A little side project

We have an abandoned Ford dealership in the town where I live.  In fact, I think it closed down about a year or two after I bought my Mercury Mistake, er, Mystique there.  Man, how I grew to hate that car.  That's a post for another day.

I pass by the old place every time I head down Hwy 67 to the office in Hope, and then back again.  At one point while diving and letting my mind wander, I thought it would be fun to park my car under the old "Used Cars" area and snap a few pictures.  So, the other day, I did:

This one didn't work so well because of the shadow falling across the parking spot...

This is my favorite, especially after tweaking the coloring a bit for a rustic, antique feel:

I really wanted to park under the "GUARANTEED" section, but there is a LOT of junk under there - boards, trash, and who knows what else:

This is actually to the right of the photos above, behind what was once the new car showroom.  I thought this would make for a cool photo: 

It's hard to see, but I purposely caught the legible reflection of "BODY - SHOP" in the hood of the car.

Daily Photo (Are you lookin' at me?)

Hey, are you lookin' at me!?

Since Tyler had baseball practice tonight and I knew the rains were coming, I thought I would make a quick stop at the nearby carwash to hose off all the gunk that got sprayed on my car this morning.  I was behind a truck hauling chunks of cement.  It was drizzling.  Add the two together and you get that weird cement-colored glue that ends up all over your car!

I took this photo with my camera phone, and the phone hates lights.  In this case, it's a love-hate relationship.  The car almost looks like it has just come screeching up to a halt.  (insert Tim Allen 'grunt' here)

I did not grow up with ABS

Evidently, my 2004 Dodge Ram 1500 did not have anti-lock brakes. How do I know this? Because my 2009 Charger *DOES* have an anti-lock braking system. And, how do I know that? Well, aside from the little "ABS" indicator that lights up on the dash board during start-up, I engaged my ABS the other day, much to my surprise! And, to my knowledge, I never experienced anything quite like I did the other day...

I am old enough to have been trained up in the ways of driving long before ABS was a twinkle in some engineers eye - or at least before the general public was allowed t have it anyway.  Thus, I was brought up with the "pump/release/pump/release" method of stopping hard. 

Now, I do remember being told that in an ABS-equipped vehicle, one should NEVER do the pump/release as it defeats the system and can actually cause more problems than it solves.  Learning this, though, does not immediately equate to understanding. 

When I first brought my car home from the dealer, I applied the brakes as we approached our driveway.  We live on a gravel road with a lot of pits and potholes and, well, loose gravel.  When I put my foot on the brakes (from about 30 mph), I felt the brake pedal pushing back at me in spurts and heard what I thought was a horrid crunching noise coming from the front-end of the vehicle.  My first reaction was shock, then a bit of fear (afraid I had managed to break something already), then I was highly ticked off that I was sold a car with bad brakes!

I let it go, figuring I would ask the dealership about it when I took my car in to be serviced.  Before that could happen though, I met a couple of deer running down the paved road that leads to our dirt highway leading to our house.  I stepped on the brake, felt the pumping against my foot, heard the crunching from the wheels and came to a dazed and confused halt in the road - unscathed and in the same general place I had started the stop.  I was more freaked out about the car's reaction than the deer for which I had come to a screeching halt.  The deer, by the way, had scampered over a barbed wire fence and into the woods.

When I got home, I made a mental note to check out ABS and to make sure I wasn't the only having this "problem."  Not only was I *NOT* the only one, it turns out the brakes worked exactly as they were designed:

I found several forums and several other informational sites that featured posts by concerned drivers who, like me, had never experienced the "thrill" of stopping on anti-lock brakes.  What I also learned was that if I ever truly feel unsafe, I should have the braking system checked to be on the safe side.  I will do that if I feel like I am ever out of control while making a sudden stop.  As it stands, I now understand what had previously been explained, and I feel fine about the whole thing.

Eight Days a Week...

Eight Days.  That's how long it's been since I lasted posted an update.  Yeah, I know I explained what's been going on, but still, I know some folks check back here to see if I've done anything, and I need to let you in on things!

First of all, I'm up to just over 35,000 words out of the 50,000 required to "finish" the NaNoWriMo contest.  I anticipate hitting the 50-grand mark by the end of Monday.  I would have Sunday, but I have to work on Saturday, so that shoots that in the foot, or the butt, or where ever you'd prefer to shoot.

I also got a NEW CAR!

Yeah, it's a 2009 Dodge Charger SXT.  It is one butt-kickin buddy!  I hated getting rid of my truck.  I have never enjoyed a vehicle as much as I enjoyed the truck.  I loved driving it, playing in it, putting goofy decals on it.  But, I am a "sporty" car kinda guy at heart, and this was much more in my price range.  I have been having a blast tooling around in it, too.

On Tuesday night, I drove four hours to Ft. Smith to stay overnight in a hotel for a training on Wednesday.  On the way up, I drove the Interstates because it was already dark by the time I left the house.  On the way back Wednesday, though, I decided to take Hwy-71 to Hwy-270 to Hwy-7 then grabbed I-30 home.  Basically, I went for a joy ride through the Ouachita hills and mountains.  I have one thing to say about it:  HOLY COW!  The pit of my stomach tried to turn over a couple of times because I am so used to driving the truck.  The truck could not take the turns in the manner that the Charger cut through them like soft butter.  Hugging curves, running on the straight lines, enjoying the ride... 

I was in Ft. Smith on Wednesday because Apple came in to tell us about integrating Macs with Netware and to talk to us about imaging the Macs.  Basically, you set one Mac up the way you want all the others to look, then save an image of that machine.  After that, you push out the image to the other computers so they all have the same stuff, set up the same way.  Very handy!

Today (Friday), I hosted a "Mac Party" day at work.  We had about 15 people come and learn how to use their Macs plus get a look at LOTS of software apps to run on their Macs (some useful, some just for fun).  I think everyone walked away learning SOMETHING new!

Tomorrow (Saturday), I am leading a group of teachers in a technology session.  I will be quickly covering PowerPoint and helping them work on their group projects.  They will create content with links, Arkansas Standards and Frameworks, the PowerPoint, and possibly videos/images.  It should be lots of fun!  I am going to share many of the resources that I've been exposed to for the last few weeks and months.  Very cool stuff indeed!

Things should return to "normal" for me after the Thanksgiving break.  Thanks for checking in on me!

Tire-changing party for a dryer

On Saturday, Shan and I headed to Texarkana to do some birthday shopping for Emily. While we were there, Shan's Mom called to say that her dryer had quit and asked if we could look around for a good deal on a new one. Luckily, I had loaded us up in my truck for the day's shopping, so hauling a new dryer would not be a problem!


We looked at Home Depot first, and they had a couple inexpensive dryers (that would be in the $350-ish range). Since we had some more shopping to do, I told Shan we could look at Sears, but that I thought Sears would be higher-priced than Home Depot. Sure enough, they were.


We eventually made our way to Lowe's, and they had a dryer for $268. Of course, the only one they had in stock was "damaged." Well, we thought we would look over the damage and the saleswoman said she could knock off 25% because it was damaged and that it would still have the year's manufacturer warranty. Sounded good. We felt and looked at the damage and it didn't seem too bad.

We loaded up the dryer, which ended up costing less than the sticker with the discount, even with taxes, so that was a good deal to me.

We had to stop at Wal-Mart in Hope on the way home, and when we came out, I noticed my passenger rear tire was low. Several years ago, Shan's Mom had given me a portable air pump for Christmas. I keep it in the truck and it has proven handy on several occasions. This was not really one of them. It was taking FOREVER to get any air in the tire. I decided to move the truck over to the air pump at the gas station in front of Wal-Mart, and as I walked around the truck, I could HEAR the air hissing out of the tire. That is never a good thing. Sure enough, evidently I had a bubble in the tire and it finally gave way.


So, in the 95-degree heat, I changed the tire. Now, many folks have asked why I didn't just wheel the truck to the tire place there at Wal-Mart, and the answer is simple: my tires are cheaper at Goodyear. Besides, I knew I was going to have some other work done on my truck since it has hit the century-k mileage mark. I'll come back to that.

Once we got the dryer to Shan's folk's house, we opened the box and found the dryer had a bit more damage than we thought. It was all cosmetic, though, and we did get a good deal, so they opted to keep it. I think we can take care of some of the cosmetic issues, which is a good thing.

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So, back to the truck... I took it in Monday morning, driving to the Goodyear place near the office. The tech looked at the tire and explained the whole 'bubble bursting' thing to me. I told him I wanted two new tires put on the front and the current front tires moved to the back. I also wanted an estimate on a tune-up and I definitely wanted the serpentine belt replaced, since it had 100,000 miles on it with no problems. Much better to head off a belt problem than to deal with it after it breaks!

While at work, Goodyear called me to let me know that my truck had no front brakes at all! Ouch! They had worn down completely. Well, since I am in the 'fix-it' mood, I just as well get those taken care of.

I don't imagine getting another 100,000 miles out of the truck, but if I can keep it going as well as it has for a few more years, I can feel good about passing it along to Tyler when he's ready to drive. And, really, if he doesn't end up with it, then hopefully, it'll be around for years to come as my work truck for when I need one.

I have a year left to pay on it, then I'll be looking for a new car - yes, car - to tool around in. I'm thinking Charger SXT....