iPariah

I must come across as totally uninteresting or some kind of dick online. If I make myself available on the few chat places/programs I use, no one says a damn thing to me anymore. So, I have taken that as a sign that it's time to abolish the couple remaining profiles I have left and keep LJ for the time being as my sole interaction space. I at least get some response here, and I can deal with the pace of conversation here if any takes place. If this comes across as some kind of flounce post, it's not intentional. I am just to the point of wondering what the hell I did wrong.

It was fun while it lasted.

Spring cleaning

With the weatherman predicting crappy weather for Saturday, I did not expect to get much done outside. As it was, the weather was quite nice, and some much needed spring cleaning took place. A full truckoad (no kidding) of flattened cardboard boxes got taken to recycling. A full 55 gallon bag plus a partial one filled with styro packing peanuts I took to the bewildered (yet always happy to receive them) folks at my post office. Being that Jeff and I do so much internet and mail order buying, the fallout of packaging collects in no time. All the styro blocks and materials will have to find some other disposal method.

It was also time for me to tackle the soapy disaster in the trunk of The Strat. The half-quart or so of mega-concentrated dishwashing soap collected in the spare tire well, soaping up just about everything on it's way through the well. Trying to figure out a way to not waste the soap, I pulled everything from the trunk, filled the well with several gallons of water to dilute the soap, then bailed it into buckets to be used for cleaning the cars and trucks. It seemed a wonderful idea. And it was. It also begun the inside-out, bottom-to-top detailing I like to give my vehicles in the spring. Taillights were removed, housings cleaned, the trunk scrubbed and shop vac'd clean, then onto the engine bays of three of my rolling stock. Rinsing the soap from the carpet and the spare tire cover panel took about a half hour of continuous water blasting. It looked as though I had a foam party in my driveway afterwards.

People who know me well will know that I prefer to have the engine compartments of my vehicles clean enough to eat from. So, with the soapy water, engine cleaner and other goodies, I cleaned up three engine bays:


The Strat ('00 Dodge Stratus ES)


The '03 Mini Cooper S and all it's mods


The '07.5 Chevy Silverado Duramax, All 365hp/660lb-ft of diesel goodness.

Okay, the last one was a bit of cheating, it did not need a lot of work to look spiffy, since it's so new. And yes, I added a second alternator, just because I could.

Today was cold and windy, and I did not feel like washing these vehicles as I was hoping to do. Instead, Jeff and I took a trip to Carmax for kicks to see what was available. Jeff's commute , though not that long, is a killer in gas mileage since his S-10 does not exactly sip fuel with it's big V6, oversized tires and the roof visor. There was a lot of cars in decent shape, but nothing truly stood out that was not already sold or either too expensive or with way too many miles. There were some nice Cobalts, quite a few Pontiac and Malibus, an unusual blue Camry, a couple Solaras, and a couple Dodge Calibers. The pretty green late model Stratus Jeff saw on the intarweb had been sold. Other interesting cars had manual transmissions, which Jeff does not do. After some walking around, kicking tires, picture taking and a little bit of seat time, we had lunch then did our grocery shopping for the week. The funky weather put me under the weather somewhat, so I rounded out the day with some household tasks, a nap and other sundry nonsense.