Category Vehicle Maintenance

So I kept busy last night.  I ordered an additional WeMo switch to control the automatic chicken door.  My thought process was it would allow more precise control of the door instead of the analog timer it is running on now.  I plugged the motor that controls the door into the WeMo switch and configured the switch via my Iphone to close and open automatically on a schedule.  When I checked the coop video feed last night I saw the door had indeed gone down as scheduled so I figured we were good to go.  Well this morning the door did not open as scheduled so I had to go out there and manually hit the power button.  It looks like I have more tweaking to do tonight.

I also applied a second coat of touch up paint to the spots on the Tacoma I painted Sunday.  The color match is very good and makes the truck a legitimate 20 footer, meaning from 20 feet away it looks half decent. Cindy is supposed to try to paint the beat up Toyota logo on the tailgate flat black to give it one more tweak. Tonight I hope to finish it up with a little wet sanding so I can list the truck for sale.

I also started redoing the used system I got from my accountants, blowing it away with the set of four system restore DVD’s.  Doing so reset the system back to it’s Windows 7 Pro SP1 starting point.  I plan to upgrade it to Windows 10 with a SSD hard drive before handing it off to Ali. The combination should be pretty damn quick, even on 3-4 year old hardware.

Saturday morning I was out the door before 8 am to head up to Fort Myers.  I had two brand new HP computers loaded in the trunk of the Prius for my accountants, a husband/wife team I first met when I lived in PA.  They moved to SW Florida permanently last year.  One of their systems had been having a ton of lock up problems the past few months which was terrible timing since it fell in the middle of tax season. Although I had plenty of stuff I wanted to get done around the house this past weekend I wanted to get their systems migrated instead of having it hanging over me.

Going in I had delusions of getting done around lunch time.  I instead wound up spending all day there, pulling out around 4. They just had a lot of data and a lot of little hurdles I had to get around.  I methodically knocked down the problems one at a time until we got to a point where they were both up and running with their data intact.  We sort of have a barter arrangement in place where I help them with computer stuff and they do accountant stuff for me.  They also gave me the one computer that was locking up.  I may fix it up and give it to Ali since her computer is about 95 in computer years.

While I was working Cindy was as well, painting the garage floor.  We spent all that time cleaning and reorganizing the garage but it still had the ugly bare cement floor that had countless stains on it.  Cindy painted it a solid gray to match the accent color on the walls.  It was a nice finishing touch to the space and makes the garage look officially renovated.

Even though I only got home about 5 we wanted to still get out to go see the new Captain America Civil War movie.  It was playing every 15 minutes at Coconut Pointe so we headed there.  I brought GoPro with to film our review of the movie.  Of course it went off the rails and included other random subject matter.

We were happy to see the theater was not overly crowded thanks to the numerous showings and the snowbirds migrating back north.  Before we got seated I made a bathroom pit stop.  As I was washing my hands a large man stood in front of the urinals behind me.  Thanks to the mirror I got a horrific view of his urinal technique.

The man apparently wore elastic band shorts.  Instead of just pulling down the front of his shorts to gain access to his penis he instead pulled his shorts down until they were resting at mid-thigh leaving his entire ass hanging in the wind.  I stared briefly in disbelief before getting the fck out of there.  It was a visual that will likely be burned into my mind for the foreseeable future.

The movie itself was quite entertaining, keeping the bar set quite high for anything Marvel related.  I am not sure why the film was pitched as a Captain America film instead of Avengers 3.  It had more super heroes than any previous Marvel movie.  Regardless of the branding we both found the movie entertaining, fun and left us hungry for the next installment of the series.  It was odd seeing the good guys beat the shit out of each other and the thought process of the head bad guy in the film didn’t make much sense to me but it really didn’t matter.  Despite being some 2 1/2 hours long the film got a solid A from both Cindy and myself.

Sunday morning we wanted to take advantage of what likely will be our last batch of cool mornings for 6 months or more to get out and run.  We first dropped off Sadie who was visiting for a couple days.  We then headed to the water park to get our run in.  Our normal run around the perimeter of the park is two miles per lap.  That course includes running through sections of grass.  We wanted to avoid grass and get 3 miles in only using one lap so we did a new route that included several back and forth turns to get additional distance in.  It was my first run in a couple weeks so I didn’t feel strong or fast.  The best thing I could say about it was I my lower body didn’t hurt too badly during or afterward.

Shortly after we got home Cindy’s daughter came over for Mother’s Day.  Cindy loves nothing more than to spend time with Katie and that was what they did for the majority of the day.  They spent most of it working on refurbishing a small doghouse they found at a yard sale.

I kept myself busy with my own projects, the most time consuming was me working on cleaning up the 99 Tacoma for sale.  I used the pressure washer and fine grit wet sanding to try to clean up the peeling and oxidizing clear coat as much as possible.  I also applied a couple layers of Nu Finish to the roof and hood of the truck which actually brought back some degree of shine to the 17 year old paint.

I spent a lot of time and energy trying to refurb the exterior to at least an acceptable level.  As a last step I pulled out the matching touch up paint I bought a few weeks ago to try to make the area on the fiberglass fender that had no paint left on it look better as well as a few small spots scattered on the truck.  I want to apply a second coat of the paint and then wet sand again to smooth it out.  It looks far from professional but still an improvement over how it was.

We cleaned up and headed out to take Cindy to a Mother’s Day dinner at Iguana Mia since Cindy is a big fan of mexican food.  The last couple times I have gone there my meal was less than spectacular.  Unfortunately the streak continued.  Katie and I both got blackened fish tacos and both of us thought they sort of sucked.  The fish was dry and basically tasteless.  Even though I am not a big fan of spicy sauce I dumped a bunch on my tacos so they at least tasted like something. Cindy enjoyed her meal more than us so that was good.  Even with the less than spectacular meal Cindy had fun.  She loves when the three of us are all together.

Keeping busy this weekend was a good thing as it didn’t give me much opportunity to focus on this being my second Mother’s Day since my mom passed away. Despite the passage of time it’s very easy to moisten my eyes by simply thinking for a few moments about her unexpected death at a relatively young age.  I miss having her around and still have a difficult time grasping that she is not.

I had an odd dream last night where I was at my grandparents home in Birdsboro.  The dream didn’t really focus on any people being there besides myself.  It was basically me going around the house remembering focal points.  There was grandpas basement that was loosely organized chaos filled with countless tools and items.  On the main floor I remember the sunroom that was off the kitchen, leading to the back yard.  In that backyard there was a garage and another shed, both of which were packed with additional stuff.  The back of the yard was framed by railroad tracks that I used to explore on a regular basis when I was there for holiday visits.

Back inside the house I vividly remember the grandfather clock and smaller clock on the mantle of the living room which would chime on the hour.  There was a small library filled with books that never held much interest for me since I was almost exclusively a magazine reader at the time.  Upstairs I remember a couple things.  I recall the toilet in the only bathroom in the house had some sort of damage to the bowl that made it look like someone abused it majorly every time I lifted the lid.  I always wondered how that could happen.

In my Uncle Randy’s old bedroom I remember a small globe that had what looked like a psuedo weather vane inside.  It had 4 paddles that reacted to light in such a way that it would spin when exposed to bright light.  I always thought it was cool.  From that room there was access to a weird second story porch that I may have snuck out onto once or twice even though I was not supposed to. The attic was on the third floor and I only recall ever venturing up there once or twice in my life.  Again it was a treasure trove of stuff.   I also remembered a small coin bank that looked like a treasure chest but now that I am awake I am having a hard time remembering if that was at my grandparents on my mom or dads side.

Anyway I am not sure what flipped my subconscious back to the Birdsboro house circa the late 70’s and early 80’s.  It was a simpler time for sure.

So I had a big agenda already for the weekend, hoping to get a number of new Tacoma accessories installed as well as completing the garage reorganization.  When Cindy reported starting problems with the 99 Tacoma late in the week I asked her to watch the video I did regarding starter replacement back in 2012, asking her if it sounded like that.  Basically she turned the key a couple times and got clicks but then the truck started normally.  That was the same behavior I had when the starter died in 2012.

I thought I should be proactive and just replace the starter, hopefully for nothing since the Autozone starter I installed had a limited lifetime warranty.  I would feel badly if I sold the truck and then had the starter let the new owner sitting in the near future.  Some people may view that as a stupid thing to care about.  After going through what I did as a result, I may agree with them.

So I got out there bright and early Saturday morning, hoping to finish up in the driveway before the heat of the day rolled in.  I assumed removal of the starter would go pretty easily since I did it before.  Predictably I had some struggles.  I used a different technique to remove the top starter bolt this time.  It required less socket extensions but more patience as I could only turn the socket 90 degrees at a time.  With a little more effort than expected I dropped the starter out of the engine compartment.

Installing the new starter went better.  After I tightened the bolts and reconnected the electrical stuff I leaned in the cab to do a test start, expecting it to be a mere formality.  Instead I was rewarded with a click.  WTF.  I turned again, hoping it was a weird anomaly.  Click, click, click…  How can this be, is it possible that Autozone sold me a DOA starter???  I was so pissed off as I imagined the hassle of having to pull the starter I just installed in order to get it checked.  I screamed a few obscenities into the wind as I walked back around to the front of the truck.

I double checked my connections and again tried the key, only to be greeted by more clicking.   I realized I had no choice but to remove my second starter of the day.  Luckily by this time I had become rather adept at it, I had the starter out in 10 minutes.  I loaded both starters AND my battery from the Tacoma into the new Tacoma in the remote chance the battery was bad as well.  The parts went into the bed.  I threw my seat cover over the driver seat since my clothes were covered with automotive fluid/dirt/grease/lubricants.

So as I pulled into Autozone I was not in a good mood.  The idea that they sold me a dead starter annoyed the piss out of me.  As I walked in from the lot my annoyance got ratcheted up a couple more clicks.  In front of the store was a pop up shelter with some kids and women that were obviously fundraising.  I was carrying the new starter in it’s box along with the old starter piled on top of it.  I was covered in dirt and surely had a sour look on my face.  Despite these obvious clues that I would not be a good solicitation target, one of the woman approaches me as I am approaching and tells me they are fundraising so some kids can go to judo camp.  I was amazed that this woman was so oblivious.   I had this immediate impulse to snap back with something like “are you blind, do I look like I am in a position to donate?”, but managed to submerge the impulse.  Instead I just gave her look of disbelief and disgust with a side order of head shaking.

So I plopped both starters on the counter and explained the situation.  The manager took both starters back to their tester.  He first hooked up the old starter.  After power was applied it fired up and passed the test.  Since the problem seemed intermittent I was not surprised.  However I expected the new starter to be dead as a door nail.  Instead the new starter fired right up as well, son of a …..

So I went into further detail about why I assumed the new starter was bad.  The manager said perhaps I have a grounding problem which he said I could check by using jumper cables to create a new temporary ground.  I told the manager I had my battery out in the truck as well.  I asked him if we could test it.  The judo woman was smart enough to not ask me for money again as I lugged the battery back in the door.  The guy slapped his tester on the battery and after 30 seconds or so showed me the result on the lcd screen, BAD BATTERY.

I was dumbfounded.  The behavior Cindy described just did not sound like a bad battery.  However the battery was around four years old which is about as long as they last in Florida conditions.  The idea that all of this bullshit and labor could have been avoided with a simple battery swap was frustrating.  I told the guy to get me a battery and that I would keep the new starter anyway. I turned in the old one to get my core charge refunded.  I returned home annoyed but relieved the solution to the problem was finally at hand.

By the time I got back Cindy had returned from the track meet she was coaching at.  I gave her the news that the starter replacement had not been going well.  I got busy installing the starter for the second time followed by installing my brand new battery.  This time I leaned into the cab and turned the key knowing it would start for sure.  CLICK.  You HAVE to be kidding me. I was in disbelief and angry.

So after verifying my connections I decided to test out the managers theory.  After disconnecting the negative battery lead I used the two black connections on my jumper cables, connecting one to the negative post on the battery and another to a grounding point on the engine. I turned the key and the truck roared to life.  Son of a bitch.  Could all of this bullshit really just be a flaky ground or bad battery cable?

I pulled out my Chilton’s manual and tried to find the battery ground location.  Unexplainably it did not seem to include that information.  I could not easily follow it visibly since it was encased in a wire loom that lead under the engine and out of view.  I then looked online for the ground location and again came up empty.  I walked back outside frustrated once again.

I decided to take a two step approach.  I took apart the negative battery terminal and cleaned it up best I could.  I also reconnected a secondary ground that was cut years ago that leads to the fender of the truck.  The combination of the two things finally seemed to do the trick, the truck fired up normally.  There is the very real possibility that I needlessly replaced the starter and the battery but at that point I didn’t care.  I’ll just add the items to the “features” list when I list the truck for sale.  The work that I hoped to have completed in 90 minutes instead wound up consuming the entire morning. If you want to see the video of the entire frustrating experience look here. I do have a sneaky suspicion that Tuffy may have knocked the ground loose during the water pump/timing belt install.  I may have to get under there one more time to check it out.

So after eating lunch I headed right back to the garage to start installing my new Tacoma accessories.  Despite my frustrating morning the Tacoma upgrades were on my mental checklist and needed to get done.  In total Cindy and I installed 5 upgrades including mud flaps, black out tailgate letters, console organizer, chrome tailpipe extension and nerf bars, which happened to show up as we were finishing the other upgrades.  I made a video for most of the stuff which is linked above.  The installation for all of it was pretty straight forward and simple but they really helped add some visual appeal to the truck.

Even though it was getting later in the afternoon I wanted to get the garage reorganization done or as close to done a s possible.  Cindy, who is an organization junkie was all on board.  I set up one of our folding tables in the garage and used it as a staging area.  We then began the lengthy process of removing EVERYTHING from the existing pegboard and piling it on the table in a haphazard manner.

As stuff was pulled off it was a good opportunity to throw out or curb items that were no longer of use.  Of course there were many things that fell into that category.  Once everything was removed we started the rebuild.  I was the one that did all of the pegboard population since that stuff is almost exclusively my domain.  Cindy worked a lot on organizing the endless surplus of screw, nuts, bolts, and washers that I had spread all over the place.  She also emptied out the area under my workbench.

It took a long time to get everything back in place.  We worked well into the evening but were driven by having the end in sight.  Cleaning up the garage was a long standing item on my winter project list.  Even though we are now far into spring it was exciting to have it finally nearing completion.

When we finally got the last thing put away we stood back to admire the fruit of our labor.  Not only did everything look better and have a spot, I had plenty of room for additional stuff, not that I am looking to fill in my pegboard space anytime soon.  Items I use frequently went in the workbench area, everything else got hung on the left in an orderly fashion.

After we were done we both felt beat up, really beat up.  All of the fighting with the truck in the morning backed up with a solid afternoon of nothing but additional work left me walking around with my ever more prevalent old man shuffle.  There wasn’t much on me that didn’t ache to some degree.  Cindy felt much the same.

I sometimes wonder what it is that drives me to fill many weekends with such an unbalanced work/relaxation formula.  I suppose it is a hereditary thing.  I just don’t feel at peace if my mental list for that time period remains incomplete.

On Saturday night we finally relaxed, watching Pawn Sacrifice, our most recent Netflix rental.  It was a movie about Bobby Fischer who I knew was a famous chess player but little else.  It seems he was equal parts genius and neurotic with a healthy dose of asshole thrown in there.  The movie was interesting enough for a solid B rating. I had no idea that later in life he lived in exile before he died in Iceland.  I guess brilliance comes with a price.

On Sunday I felt somewhat guilty for brushing off any endurance training, despite physically feeling not up to it.  I instead spent time getting the various video footage I shot the day before up on my YouTube channel.  Speaking of YouTube I hit a big milestone, gaining my 1000th subscriber to go along with my close to 900,000 channel views.   After I announced the milestone on Facebook, that number immediately decreased by a handful, dropping me back below the 4 digit mark.  I suspect some of my FB “friends” thought it would be funny to steal my thunder and unsubbed just to dick with me.  Luckily I picked up more subs to once again put me over the mark in the last 24 hours.

During the morning I also did some simple maintenance on the used Honda generator I got from my buddy John.  Instead of taking payment for the Immokalee race I timed for him he asked if I just wanted to keep the generator I borrowed since I needed one anyway.  I accepted his offer and figured it would be good to change the oil.  In addition to changing the oil I swapped out the air filter and spark plug.  None of the work was difficult but I took the time to document it anyway.  One thing I have found with YouTube videos is even procedures that may seem very simple to me can generate substantial views by others that don’t have my background.

We took the new Tacoma for it’s first Rural King run.  We got to admire the result of our accessory installs the day before.  We both commented on just how much we love the new truck both inside and out.  After picking up several items we returned home for what we hoped would be an afternoon sans-labor.

I did my weekly bill paying/budget balancing session.  That was an opportunity to shine a light on all of the spending that has been going on since the sale of the SSR. Of course I knew it was all going on but seeing the cold hard numbers helped me apply a gentle tap on the mental spending brake so I can catch my breath a little.  Sure there are more big ticket items on the list but none of it is anything that can’t wait for a bit.

Later in the afternoon I just could not help myself and began another small project.  I had a wire shelf that was displaced from the garage during the reorganization project that was sitting in the back yard.  It was one of those strong industrial models so I wanted to put it to use.  I wound up ripping out a less useful, smaller wood shelf in the large shed and sticking the wire shelf in there.  In order to make it work I also had to cut in half some wall mounted shelving in there.  The end result was more usable storage space that worked better.

My work set off an unintended chain reaction when I asked Cindy if she wanted the old wood shelf for anything.  If she didn’t I was going to curb it.  She said she wanted to try to possibly do something with it.  I carried it over and stuck it in the corner of the smaller shed that Cindy had already spent extensive time reorganizing.  She then went on another mission, shuffling things around yet again to work with the shelf in there.  She wound up working in the shed until around 7.

She worked so late that I offered to take her out to dinner so she wouldn’t have to tack on food prep to her list as well.  We went to Pelican Larry’s that is in a relatively new shopping center I never frequented before.  It was a very nice place and worthy of our future patronage.  My grouper basket was quite tasty.

When we got back home later we were both in the office.  I was watching Casey Neistat videos on YouTube.  All of a sudden I saw movement by the office window.  At first I though it was just the sprinklers turning on.  I then focused on the window and realized I could not have been more wrong.  There was a large raccoon on the outside ledge looking in at me.  On the ground next to it was a smaller one looking at me as well.  When I told Cindy to look she couldn’t believe it.

When I turned on the porch light to take a peek out front they had taken off.  A little later I saw the motion detector in the chicken run had tripped.  I walked out there as well just to make sure the raccoons were not trying to harass the hens, despite there being multiple levels of defense in place.  I once again saw nothing but both Cindy and I felt a bit unsettled knowing these chicken predators were once again freely roaming the grounds.

I was a dumb ass yesterday and totally neglected to mention that my half sister Meghan had her first child, a beautiful girl named Cadence late Monday night.  It marks the 4th time I have been indoctrinated into Uncletude.  Meg and her husband Paul are both really good people and I have no doubt they will be terrific parents.  Congratulations to them both.

I also had a robotic addition to the family yesterday, a Braava Wetjet 200. It joins my large fleet of home cleaning robots that include a Roomba, two Neatos, a Scooba and a Braava 380.

The wetjet caught my eye because of it’s small size and it’s ability to spray water before scrubbing with it’s vibrating cleaning pad.  I found it odd that this device cost less than the Braava 380 which has no spraying capability or vibrating cleaning head.  When I looked at the cleaning pad system the 200 uses I understood why.

Irobot is following the classic inkjet printer model.  Sell the hardware cheap and then make a killing on the back end with consumables.  The Wet Jet utilizes single use cleaning pads that are designed to be used and then tossed.  They have three types, one for dry sweeping, one for damp sweeping and one for wet mopping.  When I saw this I was about to write off the robot as too expensive to use on a regular basis.  Luckily I saw Irobot also sells washable cleaning pads that can be used upwards of 200 times or more, making the purchase decision once again feasible in my mind.

The WetJet is small in size and not designed to clean huge areas of floor real estate.  It does not utilize a navigation cube like the more expensive 380 and has a smaller battery which means less run time. The small robot is ideal for cleaning things like bathrooms where it’s small size allows it to get into areas most robots would not fit.  I gave the 200 a test run last night.  It uses the same cleaning pattern the bigger Braava does when mopping.  The difference is before it does, it backs up and squirts some water.  It was fun watching it work it’s way systematically around the kitchen.  I plan to let it loose in the bathrooms tonight.

It has been a little like Christmas lately.  Hell it’s better than Xmas.  A new truck and kitchen appliances are far better than Santa has ever delivered.  In addition there has been a pretty steady stream of boxes at the front door in a very December-like manner.  Yesterday in addition to the Braava I received a new set of toners for my color laser printer, and two Qi compatible charging adapters for the iPhone.

The new Tacoma has a Qi inductive charging pad that allows you to charge compatible devices by simply laying them on the pad.  The iPhone does not natively support this unlike the Samsung Galaxy line.  However you can buy adapters to allow your i-device to take advantage of this technology.  I hooked up my iPhone 6 last night and tried it out.  Just like magic the phone showed it was receiving charge as it laid in the truck.

I also messed around with the built in GoPro mount in the Tacoma, hooking up my camera to it.  The mount is located on the passenger side of the rear view mirror so I utilized a few mounting brackets to get the camera down far enough so the mirror didn’t obstruct it.  When Toyota decided to adorn all Tacomas with a permanent GoPro mount it was probably with the assumption that off roaders would like to shoot footage out the windshield instead of flipping the camera around for vlogging purposes.  Regardless it seems like it will work out pretty well.  I shot some more footage on my way to work.  I have to see how it turned out with the background noise.

If my night wasn’t busy enough I also changed the oil in the Prius since the MAINTENANCE REQUIRED light had been on for a few days.  Cindy lent a hand, changing the air filter and refilling the crankcase with fresh oil while I dealt with the dirty end of things on the ground.

Even though I have only been off for four days it feels like longer due to just how jammed pack those days have been.  On Wednesday night we did some prep for the arrival of the appliances that was scheduled for Thursday.  We got the microwave off the wall after a lot of hassle.  My brief internet research said the wall bracket for the microwave is basically just a lip the back end sits on.  Once the top two bolts are removed it should lift off easily.

Well after removing the bolts I was able to get the microwave to tip down but not pull free from the bracket.  Evidently Maytag for some reason has some additional thin side arms that slide into the microwave that were preventing me from pulling it free.  After a lot of grunting and awkwardly holding the unit by both Cindy and myself I finally got it off the wall. After that frustrating episode we deemed our appliance removal as good enough for the night.

The appliance installers had an install window between 9:30 and 1:30, a wide window.  We were hoping they would arrive early which would allow us to be able to still drive to the east coast in the evening to pick up the new Tacoma.  Cindy left early for her middle school track coaching gig so I got busy doing more appliance removal.  Our purchase at Home Depot supposedly included free installation of the stove and fridge.  The dishwasher and microwave had an extra charge.  I paid to have the dishwasher installed but not for the microwave.  Regardless the delivery/installer services should include pulling the old appliances out.  Well to expedite things I wanted to get the removal out of the way ahead of time.

I was able to get the old stove and dishwasher out to the garage with the help of my handtruck.  I removed the front handles on the fridge but waited for Cindy to get home to get it moved outside due to it’s heavy weight and tight clearance with the front door.  I had already put all of the freezer items in our coolers.  All of the fridge stuff was on the counter.  Once we got the fridge back in the garage we plugged it right back in and put the food back in there for safekeeping until the new Samsung refrigerator was in place.

Just as we were finishing up moving the food to the garage the installers showed, close to the start of their installation window which was awesome.  Both of the guys were very nice and surprised we did the prep work that normally falls on their shoulders.  They wasted no time getting busy.

The install went smoothly.  It was my time to be pleasantly surprised that they installed the new microwave as well, despite me not paying the extra money for the installation.  When we pulled the fridge out it revealed the plastic outlet cover was broken from overly aggressive fridge pushing over the years.  I ran out to the nearby hardware store and got a metal replacement.  By the time I got back home everything but the new fridge was in place.

The installers said in order to get the new fridge in it would be best to pop the hinges on the front door which was easier said than done.  The top two pins came out easily but the bottom pin was tough for them since you can’t get a good swing of a hammer on it.  Some determination and WD-40 eventually broke it loose.  I helped the one guy cart the new fridge although he did most of the grunt work.  My primary role was to make sure the doors stay closed.  Before long they had the fridge up and running.  Both of the guys were really friendly, helpful, and professional.  We gave them whatever cash we had as a tip.

After they left Cindy and I spent a lot of time just admiring our new kitchen hardware.  We liked the contrast with the white cabinets as well as the way it complemented the granite which has a lot of black.  The fridge was especially cool.  Over the weekend Cindy did several reworks of the layout trying to figure out the best way to utilize the large amount of additional space it has.  I had a big pile of manuals on the counter to look through so I had a basic understanding of how all the bells and whistles work.

So I contacted the Delray Toyota dealer and let them know that I indeed would be able to pick up the new truck that evening.  We set a tentative time of 6PM, plenty of time for them to get it all prepped and ready to go.  However before we left Cindy had a dentist appointment in the afternoon.  The plan was for me to take her there so we could leave immediately afterward to save time.  While Cindy was in the chair I ran to the credit union to pull some cash and stopped at Walmart to grab some safety pins for the race I was timing Saturday.

When we left Naples I figured we had plenty of time to get to Delray which according to the GPS should take about 2 hours.  What I didn’t give any thought to was the time of day we were making the trip.  We got onto I-95 right in the heart of rush hour which was miserable.  We had no choice but to sit in stop and go traffic for long periods of time which made the drive 30-45 minutes longer than expected.

Our GPS got us right to the door of the dealership which was visually impressive and huge.  We walked inside the massive showroom and soon met up with Owen, the sales guy assigned to delivering the vehicle.  Up until that point I had dealt with a guy named Tony on the phone and via email as he is the guy assigned to all internet/Costco leads.  Owen was an older, relaxed man with a pleasant demeanor, certainly not the prototypical car salesman template.

After a much needed bathroom break I asked Owen if we could first take the truck for a test drive.  Despite the foregone conclusion I was buying a new Tacoma I had not actually sat behind the wheel of one, I just assumed I would like it.  Owen walked us out the side door where the truck was waiting for us.  It looked awesome in it’s Inferno Orange color scheme.  Cindy had to jump in the back of the access cab which isn’t too bad for someone of her dimensions while Owen rode shotgun.

As I slid into the driver seat for the first time I could not believe how big the truck felt.  It felt tons bigger than my 99 Tacoma, almost as big as a full size truck thanks to the large and in charge hood design.  It feels bigger because it actually is bigger in every dimension.  It’s longer, wider, and sits higher.

I immediately loved the interior complete with the high tech info center that was equipped.  It had all the bells and whistles.  This was a pretty big thing for me.  Yea I had bought a total of 4 new vehicles in my lifetime but the only other time I bought one 100% based on what I wanted was my Pontiac Sunfire GT after my first divorce.  It felt sort of surreal.

The big size of the truck felt a bit disorienting.  Plus I found myself distracted checking out all of the feedback the truck gives you through the two screens, one in the radio position and another integrated into the instrument cluster.  The test drive was a couple miles at most but it was enough to convince me I made a good choice.  Cindy shared my enthusiasm for the truck, she thought it was awesome in pretty much every way.

So when we got back it was time to run some numbers.  This deal was unconventional in several ways.  Not only did I have to drive to the other side of the state to find a Costco affiliated dealer, I had no idea exactly what the truck would cost me since they will not pull out the Costco pricing book until you are inside the dealership.  So Owen brings out the book and we begin the negotiation process which again happens in reverse to what is normal.

Normally you start at the marked up price a dealer has on a vehicle which usually includes their addendum sticker and work down from there.  In our case we started down way low at the Costco member price which according to the book was 1100 under INVOICE, not MSRP, INVOICE.  So I had all of my internet pricing info with me so I immediately knew the invoice pricing they were listing was a little inflated but not much.  However from that number there were additions for stuff like floor mats, nitro filling the tires, and title/tag work which of course were dramatically inflated in pricing.  In addition there was a $799 dealer fee that Owen said was added to every vehicle they sell.  When I asked him what exactly that was for he said prep but admitted that of course there was additional profit taking in there.

So even with this subtraction followed by addition, the out the door pricing was much, much better than any number any other Toyota dealer offered.  They started their pricing at MSRP plus since the Tacomas have been selling very well with the new redesign of the truck this model year.  When I started doing my research I assumed I would be lucky to just get the truck for MSRP.  Even with the overpriced add ons I was still well under MSRP and able to very easily swing into my financial wheelhouse.  Even so I asked Owen if he could do a little better for me.  When he came back with a price 250 bucks less that was good enough, we agreed to the deal and moved on to stage 2.

So I had all my financing in place so I hoped our visit to the F&I guys office would be brief.  Even with my own financing and turning down all the extended warranties and other profit padding options we were in there for a while.  There seems to be a lot more paperwork involved than when I sold cars.  I was signing and initialing for quite a long time.  After we were done it took awhile to track down Owen so we could head out.  He had already attached the license plate and gave me a brief run down of the vehicle although I probably knew as much as he did based on my extensive internet research ahead of time.

When we left the dealership we were both starving and hit a nearby Chipotle to fuel up.  By the time we left the east coast it was quite late.  At least the traffic situation was much better.  The disorientation with the new truck continued on the way home.  It’s bigger dimensions made me feel unsure of my position in a lane.  Once we got back out onto Alligator Alley things were fine.  We didn’t pull back in the driveway until after 11PM, much later than I was expecting.  The garage was in no shape to house the new Tacoma with the old appliances residing there.  Cindy and I planned on working on alternatives over the weekend.  As we were laying in bed we could hardly believe that we got new appliances and a new vehicle, on the east coast no less, the same day.

On Friday I kept busy around the house for a good portion of the day.  Cindy had a fitness class to teach.  I told her to take the new Tacoma since she hadn’t had a chance to drive it yet.  She gave the truck a glowing report card as well.  One of the things I did was list the old appliances on Craigslist, hoping to quickly sell them to reclaim garage space.  I had exactly zero responses from the ad.  Used appliances on CL are a dime a dozen.  I followed up later on in the weekend posting on a local FB yard sale group and at least got some possible interest but as of now all of the appliances are out there.  Although I would like to get a little bit of money to offset the expense if we don’t move them within the next week I have no problem donating them as well.

I also needed to do prep for the race I was timing Saturday.  During the day I met up with John to pick up one of his generators.  The race finish line location had no nearby power available.  I also picked up Sadie for an extended visit while Ali and her boyfriend are up in PA.  I chose to do both of these things in the old Tacoma.  I figured I may as well try to keep the 2016 Tacoma as pristine as possible while I can.

On Saturday morning Cindy and I awoke to the 4:30 alarm clock.  Cindy actually had a track meet she had to attend but she agreed to follow me to the race to help me get as much equipment set up as she could.  The inflatable arch is particularly difficult to get set up solo.  I punched in the address for the race that was on the entry form which took us into the Immokalee Airport access road.  We saw noone around so I called the race director.  He said he was 5 minutes behind me and would be there soon.  We sat for another 10 minutes without seeing him so I called again.  He said he was now there but did not see us.  He described a park where the race was held which was nowhere in sight.  We came back out of the park and used his verbal guidance to get to the right spot.

So the location confusion cost us valuable time since Cindy had to leave asap.  We hustled and got the arch up and running off the generator and most of the other finish line equipment in place before Cindy had to head out.  The morning had a hectic start and it only escalated from there.  The location of the finish line was not good.  It was staged on the main road used for vehicles to park.  I had cars coming back and forth the entire time before the race.

At one point while I was setting more equipment up I heard the generator start to sputter.  Just as I thought to myself, “it better not die”, it of course did, sending the arch quickly to the ground as yet another vehicle was approaching.  I ran over to the generator and realized I did not have the vent on the gas cap turned to the ON position which caused it to shut down.  After opening the vent the generator fired back up on the first pull and was fine the rest of the event. The registration area was at least a couple hundred yards from the finish line which was problematic as well.  I had to go back and forth several times to do data entry while trying to finish the equipment set up at the same time.   I definitely wished I had Cindy there to help me.

So with the vehicle traffic constantly going through the finish line before the race I wasn’t going to put the timing mats in place for a chip start.  The field of runners was small so using just gun time wasn’t a big deal.  As the race was getting ready to start the race director came up and made some announcements on my bullhorn.  He then asked me if I had a starters gun we could use to start the race.  I told him no but the bullhorn had a siren we could use.  I showed him how to start it, assuming he would start the event.  Instead he asked me if I could start the race since he was going to run the race as well. Um ok.  Of course he didn’t realize that I already had a clipboard, my atomic watch, and a stopwatch I utilize when starting a race.  Trying to awkwardly work the siren was not going to be a good thing.  I managed to get the race started in a rather clumsy manner.

So once the runners cleared I had to quickly get the timing mats in place but I had to get the race clock set first.  I had some issues getting it set just right but eventually got it working. I then jumped on the laptop where I have to do stuff like set the time on the timing box.  I was getting no response.  A quick diagnosis revealed that the USB ethernet adapter seemed to not be working.  My only option was to power off the laptop and bring it back up.  By the time I got it back up I getting close to crunch time time-wise.  I quickly set the time on the Ipico box and got everything up and running literally seconds before the first young kid crossed.

So as I started looking at my finish line time reports I noticed something was wrong.  The times on the report were almost a minute more than they should be??  WTF…   So I started to try to figure out the problem.  This was my first timing with the Ipico equipment in roughly a year so I wondered if I missed a step.  Part of the process is setting the time on the laptop to match the time on my atomic synched watch.  The laptop time is then used to set the time on the timing box.  I had set the time on the laptop to match my watch before the race.  Well somehow my shutting off the laptop had caused the time to fall out of synch by almost a minute so I set the time on the box with the incorrect time, causing the problem.  I was luckily able to apply an offset to the finish times to correct the problem.  I was glad I had my new security dvr there to allow me review the time the race winner crossed the line so I could determine exactly how much offset I needed.

The security dvr system also came in handy for environmental conditions.  The way I was facing the rising sun was directly in my face.  The large 27 inch monitor I have attached to the DVR served as a sunvisor.  I spent much of the race ducked down behind it so I could see.

So in the end all of the race results worked out without anyone realizing just how much scrambling I was doing behind the scenes to make it happen.  It also revealed some weak links in my GMT race equipment.  My $149 Asus laptop is going to need to be swapped with something more substantial and I need to get more adept at setting the race clock.  Clean up from the event took FOREVER with me doing it solo.  I bet I spent damn close to an hour just tearing down and putting everything back in the truck.  I pulled off site mentally and physically tired.  Just as a final exclamation point on the morning, I had a hell of a time getting back on Immokalee Road due to a farmers parade going down Main Street.  I probably spent 15 minutes finding a route around it.

By the time Cindy got home I had already finished unloading all of the equipment and had started on post race work like posting results and ripping finish line video.  After we ate lunch turned our attention to the garage.  At first I had given up hope on keeping the new Tacoma housed in the garage.  It’s bigger dimensions would not allow it to fit where the SSR resided.  Initially Cindy’s suggestion of changing the layout of the shelves in there, which meant removing them, was not appealing to me since I hate losing storage options.  However the more I thought about it the more open I was to it.

We first had to get the old appliances moved to the opposite wall as they were sitting where the Tacoma would go.   We then started pulling stuff out of the garage.  Of course this was also an opportunity to purge some shit.  I had a bunch of maintenance items like transmission fluid, air/oil filters, oil and other stuff that were needed for the maintenance of the old Tacoma and the SSR.  Obviously I had no need for these anymore so we deposited them by the curb for someone else to use.  Like I said almost everything was unopened.  We moved some shelves around and completely removed others.  The non-Tacoma side of the garage looked like a mess.

After we got done we did a test park with me backing into the space.  I fit fine but it was tedious backing in there.  We discovered that I could pull in forward and still have enough room to get out of the door once I raised an adjustable shelf on the wall, awesome.  Cindy came up with the good idea to utilize the wall space where the shelf use to reside for extra pegboard space, something I have been in dire need of for many years.  We stopped at that point since we were going to a sweet 16 birthday party for Cindy’s niece.

Even though I knew sweet 16 parties existed I never attended one and I never knew anybody that had one.  I was surprised at the size and scope of it all.  It almost seemed like a mini-wedding reception.  It was held at a cool little marina that I never knew existed.  Of course we cruised there in the new Tacoma.  By Saturday I was finally feeling adjusted to the different driving dimensions and was comfortable on the road.

The party was very cute.  Cindy’s niece is a terrific young lady with a bight future in front of her for sure.  Cindy’s daughter and mom were there as well so we got to hang with them to varying degrees.  We also got to meet Cindy’s brother’s girlfriend who was very nice as well.  I chilled out with four beers to take the edge off.  After the prior three days of go go go it felt good to just sit and chill for a bit.

Despite our high activity level up to that point, Sunday morning Cindy and I decided to get out and run, something that just has not happened on a consistent level for a long time.  We put in a little over 3 miles at the track.  With my lack of running of course I never felt comfortable the entire time but at least I got it done.

When we got home we loaded up Sadie for a ride.  I needed to stop at Home Depot to get stuff to expand the pegboard and a few other things.  Going there when we have Sadie is so much more fun now that we found out she is allowed to shop with us.  The 4×8 piece of pegboard hung out over the edge of the old Tacoma but was held in place by the weight of three bags of mulch pretty securely. We took the old Tacoma, trying to spare the 2016 from unnecessary dirt and labor until necessary.

Most of the remaining daylight hours of Sunday were spent out in the garage getting the new pegboard up.  I had some challenges along the way due to inconsistent stud placement on that wall but I worked around it.  In addition we built a small shelf/table to get back some of the storage capability we lost.  We also hung a tennis ball on a string parking aid we found at HD to make pulling the new Tacoma in far enough a no brainer.  We were both quite pooped when our day’s labor came to an end.  We now are quite anxious to get the old appliances out of there so we can again welcome the Prius back into the garage as well.

Like I mentioned earlier, we had a bunch of stuff by the road to give away.  Late in the day Cindy noticed like it looked like it was scattered.  We walked down there and saw a big freaking mess.  Some idiot ran off the side of the road and into the various bottles of automotive products.  In particular it looked like he squarely ran over one of the full bottles of tranny fluid, causing it to spray all over the other items, ruining them.  The only good news I could see was the spray pattern included a good portion of the road as well so I hope the asshole has transmission fluid dissolving his paint as we speak.

Of course I would be remiss to not mention the celebrity deaths over the weekend.  Chyna, one of the first big name female WWE stars died at the young age of 45.  Her death was quickly overshadowed by the shocking death of Prince who was 57, far outside of normal dying range.  It sounds like there are some odd circumstances in the week or two leading up to his death which I am sure will be beaten to death in the media.  Regardless of how it happened he was an extremely talented performer and musician that in my book gave Michael Jackson a run for his money.  I hate being old enough that famous people I grew up with that aren’t that much than older me are dying off. RIP Prince (and Chyna).

I also have forgot to mention my thoughts about the Eagles big move, trading what many (including myself) think was too much to move from the number 8 position to number two in the upcoming NFL draft.  The team is presumably going to pick one of the top two projected QB ‘s in the draft and at this point it seems it will be the kid from North Dakota, Carson Wentz.  This move concerns me on several levels.

If the Eagles were already holding the number 2 pick and wanted to draft the kid I guess I would be ok with it.  To be successful every team needs a franchise QB eventually and the Eagles don’t think they have one currently on their roster.  I agree with them.  However to trade 5 picks to move down 6 spots to get this kid seems really, really stupid.  How often do early pick QB’s fall on their face?  The answer is all the time.  More of them fail than succeed.  To compound that, they are giving this up for a QB that played at a small school that faces a competition level far less than bigger programs go up against.  Expecting him to jump from that scenario to play in the NFL where the talent level is magnified many times over seems like a stretch to me.  When you factor in giving up all those picks it all just makes little sense to me.

Last year when Chip Kelly made all of those questionable moves, I said I thought they were bad decisions (which they obviously were), but I hoped he would prove me wrong.  Once again I am hoping Howie Roseman turns out to be some sort of super genius and Carson Wentz proves to be the Eagles franchise QB for the next decade or more but I have a bad feeling it’s not going to be the case and cost us dearly in future draft talent to boot.

This was an arduous weekend as expected.  It started immediately on Friday evening with me working at one of our branches to almost 9PM.  It was frustrating because the majority of the time was spent standing around while state installers tried to figure out issues beyond our scope of work.  When I got home Cindy and I did a late pizza dinner.

Saturday morning I had to head out relatively early for the track meet.  I threw a few items in the back of the Tacoma and headed out.  There was a slight chill in the air so I turned the heat on low.  Usually the truck warms up pretty quickly so when I was a couple miles from the house and still felt no heat I glanced at the temperature gauge.  My panic level went from 0 to 100 when I see the needle pegged into the red area, wtf??

I pulled off at the next intersection and turned the truck off.  I popped the hood and looked for anything obvious.  No hoses or belts were broken but I did see what looked like coolant on the bottom of the motor, great.  I immediately wondered if it was somehow related to my thorough degreasing of the engine compartment although further mental analysis deemed that unlikely. So I turned the truck back on and babied it back home with the gauge buried the entire time.  Luckily despite the high temps the engine seemed to be running ok. I had the heat on full blast.  For brief intervals hot air would come out of the vents but it would then go back to cold.

When I got home I quickly took another look under the hood.  There was a pretty steady stream of watery brown liquid dripping from the engine.  At that point I was pretty sure my water pump had failed.  Of course I had no time to do anything further.  Cindy helped me throw my stuff into the Prius and I was back on the road.  When I got on site I asked Cindy to see if she could use her USAA membership to get the truck towed to the Tuffy where I have had work done before.  Luckily she was able to make the arrangements for a tow.

I called to Tuffy ahead of time to let them know the truck was on it’s way.  I was familiar with what is required to change the water pump on this motor,  it isn’t pretty and very labor intensive, way beyond what I am comfortable doing.  I knew this was going to be a big repair bill which of course is terrible timing since I planned to sell the truck within the next 30 days if things go as planned.  When the garage called me later in the day the estimate was even higher than I expected, $1500.  He said when you tear it down to replace the water pump you should replace the rubber timing belt as well, which I already knew.  I had it done once already at about the 100k mark.  Since the Tacoma was now at almost 190k miles it should be done anyway.  I told them to go ahead with the work.  I couldn’t believe the bad timing of the pump failure as I hung up the phone. Although in a weird way, if I sold the truck and the pump failed shortly thereafter I would feel badly for the buyer so at least it will be addressed now and perhaps I can use the repair as a basis for a couple hundred bucks more in the sale price.

So even with having to switch vehicles I got on site at the track meet on time, right around 8:30.  It turns out I probably could have showed up an hour or so later since the first action wasn’t until close to 11.  Before the main preliminary heats started I went to the snack stand to grab some food.  I went with something simple, a toasted plain bagel with peanut butter.  Instead fo applying the pb yourself they do it for you.  I thought that was nice, until I got it.

The bagel was wrapped in tin foil.  When I opened it up it was a brown runny mess.  It looks like the woman was overly generous with the creamy Jif and encasing the warm bagel inside the tin foil encouraged further melting.  My hands and face were disgusting after eating the bagel.  I went into the bathroom and tried to wash up the best I could.

This was a district track meet which is a big deal.  It also means it takes up big blocks of time.  I knew the meet was going to be long, I didn’t realize it was going to that long.  By the time we got off site it was 7PM.  By the time I got home it was almost exactly a 12 hour day.  My free time is way more valuable than the relatively small amount of pay track timers receive.  As a result I don’t expect to be doing it in the future.  Backing up the long day at the track with the late night at the office the night before made my weekend feel very consumed.

On Sunday morning we went out to Home Depot and brought Sadie along as she was visiting for the weekend.  We didn’t have anything specific to buy, I wanted to go to take a closer look at appliances, comparing models and getting ballpark pricing.  With the rows and rows of appliances it was somewhat difficult to keep straight all of the options.  One thing that was clear that it was a decent time to buy as it was Home Depot’s spring Black Friday sale where they take 10% off all appliances over 400 bucks, even if they are on sale already.  We walked out of the store not buying a single thing.  I am not sure if that has ever happened.

So while we were there we did identify what we liked and disliked.  When we got home I did further looking on the Home Depot web site.  I found the fridge we liked, a Samsung model with tons of bells and whistles.  I added it to my online cart just for fun.  When I did I saw the site popped up a window showing the matching Samsung appliances for the other kitchen pieces, like the dishwasher, stove and microwave.  Being able to easily browse them was great and a convenience we couldn’t do nearly as easily inside the brick and mortar store.

With Cindy’s help we went through each one and again added them to the cart, wanting to see the numbers.  Of course the same discounts applied online.  The grand total with tax and delivery (free) was a number well within the ballpark of what I was expecting to spend so I made the decision to convert from browsing to buying.  If things go as indicated online the new appliances should be in the house on Thursday.

We decided to go with all black appliances, the polar opposite of the all white appliances that have adorned the kitchen since the house was built some 16 years ago.  We think they will contrast nicely with the white cabinets and pick up very nicely on the black in the granite counter tops.  When I told Jeremy about the purchase he immediately said I should go with stainless steel instead as it is viewed by many as the gold standard.  I tried explaining to him I wasn’t looking to flip the house and if I prefer black, I am going to go with black.  I am confident it will look very slick.  I have never been one that is much interested in whole heartedly embracing the mainstream anyway.

So despite a large deficit in relaxation time in the weekend I filled my Sunday with more work.  I weed whacked the property to match the mowing Cindy had done on Saturday.  Mid-afternoon I decided to take a shot at getting the security dvr cables up the wall and into the attic.  My only access to the attic on the office side of the house is via a small door in the hobby room closet.  To get access to it required getting a shelf and everything on it out of the way.

Once I gained access and dropped the hatch my first visual was rolled up insulation that was covering the opening.  I was able to push it out of the way enough to get a look around.  Most of the area I needed to work in was covered with a foot or two of the blow in insulation.  Before venturing up in the attic I made sure I had on long pants and a long sleeve t-shirt to protect from the incessant irritation home insulation can cause.  In addition I had a paper air mask to keep me from inhaling tons of dirt and whatever else resides up there.  Of course it was quite warm in the attic since the afternoon temps hit the mid-80’s.

So I was very paranoid about inadvertently putting my foot through the ceiling.  I drug my body across some of the angled roof trusses to keep myself suspended the entire time.  Of course this resulted in my chest having almost brush burn like redness after I was done.  So I located the wood stud on top of the wall.  I started tapping on it so Cindy could verify I was in the right spot.  I then used a 1 1/2″ wood boring bit to punch a hole in the wood that seemed to be at least 4 inches thick.  I used my wire snake to fish down behind the drywall.  Cindy again verified she could hear the wire come down in the right spot.

I emerged from the hot attic covered in insulation.  I used the same drill bit to pop a hole in the drywall at about the same height as the other outlets.  I returned to the attic and moved the snake wire around until Cindy could grab it.  Once she did I came back down, taped the DVR wires to the snake and then returned one final time to the hot crawl space and pulled the wires successfully into the attic.  Due to time and patience restraints that was all the further the project progressed for now.  The next step will be more miserable crawling in the attic to the corners of the roof line to punch a hole where the wiring can connect up with the externally mounted cameras.  I can hardly wait.

Last night we had our second Tarpons game to attend in as many weeks.  The attendance was even less than the first week.  The game at least was more competitive, the Tarpons only won by around 20 points.

Today Cindy dropped me off at work since we only have one vehicle in the household currently.  If it was a year or so ago I would have had two spare vehicles to chose from in this situation.

Last night when I got home I got started on doing some prep work for the eventual sale of my 99 Tacoma.  I grabbed my socket set and checked the torque on my valve cover bolts.  It seemed like there was some minor seepage of oil going on.  I found a couple that felt loose.  I then grabbed my bottle of degreaser and went to town under the hood. The engine compartment had not been cleaned in many, many years.  In addition to spraying down the area I hit what I could with a stiff brush as well. I also got down on the wet driveway and sprayed the bottom of the engine and transmission to remove years of oil/grease build up.  I thoroughly soaked the engine so I made sure to fire it up and let it run for awhile to dry it out thoroughly.  Things under the hood looked much better when I was done.

I also tried working on a small section of the gross, poor quality clear coat on the passenger side.  The stuff that has not peeled off has become very dark and dirty looking, not a good thing when your truck is white.  At first I tried rubbing the dirty clear coat with a magic eraser, hoping it would help brighten it up.  It had little to no effect.

I then grabbed a small section of sand paper and lightly sanded the shitty clear coat.  I sprayed it with the hose as I worked, my version of wet sanding I guess.  The sand paper did seem to do the trick, the problem is it makes the area look scratched which I may be able to address with finer grit paper.  The experimental section I worked on was about the size of a dollar.  I will do some more experimentation this week.

I also pulled out my trusty bottle of Nu Finish.  I became familiar with the product back in the late 80’s and early 90’s.  You may remember their commercials where they would go into a junk yard and polish up the hood of junk cars, turning faded paint to bright and shiny.

I have used the product for a long time.  I remember in the late 80’s my mom gave me her Chevy Citation, sometime after I crashed and wrecked my 69 Buick Special Deluxe that she also bought for me for $600.

The Citation was a decent car and it’s 4 speed manual transmission allowed it to do pretty incredible front wheel drive burnouts if called upon.  It’s biggest visual flaw was it’s yellow paint was fading pretty badly. When it came time to sell it I gave the Chevy a head to toe Nu-Finish polish and it truly did transform the paint.  It looked great and surely helped me get a few more bucks when we sold it.  Ever since then I have been a Nu-Finish believer.

The sun was going down so I just wanted to do a small section of the Tacoma hood to see how it worked.  It was hard to tell just how dramatic the change was in the low light but it definitely looked better.  Sometime this weekend I hope to get a couple hours to go over the entire truck, hoping for similar results as I had with mom’s Citation close to 30 years ago.

Man can you believe Kobe Bryant scored 60 points in the last game of his 20 year career? Wow talk about going out with a bang.  Good for him.

Saturday morning it was cool outside, a forecast that looks to be the case for most of the upcoming week.  In the morning we went out to run errands.  Most of what we needed was picked up at Rural King including bird seed, top soil, and a few more odds and ends. After eating lunch I felt adequately ambitious enough to finally take on the brake shoe replacement on the rear drum brakes on the Tacoma.

I have had the new shoes at home for a couple weeks but I was in no rush to tackle the job.  I worked on the drum brakes of my Mom’s Rav 4 years ago and it didn’t go well.  I didn’t pay enough attention when taking them apart and as a result had a hell of a time getting everything back together correctly. The rear brakes on the Tacoma had not been touched for years and years.  I bet 100k miles have ticked by since they last received attention.

Recently the brake warning light on the dash has been coming on periodically and the pedal seemed to not be grabbing until it traveled a short distance, both indicators to me that the brake shoes on the back were probably ready to get replaced.  Of course I intended to video the entire job as my automotive maintenance videos are among my most popular on YouTube.  People seem to like my honestly amateur approach to the work where I am not afraid to show mistakes I make along the way so others can learn from them.

I took provisions this time to make sure I had adequate visual references.  I pulled the drums from both rear wheels so I could always refer to the other side if need be, even though it is reversed.  I also took close up pictures of each drum brake assembly to further assist me.  While this is helpful, there are parts of drum brakes that are not clearly visible when everything is put together.  Those aspects just needed to be mentally observed and noted.  As I started tearing down the driver side wheel I laid out the parts I removed on the ground roughly in their position in the brakes to further assist me in the reassembly process.

The most difficult part of getting the brake shoes off is the main long tension spring.  I used a combination of a flat head screw driver and my locking needle nose vise grip pliers to brute force the spring out of it’s mounting point.  Once it was removed the rest of the parts come off pretty easily.  The first thing I noticed on the old pads was they had more brake material on them than I expected.  After all they had been on the truck forever.  When I looked at them more closely later it appeared the pads were glazed over pretty badly which results in poor stopping power.

So once I got old shoes off I pulled out the new brake shoes I ordered online from AutoZone.  I immediately spotted a big problem, literally.  The brake shoes I just removed were much larger than the new ones I pulled out of the box.  Apparently I was sent shoes that are for non Pre-Runner Tacomas which are approximately 8 inches in length.  Pre Runners use shoes that are a little over 11 inches long.  My reaction when I see this was caught on tape and is pretty funny.

So I had no choice but to drive to the nearest AutoZone and swap out the pads.  I was worried they would not have them in stock.  Fortunately luck was on my side.  Not only did they have the pads, they were a couple bucks cheaper for some reason, despite their larger dimensions.  I headed back home with the proper part, eager to complete the project.

The 90 or so minutes it took to get the new shoes resulted in a few hiccups when I was putting stuff back together as I forgot how a spring on the back of the one shoe was positioned.  After some trial and error I got it figured out.  Getting the brakes back together was a bit of a grind, the biggest issues of course being reattaching the high tension springs which again I mostly used the vise grips to perform.  Tearing down and replacing the shoes on the passenger side went much faster after cutting my teeth on the driver side.

Drum brakes have a self adjusting mechanism.  Basically when you go in reverse with the brakes applied it is supposed to keep the brakes adjusted.  Normally you are supposed to manually adjust the shoes when you replace them so the clearance is tight and allow the self adjuster to take over from there.  In my case I only manually adjusted the brakes a little bit, hoping the self adjuster would take out any remaining slop.

I spent a couple minutes in the driveway pulling forward and backward to hopefully let the self adjuster do it’s thing.  However when I took the truck on the road in a steady rain I still felt too much pedal travel so I pulled it back into the garage.  I jacked up the rear end of the truck once again and slid underneath the wet and dripping undercarriage.  On the back of the brake assembly is a small adjustment hole covered by a rubber plug.   It gives access to the brake adjuster, you basically spin it with a small screw driver.

By this time it was dark outside so I was awkwardly trying to hold a shop light while I spun the adjuster.  Basically I spun the wheel, adjusted the gear and then spun it again.  I repeated this till I got just a little bit of resistance on the wheel.  On the next road test the brakes felt tons better, the best they have felt in years.  Sure in total I spent something like 5 hours (including drive for parts) getting the job done but it is another chapter in my growing book of successful automotive tasks.  If you have a half hour to kill you can watch the whole ordeal below.

On Sunday morning Cindy and I wanted to get out to do a run to help negate in at least to a small degree the caloric hit we were sure to take from the Super Bowl party.  I came up with the idea of running the loop down around King’s Lake, an area I ran years ago when Ali and I started running down here.  I knew the loop was somewhere close to 3 miles.  The temps were quite chilly in the 50’s with wind which I actually prefer to running in 85 degrees with 85% humidity.   The run was scenic and done at relatively slow pace but I didn’t really care.  It worked out to be a 1/4 mile short of 3 miles which was good enough for me.

We got home just shortly after Katie and her boyfriend picked up the second of my old furniture pieces.  It was the bigger sofa piece which had been sitting in the garage for the last few days.  I have been liking our new set from Rooms to Go but only time will tell how directly the correlation between it’s relatively low price and durability will work out.

Once we got home we got busy plowing into party prep.  While Cindy was inside I was outside trying to get the back yard in order.  The chickens have been on another hole digging kick recently, excavating a number of holes in the small hill by the pool border on the door side of the cage.  I bought top soil and a roll of green plastic chicken fencing to stop the behavior.  After back filling the holes I cut the fencing to length and laid it on top of the area, pinned down by heavy patio stones on either side.  It surely is not what I would prefer the hill would look like but it’s better than being filled with chicken created potholes.  I really wish we could come up with a way to permanently keep the chickens out of the pool border, they just make a mess of it.  When I see them digging around there I often will go set the sprinklers to fire off in the border to scare them off. Of course it works for a time being but in order for it to be effective we need to be more consistent so their little chicken brains associate digging in that area with getting wet.

Besides taking a brief time out for lunch Cindy and I were busy pretty much right up to the arrival of the first party guest between 5 and 5:30.  There are just so many moving parts to hosting a party for almost 20 people.  Almost everybody showed up that we expected and they did so before kick off.  In the past we had some people screw around in the back yard before the game but the cold and blustery conditions curtailed that this year besides taking a few people out back to say hi to the chickens, since they are a new addition since last year.

At the party’s peak the great room/kitchen area was packed.  In addition to the two sofas we had our portable ottomans, dining room chairs, two bean bags and a couple large floor pillows in use to provide adequate seating arrangements.  There were so many people it was difficult to hear much of what was going out of the surround system, despite me having the volume cranked pretty high.  Between the noise and Cindy and I attending to party needs we got to focus very little on the game during the first half.

One of my main concerns was managing the betting board, making sure bets like first penalty, first td, first coaches challenge, etc… were all documented properly so the winners of each bet could be identified. After half time there was a mass exodus of people as most individuals were not as fortunate as I was to have taken off Monday from work to recover.  For most the second half of the game we only had maybe a half dozen people hanging with us so I got to pay more attention to the game itself.

Of course one of my core activities during the game was drinking.  I bet in total I knocked down somewhere between 7 to 9 Miller Lites.  Of course the generous consumption of alcohol lead to me consuming obscene amounts of food.  I sampled pretty much everything in the huge spread at least once with multiple trips to several items throughout the night. It was pure gluttony.

I was happy with the outcome of the game as I was really pulling for Peyton Manning to get a Super Bowl win to close out his spectacular career.  Peyton was really a minor player in the victory, it was the Denver defense that really controlled the game, battering Cam Newton from start to finish.  It reminded me of the way the Baltimore Ravens Super Bowl teams felt.

Cam got chastised after the game for not diving on a loose ball after it got knocked out of his hand.  To me I think the criticism  is a bit overblown.  If you watch the play it seems to me Cam stopped himself from diving because he saw his offensive lineman already mid-dive in front of him.  Diving on top of your own player in a loose ball scenario rarely helps matters but evidently for appearance sake, the media thinks otherwise.

I was surprised to hear the negative backlash about the Super Bowl halftime show.  It was basically crucified but perhaps it was in a way similar to the Cam Newton thing.  Once a negative opinion gets legs  people love to pile on.  I am personally a Cold Play fan and even though I didn’t think there was anything spectacular about the halftime show I thought it was entertaining and well produced.  Apparently I am in the minority.

After the last people left Cindy and I dug into clean up duties, trying to get as much as we could done before retiring to bed.  As you can imagine there is all sorts of collateral damage when you have that many people jammed into a living space.  By the time we collapsed in bed closing in on midnight we were both exhausted.

On Monday we both hoped to have a good portion of chill time available.  Somehow it didn’t work out that way.  I rolled out of bed feeling hungover but not horribly so.  I slowly worked on breaking down the table we had in the great room to house drinks.  I then worked on emptying the coolers which included giving away large amounts of beer to two of our neighbors.  The Miller Lites I have left in the fridge would probably satisfy my drinking needs for the next 6 months or more.

We headed out to get some coffee and hit the bank.  Once we got back I had it in my head I wanted to set up my recently refurbished inflatable arch.  You may recall I sent it down to a place in Texas for them to replace some sections and rebrand it for Green Machine Timing.  Even though I saw a picture of it inflated down in Texas I had not blown it up myself since getting it back.  I am going to be renting the arch in a couple weeks for a race so I figured it would be a good idea to blow it up as practice and to see the refurbish work.

Cindy helped me get the arch up.  We both liked the new look of the arch with the new black/green color scheme with the GMT badging across the top and both legs.  I decided I wanted to pull out all of my race gear and take a few pictures that I can use on my web site to help promote both my timing services and equipment rental.  Right now I only have the stuff needed to time a small event.  My further acquisition of stuff will depend on how things progress.  I am certainly in no rush to rapidly expand my workload as for the near future I would like to enjoy not having anything race timing related to worry about or focus on.

Somehow despite our noble intentions to chill out a good portion of the day we instead kept busy for the majority of it.  I needed to tend to the automatic chicken door once again.  It was in the down position Monday morning instead of opening up at 6AM as it is supposed to.  I found out the fishing line we used to fix the door last time had snapped.  I went to the local hardware store and bought some more robust braided string to use this time around.  I think it will hold up much better.

I also gathered up all of my tax paperwork to submit to my accountant during the afternoon.  I am expecting a less exciting than normal tax refund this year because of more race timing revenue, $1000 in Google Ad dollars combined with my cashing out the dependent IRA I received as part of my mom’s estate to pay for the flooring upgrade.   I am hoping some of the additional race timing expenses I had during the year will help even things out at least a little bit.  I guess as long as I don’t have to pay in any taxes it is a win although for the last 15 years I have counted on my tax refund as an indirect savings plan that is normally used for some home improvement task/item.  Hopefully that streak does not end this year.

I had a horrible night of sleep last night, waking up first at 1AM and then rolling around restlessly for at least a couple hours.  It’s frustrating and a negative on my overall well being obviously. Despite the poor sleep, all in all it was a productive/fun 3 day weekend.  The best news is I get another one in four short days. 😉

This has been the oddest winter weather I have ever experienced since moving to Florida.  At first it was like there was no winter at all with highs near 90 degrees for extended periods of time.  Recently we have been having summer-like storms as well including the storm last weekend that cancelled the half marathon. Last Friday’s storm was bad enough that it actually placed standing water on our property, something that has NEVER happened in January.  Usually this is the the heart of the dry season where the time between precipitation is measured in weeks or even months. On Saturday we had extreme amounts of wind as a cold front blew through with some gusts topping 50 mph.

Of course our weather didn’t hold a candle to the massive snowstorm that pounded the northeast.  I saw pictures from my old stomping grounds in PA with snow 2 1/2 feet deep with drifts much, much higher.  I was also shocked at the pictures of many of the Jersey/Delaware shore areas I used to vacation in under water from terrible flooding. Despite the bad weather we have been experiencing locally, pictures from the NE this weekend make me feel quite glad to be 1200 miles south.

We picked up Sadie for a weekend visit after an errand run that included stops at Home Depot, Rural King, and Pet Supermarket.  While we were at Rural King we saw they got a new shipment of baby chicks.  I joked around with Cindy about picking up a couple Sicilian Buttercup chicks that looked particularly cute.  We could accommodate a couple more birds if we had to but I hate to mess what seems to be a pretty good balance with our chicken family now.  I also think we are forgetting just how much maintenance the chicks required while they were in the house.

When we got home I decided to finally rip into the Tacoma which has been sitting in the driveway all week.  I had my new set of plugs and wires that I ordered on Amazon.  The winds had not only continued but intensified at that point.  My tools and supplies were blowing around everywhere.  The hat I was wearing got thrown in the garage after it blew off my head four times.

The first step was to gap the 6 new plugs.  Since the Tacoma uses dual electrode style plugs gapping them takes twice as long as normal.  I then got under the hood and got busy.  My plan was to do one wire and the two corresponding plugs as a set to make sure I don’t get any coil/wire connections screwed up.

Normally any automotive project I do I will film as they are some of my most viewed entries on my YouTube channel.  Unfortunately with the amount of wind going on I knew it would be pointless as either you wouldn’t be able to hear me or the camera would get trashed from blowing over.

The plugs on the passenger side are easy to get to.  Once you remove the intake rubber tube there is nothing in your way. The driver side is much more annoying because the intake plenum looms above the plugs.  I ran into various problems with the driver side plug/wire removal.  I had to use my long extensions with a swivel attachment to get on the plugs.  Plug six, in the right rear of the engine compartment was especially tough to get swapped out for a couple reasons.

I had mentioned last week the entire reason I went down the plug/wire path to address my cylinder 4 misfire was I discovered the terminal in that wire was falling apart.  Well when I pulled the wire for cylinder 6 once again the insulating boot stayed down in the hole, requiring another tedious fishing session with my hooked small wire so I could pull it out.  I am really disappointed with the quality of these Duralast wires that I bought from Autozone,  I installed them maybe three years ago.  To have two of the three wires fall apart already was very aggravating.  I have used Duralast parts for many other repairs and have had good luck.  I won’t be getting their plug wires ever again, that is for sure.

I also had an issue with my spark plug sockets.  I had two 5/8″ sockets, one from my big socket set and an Autozone socket.  I had different problems with each.  The one socket had a loose rubber boot that is used to keep the plug in place as you stick it back in the hole.  The end result was after I would get done torquing the plug back in the socket would come back up sans rubber boot, it was stuck on the plug terminal.  So I had to jam the socket back on, back out the plug and try again.  The Autozone socket had a maddening precise fit, making it very difficult to get the spark plug securely inserted.  In total between the two socket issues I bet I wasted another 20 minutes of futzing around.

So finally I had all six plugs and three wire sets replaced.  I hopped back in the truck and turned the key, hoping to hear the engine roar to life.  Instead it fired up for a split second and then shut down.  I was not happy.  I jumped out and did a quick survey under the hood, hoping I just forgot to reconnect something.  Luckily I quickly spotted a coil connector on cylinder 5 that I forgot to snap back in.  After clicking it together the truck fired back up and sounded normal.

Now last week during my testing the truck also sounded normal briefly until I got it out on the road so I knew I was not in the clear yet.   I took the truck east on Immokalee Road and was encouraged that I did not feel the chugging engine the truck had when the misfire was present.  In total I did a 10 mile test and the Tacoma passed with flying colors.  I drove it a few more times over the weekend and to work today without a problem so I feel confident declaring the issue as fixed.  I feel very fortunate that the simpler solution fixed the problem this time.  Replacing fuel injectors would have been a much, much larger pain in the ass.

On Saturday night we decided to stay home and plow through the remainder of the Making a Murderer.  If you are looking for a happy ending out of this documentary, look elsewhere.  The story is such a bizarre collection of situations all cross contaminating the other.  The theme of the documentary is basically how Steven and his nephew Brendan are unjustly in prison for a crime they did not commit, largely in part to shady activity by the local police department.  Although Steven’s guilt or innocence is a bit foggy, it is crystal clear that Brendan had nothing to do with the crime, yet he is in prison until the year 2048 at the earliest.

My friend Cheryl found this well thought out explanation that does a good job of unwinding the various evidence and points the finger in a direction not really touched on in the documentary.  After you watch the series, read this explanation.  It makes a lot of sense and connects a lot of dots.

We woke up Sunday morning to some cold for Florida temperatures in the upper 40’s.  We decided to go out and do a short run, something I have note done for at least a couple of months for a myriad of reasons.  Our goal was a simple two miles around the middle school track.  I really like running in colder temperatures, I just feel better.  Cindy does not, the cold air can make her lungs feel like they are closing up.

Despite the cold Cindy was actually the pace setter, I constantly was a stride or two behind her, working to keep up.  I was surprised when Cindy said we averaged right around 9 minute mile pace, 30-45 seconds per mile faster than what we were carrying for a normal pace for most of our runs in 2015.  Of course it was only two miles of running but still it felt like a minor accomplishment.

I added two more pieces of tech to the chicken coop on Sunday.  The first thing was adding a Ring doorbell to the front of the run.  It allows us to take advantage of the coop based wi-fi network to monitor back yard motion and do two way communication if one of us is in the house and the other in the yard.  Is it overkill? Yes.

The other addition was another WeMo smart outlet that is used to control the LED light in the coop.  The light is used at dusk to provide light in the coop so the hens can get themselves situated on their perch.  Since the chickens like to push their bedtime right until the edge of darkness, without light in the coop they would be nearly blind in there.

With the WeMo switch I now have the light on a precisely controlled time cycle that is controlled by my phone.  I can use the phone to also turn the light on and off whenever I chose from anywhere I have internet service.  Plus the coolest thing of all is we can control the light with our voice via the Amazon Echo.  A simple, “Alexa, turn on/off the coop” gets the job done.

Early Sunday afternoon I was debating if I wanted to tackle the rear brakes on the Tacoma.  I really hate taking on an automotive project on a Sunday.  I decided to be productive in another way, hopping on the tractor (after jump starting it with the Tacoma), and mowed the front and back yard.  Nearly a month of no mowing with ample precipitation had left areas looking somewhat ratty.  A couple hours later things were looking much more uniform.

I got to catch a good amount of the Patriots/Broncos game.  It was what you would hope out of a conference championship.  Although I was pulling for the Broncos for Peyton Manning’s sake, there was no denying just how great Tom Brady and Gronkowski are.  Brady got hit CONSTANTLY the entire game yet somehow managed to convert on a do or die 4th down situation twice to put the Patriots in the position to tie the game with time running out.  Only a deflected pass on the two point attempt halted the epic comeback attempt.  It was a hell of a game.  The Panthers/Cardinals game was a different story with Carolina winning in a blow out.  The Carolina offense versus the Denver defense should make for an interesting Super Bowl.

This week I begin my final week of preparations as the running club timer.  To have the finish line so close is intoxicating.  To have it all wind up with the race Ali started in Nicki’s honor seems fitting as well.  By this time next week this chapter in my life will be written and I can move on to whatever comes next.

Sorry for being mostly incommunicado the past few days.  My attention has been needed elsewhere other than my daily brain dumps.

I had heard the discussion in the news the past few weeks about the Netflix documentary named “Making a Murderer” .  I had no idea that it was literally a series, I thought it was something like a two hour film.  Well by the time we went to bed last after 1 AM we had plowed through 5 episodes.

The sequence of events in this story just seem incredible.  The layers of deceit, corruption, tampering, and all around shadiness are countless.  Make no doubt about it, Steve Avery is an uneducated, simple man with a history of making some bad decisions and exhibiting poor behavior.  When you see the various members of his family interviewed it is clear this bloodline did not spend a second in any sort of higher education.  They seem to be Wisconsin rednecks in simple terms.  However being a redneck does not mean you are not entitled to fair treatment by the local law enforcement and court system.

In a nutshell, Steve served 18 years in prison for a rape he did not commit.  The county sheriff department apparently knowingly ignored evidence that would have exonerated Avery.  When he got released after DNA evidence proved his innocence, he filed a 36 million dollar lawsuit against the county.  Shortly before that trial was to begin he got accused of being involved in the murder of a woman.  This documentary is all about unwinding the incredibly complicated story surrounding all of this.

It is compelling for sure, hence our 5 hour binge watch on a Thursday night.  It really puts an exclamation point on just how corrupt, deceitful, and dangerous a good old boy local government system can be.  I am sure Cindy and I will finish up digesting the documentary this weekend, tonight perhaps. Do I know 100% that Avery is innocent? Hell no.  Is it clear as day that the sheriff department had an axe to grind and clearly ignored/altered evidence  to fit their agenda?  Absolutely.

This weekend I need to spend some time under the hood of the Tacoma that has been sitting dead in the driveway all week.  I am crossing my fingers that the set of plugs and wires that I bought will fix the cylinder misfire problem I have been experiencing.  If not I have a much more involved and potentially expensive problem to deal with.