Cut up, sudden sputtering, supplies secured, Monsanto = devil

So first thing yesterday morning I was in the dermatologist office for my basal cell skin cancer surgery.  The procedure is pretty much old hat at this point with as many times as I have had it done.  It doesn’t mean I enjoy it.

After injecting the area with numbing solution, which burns going in, the doc goes to town after letting the stuff set up for a few minutes.  With the cancer spot being right in front of the ear I had a front row seat to the sounds of skin being cut away, stitched and cauterized.  It’s a pretty bizarre sensation.

After cutting away the section of skin I had a temporary bandage applied while they checked to see if they got all of the bad stuff out.  Luckily they did so I didn’t need a second cutting session.  I was stitched up and out of there by 9:30 am, a very quick turnaround for a mohs procedure.

I walked out of there with a copious amount of bandaging over the incision, I looked like I was shot in the head.  I am not sure how many times throughout the day I had to explain the bandaging to various people, explaining it wasn’t quite as dramatic as it looked.

Once the numbing wore off the area did not feel very good at all.  I had pounding and burning that radiated outward up towards the top of my head and downward into my jaw.  You weren’t supposed to take my pain relievers of choice aspirin or Advil since they have blood thinning characteristics that aren’t helpful when a fresh wound is stitched up.  Instead I was told to take Tylenol which didn’t seem to make a dent in the discomfort.  I also had to skip the gym, no elevated blood pressure allowed the first day.

Since I couldn’t go to the gym, on my lunch yesterday I grabbed the supplies I should need to do the brake job on the Tacoma.  I was able to get new lifetime pads and two new rotors with 2 year warranty for less than $90.  Any brake job at a garage that involves new rotors will typically set you back at LEAST three bills.

Now my expenses for this will be slightly higher because I need to get some additional supplies for the work that I don’t have like a torque wrench, brake fluid, high temp brake grease and a few other things.  But if this experiment enables me to handle most simple brake work in the future it will pay for itself immediately.

I also have a fresh Tacoma problem that I am going to try to fix simply at first. When I went back to my truck after my Tuesday gym session the truck didn’t want to stay running.  If I worked the gas to keep it alive the truck protested with even more stuttering and backfiring.  Then after a few minutes it returned to running normally.

Well the problem has continued and I narrowed down when it occurs, when trying to restart the truck within an hour or so of turning it off.  If the engine is totally cold it starts normally, but if it is warm it will sputter like a jalopy for a few minutes and then will eventually correct itself.

Doing some research revealed many possible causes of course so I am going to start with the simple/free stuff first.  I am going to clean the MAF, the throttle body and look for vacuum leaks in the various rubber hoses.  The truck is getting to the age where dry rot of such items will happen.

Another possible cause is the IAC valve. (idle air control)  Evidently this valve can get gummed up with carbon.  I can try to clean it indirectly by dumping a ton of carb cleaner through the throttle body. However to properly clean the IAC it should really be removed which from what I read can be a pain in the ass, especially since it involves some brass screws that are very prone to stripping. I am crossing my fingers that I can kill the problem without having to try to rip down to the IAC.  Looks like my weekend is going to be chock full of Tacoma maintenance.

I gave Randall my RROD repaired 360 a few weeks ago.  Evidently it is still going strong for him.  However I noticed some weird shit going on with my Hulu account recently where stuff was disappearing from my queue and items were showing up in viewing history that I didn’t watch.

Well it seems that Randall’s Xbox 360 was still writing his Hulu activity to my Xbox Live profile.  After he removed my profile for the hard drive the weirdness stopped.  When I was reviewing the viewing history I saw a documentary that Randall had watched called The Future of Food.  I am always interested in information about how f’d up our food chain is so I watched it.

The film focuses on how “patenting life” has become a huge financial windfall for corporations.  One of the biggest and most evil examples of this is a company named Monsanto.  The depth of their treachery is far too vast and involved to outline here.  Instead I recommend you watch this Cliff Note’s video here or better yet search Hulu or Netflix for the film yourself and watch it. Get educated on where your food chain is now and where it is headed.  You will not be pleased to see that the food industry is just another example of what happens when corporations are allowed to run wild.

Oh FYI, one of Michelle Bachman’s stances is she thinks the food industry needs much LESS regulation.  After watching this documentary I guarantee you will see just how misguided that viewpoint is.

How ironic that I just received an email from Credo about those Monsanto bastards. Click here to sign the petition.