Archives July 2013

So last night Ali came out to pick up the dogs after she got back into town.  Before she did I was outside with them letting them play.  I was amazed when Nicki got excited by Sadie sprinting around the yard and actually tried to run for maybe 20 feet after her, something I haven’t seen her do for a looong time.  Then Nicki tried to tease Sadie by running around the dog deck away from her.  Sadie immediately gave chase and quickly caught, t-boned and sent Nicki barrel rolling.  However Nicki didn’t seem to mind the collision and got right back up with a big dog smile on her face.

She then joined me up on the dog deck and sat down, staring up at me with a big prideful smile, almost like she was saying “Look what I did!”  It was so cute.  I can only attribute it to her better eating and the low dose aspirin we have been including in her meals.  I am sure a few days away from the two flights of stairs she has to traverse at Ali’s place helps as well. As always it was a sad moment as the girls drove away.  Even though we didn’t do any dog specific fun activities, just having them around changes day to day existence, for the better.

Last night I decided to do some more work on my back levers, indoors on the Triple Gym to avoid the bastard mosquitoes.  I was within a few degrees of the goal of being parallel to the ground a couple times.  Unfortunately my forearms and elbows paid the price with my playing around with the forces of gravity.  They are killing me today.  Watch my progress here.

So I bit the bullet and signed up for my 3rd Tough Mudder this morning.  This year they have moved the date a full month earlier than the prior two years.  I signed up for the Saturday event on November 2nd.  It also is much further away than last year, requiring nearly double the drive which means a hotel stay will be needed.

I was hesitant to sign up for it to be honest.  It’s expensive, and almost a surefire way for an old guy with bad knees to get hurt.  Who can forget the elephant leg (and damaged balls) I developed after last years very uneven and treacherous course?

Plus I have proven my point, I can hack a Tough Mudder.  I can hack a Tough Mudder and still do 20 pull ups afterwards.  Do I need to do it a third time?  At this point the Tough Mudder races have been around long enough that it isn’t quite the badge of honor it once was to complete one, it seems like every Tom, Dick, and Harry has done a Mudder nowadays.

So despite all these reasons to not do it again, I am doing it again.  I am sure I will still take pride in the completion of the course since it will be all new and a different venue.  I just hope I can walk by the end of it.  Tough Mudders take a disproportionate chunk out of whatever shelf life I have left in my knees.

Tonight promises to be busy.  I will be installing the SSD drive in Mom’s new computer, hopefully transforming it into a screaming beast.  I’d like to get some time to play some more Heart of the Swarm but I have Ray Donovan, Dexter and Falling Skies episodes calling me name.

So on my way to work yesterday I stopped and got a battery for the SSR, with plans to install it after work last night.  All day I felt slightly bothered by the idea of the truck sitting out in the driveway, naked and disabled.

Of course about 10 minutes before I headed outside to perform the battery install it started to rain.  I didn’t care since I was going to be working under the truck, so what if my lower body gets soaked.

Replacing the battery was challenging because of the limited working space.  Once I got the battery in the lowered support tray I had to awkwardly try to push the tray up and then backward to it’s locking position.  Doing this with the weight of the battery on top of my hand was a struggle.  After a few failed attempts I was able to wedge my forearm/hand between the ground and the battery tray to fashion a human jack stand while I wiggled the tray into position with the other hand.

I bolted on the battery cables and figured I should hop in the truck to make sure I had solved my no-start problem.  The truck fired right up although the engine sounded abnormally noisy so I turned it off immediately.  My theory was being parked on the incline of the driveway for the last 24 hours allowed all of the oil to drain towards the back of the engine/oil pan.

Once I buttoned up the rest of the battery box I drifted the truck down to the flat portion of the driveway before starting it again.  It sounded normal this time and I quickly pulled the truck back into the garage as the rain was picking up intensity.  I was relieved that the problem appears to only have been the battery.  The battery I pulled was an AC Delco brand, a good one with a 7 year warranty.  Unfortunately I have no way of knowing if it was the battery that came with the truck in 2005, which would be pretty amazing.

On the way home last night I stopped by the running store to pick up a computer, normally an odd place to pick up such a thing.  Awhile back I had set this computer up for the store to use to sign up people for races. It didn’t get enough use to merit the space it took up on the counter so it was just sitting disconnected in a back room.  My plan was to put it back to use as a replacement for mom’s aging laptop.

This system, although a few years old has much better hardware specs than mom’s laptop with 4 times the memory and a faster processor. It also has Windows 7 on it which will be a nice face lift from XP for mom. To really speed it up I bought a small SSD drive to install in the desktop as well which should show up tomorrow.

I set the system up on the kitchen island to work on it.  For network access I strung a long ethernet cable up over the pot rack and kitchen cabinets to the cat 5 jack by the telephone.  It looked pretty bad but it worked well.

Since the computer had been turned off for a long time there were literally 200+ updates that needed to be applied.  I let the system up and running all night letting it update itself.  Once I get the SSD drive installed I will set it up for mom, I think she will like it.

Today is my last day with the dogs as Ali returns from her latest trip this evening.  Nicki has eaten like a champ the entire time she has been with me.  Her overall state of being has seemed better too, surely because she is eating better.  She was wrestling with Sadie, as well as she can wrestle anymore, and has generally had a dog smile on her face the entire time.  It’s a nice change from the mostly mopey demeanor she was sporting during other recent visits.

I need to lose weight.  Last night before my shower the scale clicked in at 183 pounds.  Although I certainly don’t have love handles, I can feel the extra weight on me during my various body weight exercises.  There was a period of time, probably damn close to two years where my weight was hanging in the low 170’s.  Although I looked rather gaunt at times, I also felt more efficient both at endurance and body weight training.  Less weight also was a good thing for my troublesome, twice operated on knees.

Now some people would suggest the added body weight is from added muscle, particularly lower body muscle from my increased dedication to exercises such as squats and dead lifts.  To a degree that could be true, but I always find myself assuming any higher numbers on the scale are pure fat.

My diet definitely has been less strict than my 170 pound days where many of my dinners were just veggie wraps and juice.  My amount of endurance training is a few clicks down as well which doesn’t help matters.

So anyway the plan is to enlist more dietary discipline while trying to turn my exercise intensity dial up a click or two.  If I am not careful I could find myself back in my rather defintion-less, 195 pound shape I was sporting 6 or 7 years ago.

I think losing 6 or 7 pounds would put me at a sweet spot.

I forgot to mention some Eagles related items.  I was disappointed to hear Jeremy Maclin blew out his ACL in training camp. Last year Maclin was clearly the Eagles best wide receiver, delivering much more consistent performances than Desean Dipshit Jackson.  This certainly isn’t the way I wanted the Chip Kelly era to kick off.  It will be interesting to see if they bring someone in to try to help fill the WR slot.

  The other Eagles news was that Donovan McNabb was officially retiring, as an Eagle. To be honest I was kind of surprised, I thought he did already officially retire since he didn’t play at all last year.

It’s a nice move by the Eagles and I think it will be cool when they honor him during the KC game, when Andy Reid will also be in town.  I expect both men to get a warm welcome from Philly fans, despite the love/sort of dislike relationship both had over the last decade or so.

Both Donovan  and Andy, in the big picture, delivered many years of winning football which any football fan can appreciate.  However both were also involved in some crushing disappointments, that in many fans eyes at times, almost outweighed the success.  Yes we loved getting to the NFC championship so many times but the pain from losing again and again when the ultimate victory was in grasp built some sort of perverse resentment from fans, myself included.

For years I lamented some of McNabb’s shortcomings like his poor accuracy.  His ankle high, 3 yard passes became almost legendary. His sucking wind as the game wound down during the Eagles Super Bowl appearance was another image that is not easily washed away. His mouth also became troublesome at times when he would seemingly create issues where none needed to exist.

I got sick of hearing every year how Donovan spent the off season reinventing himself.  One year he came in bigger and stronger than ever.  The next he would come in lean and mean. Every year there were reports of how hard he worked on his throwing accuracy in the off season.  I have no doubt he worked hard in the off season to get better, it just seems like throwing accuracy for the most part is something you just have or not.  McNabb, was blessed with many physical gifts but hitting a guy consistently in the numbers was not one of them.

I felt sort of bad for Donovan after the Eagles unceremoniously sent him packing.  He had a pretty embarrassing lack of success in both Washington and Minnesota before he wasn’t even invited to a roster in 2012.  If anything it confirmed to me that much of his success as an Eagle was the result of Andy being able to utilize McNabb’s strengths and hide his weaknesses to a large degree, something his subsequent coaches couldn’t figure out how to do.

So anyway, I’m happy the Eagles are giving McNabb a proper send off.  Despite his warts, the guy deserves it.  He brought the city a lot of happy fall Mondays.

So Saturday morning I skipped the club run.  I didn’t feel like getting up early and both of my knees felt varying degrees of ouch.  I also had a very sore lower back from my 110 back extensions the day before.  Instead I directed my energy towards chores, lot and lots of chores.

I did just a ridiculous amount of things.  For fun I wrote down everything I did, it added up to close to 20 different to do’s.  Most of my effort was outside.  I decided to address a lot of pruning and trimming that needed to be done on various trees and bushes.  We are in the absolute epicenter of horribly humid and hot Florida summertime weather.    I literally felt like I was melting as I toiled in the yard.

The amazing thing is with all of that work, I still felt like I had left stuff on the plate yet to do.  I found all of this work despite having mowed the entire property during the week, which was a good thing since standing water has returned in force thanks to multiple deluges the past few days.

I originally had hopes of spending some f around time on Saturday playing video games or trying to fly my wing but there was just no spare time to be found before heading out to the movies.

We saw the new Wolverine movie.  Despite it being opening weekend, Coconut Pointe once again delivered a sparsely populated theater, even with us walking in right at the 7:30 showtime.  It was the 3D version but to be honest I am having a hard time remembering exactly what was 3D about it.  Perhaps I am just so accustomed to 3D now that my brain hardly even recognizes the difference.

I liked the movie,  I thought it was very solid from start to finish.  Hugh Jackman is REALLY jacked nowadays, he is built like an NFL linebacker.  There were two little odd things I noticed in this Marvel film.  If Stan Lee was in there for his customary little cameo, I totally missed it.  I don’t recall seeing him at all.  Marvel films also are known for putting a little bonus scene at the VERY end of the credits that reveals what is coming next.   There was a short scene about a minute after the movie ended but we stuck it out another 10 minutes till the actual end of the credits.  There was nothing there, damn it.    Anyway, it gets a solid A from me.  The little bonus footage made me anxious to see the next film, it looks like the X-men are reassembling.   🙂

On Sunday my knees still did not feel great so instead of a brick I wimped out and did just a single exercise, swimming.  I figured since I was only swimming I should go longer than I normally do, both in my segments and overall distance.  The water in the lap pool area was really warm, if I were to guess it was easily in the upper 80’s.   Warm water is nice to soak your feet in, it is pretty lousy to try to swim distance in.  I felt like I was lapping in a bath tub.

Despite the warm water I was strangely faster than normal in the pool, averaging a minute per 50 yards, completing each 500 yard segment in right around 10 minutes.   I did a total of 4 segments totaling up to 2000 yards in the water.  I wasn’t quite sure why I was faster, I guessed it might simply be because I did not pre-fatigue myself with running or biking beforehand.

Even with just doing the swimming, I emerged from the pool thoroughly spent.  The faster pace and warm water did a number on me.

Once again Cindy had a run in with a clueless individual.  This time some guy decided he would exit the diving pool area by flailing across the lane Cindy was swimming in, once again causing a near collision.  Cindy stopped abruptly and asked him what he was doing.  His explanation was he thought he could beat her across the lane before she got there.  Unfortunately this behavior is a by product of trying to swim laps at a public pool, the dumb asses are on a very loose and long chain.

The dogs seemed to be having a good weekend with me, despite the property being overrun with mosquitoes which made an outdoor excursion a swat fest.  They both got baths and Nicki has been eating her revamped meals quite eagerly.  The addition of boneless chicken thighs seems to be the trick.

Sunday morning I spent some time remote controlled into mom’s laptop.  She had been complaining of overall poor performance for awhile.  I have done various tweaks over the years trying to extend the usefulness of the 7 or 8 year old laptop but I think we have reached the end of the road.  Today’s internet assumes you are running hardware with a big blob of memory and a fast processor.  512 MB just isn’t going to cut it anymore.

I have a spare PC that I may be able to add enough memory to that I am thinking about giving mom.  If for some reason it doesn’t work out I will just buy mom a new or lightly used pc to replace the old laptop.

Sunday afternoon I still found myself with stuff to do, part of which was replacing the door speakers in Cindy’s Miata to accompany the new headrest speakers that were installed the weekend prior.   I had to do some creative engineering to get them mounted in a way that was more secure than the horribly low effort way the old shitty speakers were thrown in there.  I would really like to meet whichever prior owner that did some of the “upgrades” on the car.  I have a feeling he has a large stockpile of duct tape somewhere.

Sunday evening a good friend of Cindy’s came out to the house to hang out and watch movies with us.  He happens to have Corvette, a less than a year old beast.  I saw an interesting photo op with a real Corvette behind my SSR that sports a 2005 Corvette LS2 motor in it.

I use my Xbox 360 as a dvd player.  A couple weeks ago I made the mistake of agreeing to participate in a beta program with my living room 360.  Basically they are testing new versions of their operating system, presumably as part of the roll out of the new Xbox One this holiday season.

Well as a result I am getting tons of these huge, slow to download updates every time I turn the damn thing on.  Before we could watch a movie last night I had to sit through yet another at least 15 minute download/update.  It’s very annoying.

We watched Idiocracy (again).  I made sure to  have 3 BLP’s in me before watching.  Despite this being my third time watching the movie I still laughed at it, a lot.  We followed it up with The Campaign, yet another Will Ferrel comedy.

A lot of Will’s recent films have been a mild disappointment to me with most of the funny moments shown in the previews with precious little else to make me laugh beyond that.  Well I found The Campaign very funny, possibly assisted by my mild drunkenness. Perhaps it was also the direct smacks in the face of the likes of George W Bush or the slimy Koch brothers. Regardless, I laughed out loud, a lot. I would give it an A-.

So when Alfred left I hopped in the SSR to pull it back in the garage.  It had been sitting in the driveway since I pulled it out to work on the Miata.  As soon as I slid in the seat I knew something was fishy, no interior lights popped on with the door being open.  When I inserted the key my suspicions were confirmed, it was dead as a doornail.  WTF.  How could the truck go from starting a few hours ago to COMPLETELY dead.  Perhaps something was ajar or the ignition switch wasn’t completely off, allowing the radio to still be on?

Well whatever the reason I wanted to get the SSR back in the garage.  The solution seemed simple, jump it.  I pulled the Tacoma next to the SSR and grabbed my jumper cables.  The SSR is a bit of an oddball when it comes to the battery, it is located under the truck, in the rear in a box.  However they try to make jumping the vehicle less of a pain by having remote jump start terminals in the engine bay.

So as I was working in the open air I was getting absolutely mauled by hungry mosquitoes, freshly hatched in the once again abundant standing water.  When I slid back in the SSR to try to start it, the blood suckers followed me, it was pretty maddening.

I was baffled when the interior of the truck still seemed totally dead except a very faint glowing of the check engine light.  I got back out and reattached the cables, this time I got a spark and some life from the interior.  I tried starting it but only got a partial turn followed by clicking.  I told Cindy to bring the RPM’s up on the Tacoma to try to increase the amperage from it’s alternator.  Still, I got a couple turns but not enough for the truck to start.  DAMN IT!

So my next plan of attack was to try to jump directly on the SSR battery.  I crawled under the truck with my stick light and removed the side panel which gave me access to the terminals.  I was getting bit non-stop by mosquitoes but at this point my frustration was masking the repeated pin pricks.

I exposed the battery terminals, reconnected the jumper cables and had the same level of success as under the hood, half turns followed by clicking.  ARGH.  For whatever reason I was not getting a solid enough connection with the cables to support the amp draw to start the SSR , mother f….

Ok well maybe I can at least get my beloved truck in the garage, out of harms way.  It was on the incline part of the driveway leading up to the garage.  For some reason I thought that possibly I would be able to push the 5000 pound vehicle up the hill and into the garage.  That was an epic fail of course, as soon as Cindy released the brake it started rolling backwards, despite my efforts to move it the other direction.

Ok I was officially out of options.  I once again returned under the back of the truck and dropped the battery box as I was getting riddled by mosquito bites, pulling the battery out so I could get a new one today.  I am crossing my fingers it is JUST the battery.  Despite having a number of batteries goes from good to dead since moving to Florida, the symptoms I saw with the SSR make me think something else could be in the mix.  I’ll find out tonight after work.

I picked up the dogs on the way home from work in the van for their second extended visit in as many weeks.  Nicki had some sort of urinary tract infection this past week so her meal plan will include a large anti-biotic pill twice a day.  Ali has been throwing the pill down Nicki’s throat to make sure she gets it.  I don’t seem to have much luck with that  approach.  Instead I jammed the big pill inside an equally big piece of chicken.  My alternative method was successful as she gobbled it down without incident.

Last night I was on the tractor for the third day in a row.  Once again we had a day without precipitation, something that is very, very rare during wet season.  I figured I had little choice but to get out there and mow the front yard.

I was very generous with my application of bug spray, even so, I was getting attacked pretty vigorously as I drove through areas that were underwater a couple days prior.  I felt like I was constantly swatting and smacking, sometimes at spots that didn’t even have a mosquito actively sucking blood.  It was quite annoying.

I didn’t get done until after 8.  When I took the girls out in the backyard to do their business the attacks were even worse, my calves felt like they were receiving insect acupuncture, the joys of swamp living.

Wow, did you see the video of the Spanish commuter train crashing?  For whatever reason the train was going double the recommended speed limit for that turn.  Is it possible that 80 people lost their lives because the train operator simply had a lead foot and got off on pushing the limits?  It looked absolutely awful.

It looks like a bunch of the people that were killed burned to death while trapped in the mangled wreckage.  What a horrible way to die….

Today I see they have arrested the train operator on criminal charges.  If his need for speed is the only cause for this tragedy I can only hope he never sees the light of day again.

This weekend I have some pruning and trimming that needs to get done around the house.  I might be pulling out the pressure washer to blast the grass encrusted mower deck before putting my new set of blades on it.  I should take it on the pool deck and hit the pool cage as well but it’s too early in wet season, it will just get green again.  I’ll wait another month or two before blasting away out there.

I will probably get out to see the new Wolverine movie this weekend, I am looking forward to it.

I have laid out a plan of action towards the possibility of getting a DJI Phantom.  The first step is seeing if I can get my old battery packs to take a charge to get my flying wing back up in the air.

If I am successful  and feel adequate amounts of enjoyment from doing so, my first purchase might be a much smaller, much less expensive quad copter which is powerful, light, yet durable.  I read that it’s a great set of training wheels for a Phantom.

They say it is actually more difficult to fly than a Phantom so if you can fly this reliably, the big league copter will actually be a step back on the difficulty scale.

Of course the biggest thing I need to determine is if I have the time, energy to relaunch my RC hobby.  The good thing is I still have a lot of the various accessories/tools that are needed to support the hobby so the $$ required is not as severe as it normally would be.

If you are interested in seeing the video documenting the Miata O2 sensor replacement, your wait is over.

Yesterday we had another dry day.  I took advantage of it and mowed down the area I skipped the night before.  There was still water on the ground in spots but it’s level was low enough that I could go over it without throwing H2O.  When the huge backyard area is given a complete hair cut it just makes me feel good, not sure why.

After finishing up the mowing I jumped right into yet another automotive maintenance project, this time replacing the O2 sensor in Cindy’s Miata.  The car has had a check engine light since she bought it.  I jumpered the diagnostic terminal on it and got back a 15 code which means the car computer is not getting a reading from the O2 sensor which is on the exhaust header, before the catalytic convertor.  The fix is supposed to be simply replace the sensor.

I have never replaced an oxygen sensor on a vehicle but I have heard horror stories about it.  These stories typically revolve around the old sensor being practically welded in place due to being subjected to extremely high exhaust temperatures day in and day out.  I read various tricks to assist in breaking loose the sensor without breaking it.  If you strip the head you now have a much larger headache, trying to get the remains of the sensor out of the exhaust header.

I figured I would stack the deck in my favor by having the proper tools in hand.  I bought a big 22mm wrench and special socket, specifically designed for O2 sensors.  It has a slot in it that allows you to slide past the connector wire and still get onto the fitting.

Another trick I read was removing the sensor while the engine is hot, the heat makes it easier to break the adhesions.  Of course in order to do this safely I put on my heavy duty Dewalt work gloves.  Trying to get the sensor out of a hot motor with bare hands would be a surefire way to get a lot of severe burns.

So I put my special socket on the old sensor and attached my 18 inch breaker bar to it.  I expected massive amounts of torque were going to be required to break the sensor free.  Imagine my surprise when with hardly any effort the old sensor spun free, I didn’t have to yank at all.  That clued me in that there was no way this was the original O2 sensor and also whomever put this one in did not torque it very hard at all.

So I backed out the old sensor and looked at it.  It didn’t appear to all that old but I had no way of knowing exactly how long it had been in there.  Before installing the new sensor I applied some of the included anti-seize stuff to the threads, being careful not to get any on the part of the detector that extends into the exhaust.  I turned the new sensor in, reconnected the wire and that was that.

After disconnecting the battery for a couple minutes to clear stored CEL codes I took the car out for a test drive.  Cindy said typically the light comes on after 3-4 minutes of driving.  The car felt peppier than I remembered as I cruised east on Immokalee Road.  I was 85% sure the problem was fixed.

Then, about 5 miles into the test drive the check engine light flashed back on, son of a bitch! I turned around and headed back to the house, dejected that my diagnostic procedures failed me.  I will be digging further into other possible causes for the error although a quick check didn’t reveal much short of a broken wire.  Automotive repairs offer varying amounts of satisfaction and frustration.  All I hope for is to keep the scales slightly tipped to the good side.

Alison is out of town again this weekend meaning I am back on dog duty.  I am picking them up tonight.  I am using the same strategy as the week before, my neighbor is going to help me out by letting out the girls during weekdays.  It’s such a big help but I feel badly for asking her for a hand again after only a week or so.

So yesterday was another rainless  day at the homestead.  When I got home I saw that all of the standing water in the front of the yard was gone (except the trench up front).  I took a peek at the back yard and still saw a large wet area behind the bird feeders but the rest looked mowable.

After loading up on bug spray I hopped on the tractor and got busy.  Certain areas of the back yard were in all out jungle mode with knee high thick grass.  I didn’t bother even trying to go slow enough to knock it down in one pass, it was too high.  I just went back over the extra shaggy areas another time or two when I was done.

As I drove the tractor along the still waterlogged areas I saw a swarm of black flying away from the mower chute.  These were the thousands of baby mosquitoes that have been recently hatched in the low standing water. Thankfully they apparently had not developed a taste for my blood yet, I only had to swat a few away during my time on the tractor.

As I got about half of the yard mowed I started being escorted by a squadron of dragonflies.  Perhaps they realized that I was stirring up the mosquitoes they love to dine on.  It was pretty cool.

As I was mowing the yard I envisioned a DJI Phantom hovering overhead….

Yesterday was one of those days where I felt like I just had too many things on my plate.  In addition to the big project at work that has been consuming hours by the dozen I also had a number of running club items that I was working on simultaneously.  By the time I got home I just wished I could unwind by playing the Starcraft II expansion I bought last week, but instead I found myself still muddling around doing running club related work for a couple hours.  Finally, around 8:45 I was able to get into the game and at least play through one mission.

Complaining about having too many people requesting too many things of me really shouldn’t garner any sympathy as I have put myself in that situation.  Just stating it is enough of a pressure relief valve for now.  It sure would be nice to get away on a road trip where I could unplug from things for an extended period of time.

So on July 4th there was a guy at the race that shot awesome aerial video with his quadra-copter.  It pulled a couple of the RC enthusiast strings inside me that have been collecting dust for years.

Back in the early 2000’s I got pretty into RC planes.  I owned 5 or 6 of them and flew them on a very regular basis.  I had a buddy that lived nearby that was more into it than I was.  He and I would meet up to fly every week or two and enjoyed doing so.  Heck I had a whole section of my website dedicated to it.  Well Mike moved away to Colorado and once he did I found my interest in the hobby fading.  It has remained dormant for years despite two of my planes still residing in the hobby room.

Well over the weekend I was in Brookstone. I saw the Parrot AR Drone 2.0, a $300 “toy” quadracopter that has some very cool features like two integrated cameras, an altimeter, control via Iphone/Android app and two flying frames, one for indoors and one for the wild blue yonder.    Being out of the RC loop for years, I was quite impressed by the tech they built into the AR Drone 2.0.

I actually was considering buying one, thinking it would be sweet to get some aerial photography of my property and other venues although the AR Drone has a rather small control range of only 150 feet via it’s odd Wi-Fi control system.  The idea of getting one seemed even cooler when I saw there is a big variety of improvements/mods available for the copter.

As I was watching YouTube videos of the AR Drone, I stumbled across another quadra copter, the DJI Phantom. (this is what the race video was shot with)  I did a little digging and quickly realized the Phantom is no toy, it is a rugged, powerful unit with much more lifting power, durability and safe guards.  The Phantom has an integrated GPS which allows the copter to automatically come back to the spot where it took off and land without the pilot having to touch a single control.

The Phantom has 10 times the range of the AR Drone utilizing a more conventional RC radio system, allowing you traverse 1500 feet high and still be in control of things.

On the downside the Phantom is significantly more expensive. It does not include an integrated camera although it does include a GoPro compatible mount to capture video of significantly higher quality than the AR Drone.

So anyway, I think if I would jump back in to the hobby I would do so with the Phantom.  The consensus seems to be that even though it is twice the price of the AR Drone it is about 10 times the copter in terms of quality, power and versatility.  Of course until I once again have disposable income, it will just reside on the back burner with several other items.

On Friday night I knocked out even more of my chore list, trying to clear up my weekend for other things.  One of the Friday night things included replacing the cracked lid to the pool filter.  When I ordered the new lid I also decided to order a new pressure relief valve and pressure gauge as well since the old parts were beat to hell from 11 years in the Florida elements.  Hopefully this will extend the overall life of my pool filter another few years.

On Saturday morning I was once again doing work on Cindy’s Miata.  It suddenly would no longer start one day last week.  I did a lot of research on the problem and discovered that Miatas are infamous for crank, but no start problems, especially 23 year old Miatas.  Unfortunately there are 5 or 6 things that can cause this symptom.

In 1990, cars didn’t have very advanced diagnostics.  In order to perform some of the recommended tests I had to use a jumper wire across various points in a diagnostic terminal under the hood.

I have done a few things on the car so far.  As I dig through it, I am reminded of the 88 Vette I owned for roughly 6 months, there has been a lot of rig jobs done on the Miata over the years.

So anyway, my testing had determined that the engine is getting spark but no fuel.  My troubleshooting guide lead me to check out the fuel pump.  The first test was to once again use the diagnostic terminal to bypass a relay to see if I could hear the pump running with the engine off.  I couldn’t.

I then proceeded to access the fuel pump which you do via the rear deck inside the passenger compartment.  After removing the carpet and padding I pulled off the metal cover that hides the pump.  The pump itself was rigged as well with a wire spliced in and routed through a small hole in the top of the pump housing.

So I lifted the pump partially out and inspected it.  I didn’t see anything wrong so I thought maybe I would try the run test again, just to make sure it was not pumping. I expected it not to run.  Well imagine my surprise when it did.  Not only did it run, it spit some gasoline out since the feed end was still dipped partially into the gas tank.

I had pulled the rubber feed and return lines since my intention was to totally pull the pump out.  As a result the gas spilled on the ledge.  Luckily I was quick to kill the key but still enough spilled to make the car smell like a gas station, grr.  It was stupid of me to try to run it without the lines connected or at least a towel or something in place to catch gas.  I just assumed it wasn’t going to work.

So now the pump was working.  I am not sure if something was flaky with the rigged electrical connections  and my removal just happened to get it connected again or what.  I put the pump back into the tank and turned the key, the car started for the first time in 4 days.  Wow.  I ran it through a number of start tests and took the car out briefly on the road to see how solid my “fix” was.  The car was fine and has been fine ever since. Of course what I did got it going for now but sooner or later it could pop up again.  If it does, replacing the fuel pump and the rigged wiring would be the proper course of action.

On Saturday night I saw Pacific Rim.  I had seen some poor reviews of the film but I really didn’t care, it had huge ass robots in it, it couldn’t be that bad.  I actually liked it.  I did not realize that this was basically a 2013 Godzilla style movie, complete with Hong Kong being used as a a huge boxing ring for monsters/mega robots.  I found the movie to be fun and entertaining.  If you are looking for deep plot, meaningful dialogue and Oscar worthy acting then keep on walking.  If you want to see some kick ass robots beating the shit out of some hard core monsters from hell, strap in and take a look.  I actually would give it an A- just on entertainment value.

Sunday morning it was looking dreary and overcast but I wanted to get a brick in anyway.  The rain stayed away but the roads for part of the bike ride were quite wet, my bike was coated in sand and grime after the 12.25 ride.  I also got a fast 1200 yards in the pool, averaging less than 9 minutes per 400.

During the swim there was an encounter with an incredible dumb ass father.  As I was swimming, during one breathing head turn, I noticed some guy on the diving board wearing sunglasses.  You are not ever supposed to ever go off a diving board wearing glasses, the impact with the water could potentially break the glasses and smash the shards into your face.  Of course the dumb kid lifeguard didn’t flag the stupidity either.  I recall thinking, “what a dummy” as I continued swimming.

So a couple minutes later I am turning at the wall and see the same guy by the edge of the other lane with his wife and two daughters.  As I push off and head back the other way  I hear him say “get ready, go!”  This guy had just sent his two kids down the other lane, the lane that Cindy was occupying.  Not only was she occupying it, she was about 15 yards away from the kids and swimming right towards them.

Luckily Cindy saw the flailing kids before she ran into them.  She abruptly stopped and asked the brain dead dad what he was thinking, sending his children headfirst into an oncoming swimmer.  I had heard the noise and stopped at the far side.  The guy apologized but we were both dumbfounded by just how stupid his actions were.  It was confirmation of the guys habitual poor decision making based on his sunglass sporting diving action right before.

I tried to analyze the thought process he utilized.  Did his little girls say “daddy we want to race in the lap pool!” and he was unable to deny them, even for a minute, so he let them loose without thinking about their safety or of anyone else?  Maybe he was just really, really unobservant.  Perhaps he is just a moron?  I am leaning towards choice three.

That being said, if the kid lifeguard was doing his job, he could have saved the guy from his own poor decision making, twice.

Sunday there was more Miata work, this time installing headrest speakers.  I did not know that Miatas have the option for headrest speakers.  The only vehicle I knew of that had them were the old Pontiac Fieros.  Installing the speakers wasn’t hard, it just took some time to make sure it was done right.  It’s kind of cool having the stereo output come out right by your head, it’s like open air headphones.

Sunday night I saw the latest Bourne Identity movie, the first one without Matt Damon.  It was good although I once again made the mistake of watching it while drowsy, causing me to miss some elements that may have added to my overall enjoyment of the film.  Even with the gaps I’d give it a B+.

It was a good thing I got the grass mowed last week.  The unrelenting rain since has turned the property back into a swamp wonderland.  One of the few perks of this phenomenon is occasionally ducks will mistake the back yard as a pond and stop by for a visit.  I had two of them hanging by the bird feeders for quite awhile on Saturday.

Yesterday when I was leaving work it was raining lightly.  As I was pulling out of the lot I passed a guy riding his bike.  A quick glance revealed he was not well off, he looked haggard, dirty and generally beat down by life.  Behind his bike he was towing a child stroller however it did not contain a child.  A dog, a brown boxer, was the passenger.

Despite being towed along in the rain by an owner that looked like he would be hard pressed to afford dog food, the dog looked perfectly content, excited to get to wherever they were going, even if he had no clue where that was.

The visual touched me as I imagined that despite whatever has gone down in that guys life to bring him to that point, he still at least has the unconditional love of an animal to keep him going, even when it’s bleak and raining.

So I got a surprise call from my CC company today regarding the fraud that was committed on my card a month or so ago.  I thought the issue was dead.

The woman told me she had some additional information about the transaction that utilized my card to purchase items from Underarmour.com.  The purchase, of just less than $600 was 3 pairs of football spikes and 2 pairs of running shoes.  The ship to name sounded fake, Yusmailiana Galcez, and the address the items were shipped to was over in Homestead, just south of Miami.

However the woman then gave me the telephone number used for the transaction, it was a local 239 area code, hmmm.  So the first thing I did was call the number and ask for Yusmailiana, no one there by that name, “Ok, thank you” and I hang up.

So now I look up the phone number and find it is an address no more than 5 miles from my house, under a totally different name, the plot thickens.  So I forwarded this information to the owner of Zookies whom I spoke to before as I originally suspected one of their staff could have been involved in the fraud.

I am debating if I want to further my prosecution efforts and walk over to the sheriff’s office to file an official report.  It will probably involve more hassle than it’s worth since the charges are already wiped clean and I have a new card.  However there is that little revengeful/do the right thing,  part of me that wants to see the asshole that did this get nailed to the wall.

If the number would have been a Homestead area code I would just let it slide due to distance but the fact that the potential suspect is right in my home area makes me feel like I need to make the effort.