version of Centrum Silver. They are a good deal of course (and I'll assume they are helping me stay healthy) at 9-something for a 400-pack. We also wanted a jar of their artichoke hearts. They sell a huge jar of marinaded artichoke hearts for like $7.50. It's the size of most large jars of dill pickles, and they're good. I also bought a tub of dip that I had at my cousin Melinda's house. It's jalapeno/artichoke/Parmesan dip, and it's good stuff with tortilla chips!

So anyway, we only bought those three things (and sat and had dinner at their snack bar afterwards), but now we are real Americans. Now we can flash the badge of honor at the door with the same look of smug indifference as a snooty Bellevue shopper if we want to.

We had an interesting evening of inter-family relations last night too. Sarah needed me (us) to take her picture for a school art thing. Apparently, she needed to set up a picture like an old portrait and then paint herself on canvas from the picture after she prints it. We drove to her house and Teresa was out mowing the lawn. It's a little weird for all involved when I go over there with Sue, but everyone seems to get along fine. All things considered, I guess we're all very lucky they get along at all. Anyway, instead of taking the pictures at Sarah's house, we opted to go to Suzie's house because she had some Rennaisance costume stuff and a couple of good chairs for picture-taking. It went off without a hitch, and Sarah looked quite beautiful in the dress. After taking a number of moody-looking low-light pictures, Sue burned them all on a cd for her and we took her back home. I'm sure Sarah was pleased with the outcome!