Category Fitness

Yesterday I received training on how to use an AED (Automatic Emergency Defibrillator).  They recently installed an AED at our office.  After receiving the training I wondered why it was necessary at all.  It makes the process pretty much idiot proof as long as you can read and follow direction.  The machine talks you through what to do.  One thing I did not know was it actually will do a test to verify if the persons heart is actually stopped before it advises you to administer a shock.

So after work I had a running club board meeting to attend.  It has become a tradition that I indulge in my once or twice a month McD’s habit before going to the meeting since I had an hour to kill.  I approached a near by location and pulled into the rather lengthy drive thru line which had 5 or 6 vehicles in it.

As I was sitting there an eternal dialogue began in my head.  I recalled my visit to the fair the night before and how I felt as I walked through the livestock area, specifically the miserable cow with it’s sad eyes.  I was conflicted about indirectly contributing to the demise of such animals by buying and eating hamburgers from McDonald’s of all places, one of the great facilitators of feeding the population garbage food.

The habitual part of me argued that the burger, small fries and Diet Coke would taste good, plus I only have this junk once in awhile, anything bad if it is in small enough quantities or frequency  is typically ok.

Well the logical part of my mind won out.  I pulled out of the line and headed down to the nearby Subway where I had a 6 inch tuna (never saw a sad tuna) on wheat bread with tomato, lettuce and spinach.  I washed it down with water.

I felt good about my choice and applying some willpower instead of just mindlessly consuming something that conflicts with how I really feel about animals in the food chain.  Although I don’t know that I will ever declare myself a hard core pescatarian(fish as only meat) or vegetarian I hope that when given an option I will go the non-carnivore route.

Of course one established part of a non-meat diet are whole grains, especially wheat. This morning one of my bar buddies posted a video of a professor speaking about the real deal with today’s wheat.

Now I was already familiar with the genetic manipulation of corn and soy to maximize yields while making them immune to toxic weed killers.  Well evidently the same sort of work has been done with modern wheat as well.

Of course this doesn’t really surprise me if I am being honest.  You can be almost assured that anything that is mass produced by the food industry is going to have shit in it that if you knew about would give you pause.

Anyway, if you want to get more depressed about the state of the food industry, take a look at this.

There were two surprises in yesterdays NFL news. The first was the news that Tim Tebow was traded to the Jets.  This didn’t seem to make any sense to me considering they just gave their starting QB,  Mark Sanchez a huge contract extension that he really didn’t deserve based on performance.  It seems like a horrible fit.

Sanchez has a history of having a rather frail personality.  Having Tebow on the team means he will be constantly looking over his shoulder and the fans will surely be chanting for Tebow the second Sanchez screws up.

Then later in the day there was news that the Tebow trade was back in the air and he now had an option to go to the Jets OR the Jaguars.  The Jags seemed to be a much better fit if for no other reason that the presence of Tebow would help pump some much needed excitement and attendance numbers into the franchise.

Well once again this morning the report is Tebow will be going to the Jets after all, that’s a real head scratcher for me.  It certainly doesn’t make the Jets brain trust appear to be very sharp.

However the real shocker for me yesterday was the news that the league was suspending the Saints coach, Sean Peyton for the entire 2012/2013 season for his role in the team bounties.  Evidently the defensive coordinator for the Saints, Greg Williams, was offering bounties for his defensive players to injure opposing QB’s to the point where they are knocked out of the game.  Williams, who is no longer with the team, has been suspended indefinitely.

Anyway, I thought the suspension was really severe.  The idea of bounties in the NFL is quite old.  Hell I remember Buddy Ryan talking about them openly during his time with the Eagles.  Well evidently in the new warm and fuzzy NFL this is a major no no.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think offering money for players to try to hurt an opposing team’s player is cool at all.  I just think the year long suspension without pay (will cost Peyton 6 MILLION DOLLARS) is over the top.

Sure, suspend him for a few games him but don’t cripple the team for the entire year in the process.  Hell they also took two draft picks away from the team in addition to a hefty fine.

Obviously this was intended to send a message.  I am sure the rest of the teams in the league heard it loud and clear.

On Friday I received another hard drive to put in my Tivo Premiere.  Our unit has been having some pretty regular lock up problems that are typical of hard drive problems.  Hell I was considering if I even wanted to spend the money to fix it. Tivo at this point is really on the fringe of necessary items with my use of internet provided video via Hulu, Netflix and Playon.tv.  Really the ONLY reason I still have the Tivo is the convenience of being able to access the latest versions of our shows with only a couple button presses and the ability to completely bypass commercials in a couple seconds.  To pay $15 a month for this minor convenience seems less and less feasible all the time.  To be honest if Hulu Plus was a bit more user friendly and had no commercials I would have totally dropped Tivo awhile ago.

Anyway I have done a lot of work on my Tivos over the years.  Hell back in the early 2000’s I had a second, hacked Tivo that I had hooked into an assortment of tools running on my local pc that provided guide content on the down low.  I also have replaced/upgraded Tivo hard drives many times.

Now in the past, replacing the hard drive required me to utilize my PC and a special Linux boot CD.  I would boot to the cd and use a series of commands to perform the hard drive operations.  This time I tried a new approach, using a hardware based SATA disk duplicator.

Now if you were upgrading your hard drive to a larger capacity drive this would not be a good choice since it will only duplicate what is on one drive to another, it will not expand the partition on the destination drive.  Since I was replacing my drive with the exact same size drive this was a viable option.

It worked great.  After removing the old drive from the Tivo I placed it and the new drive in the duplicator and hit the start button before going to bed.  I woke up Saturday with a perfect copy on the new hard drive which worked perfectly once I installed it back into the Premiere.

On Friday my ear was still hurting me badly so I had our health clinic call in a prescription for an oral antibiotic.  I was surprised that the medicine cost me exactly ZERO dollars at the local Publix.  Evidently there are certain generic meds that you can get for free, Cipro is one of them.

Anyway it didn’t take long for the pills to start working, I was already feeling better on Saturday and went the entire weekend without having to pop any Advil, something I lived on for the previous 4 days.

Although I was feeling better, I opted out of doing the Saturday club run just to be safe.  I also knew that Ali was talking about that 90 ride / 60 run thing on Sunday so I figured I would save myself for that anyway since I don’t want to run on back to back days if I don’t have to.

Before mom left for work Saturday I ran over to her place with the dogs in the van.  I had her taxes paperwork and some extra vegetables to give her.  It was a quick visit where I got a brief update on how things have been going.  Her job has been very busy during season which is good from a boredom standpoint.  Since mom has started working there the shop has had it’s highest grossing sales ever.  I wish the shop owner would reward my mom a little more for her contribution,  some sort of small commission in addition to her hourly wage would sound more fair to me.

Mom recently had routine normal blood work which had some less than good numbers.  The doctor told her that smoking is one of the reasons. If mom would have only taking my hiding her cigarettes as a child as a cue that maybe she should quit once and for all, I wonder how her health would be today? Sigh….

As is the norm, I kept quite busy on Saturday.  I rotated the tires on the Tacoma, you know the service I was promised by Tire Choice that they forgot about?  Spending some time around the bottom of the truck reveals how just how long in the tooth it is becoming. It is really starting to look like an old vehicle, complete with a shoddy looking exterior and an under carriage that is showing it’s age.

After completing the tire rotation I had ideas of installing the new plugs I bought online for the truck.  These were supposed to be part of the treatment of the warm starting issue although they obviously were not the cause.

I was a bit confused when I looked at the engine.  The drive side of the motor had what looked to be conventional spark plugs in conventional locations.  However when I followed the spark plug wires over to the passenger side of the vehicle I saw they terminated in modules that are adjacent to the plugs on that side.  When I casually looked at these modules over the years I assumed they were fuel injectors. They are not.

Evidently the Tacoma has these weird (to me) coils that serve two plugs each, one on each side of the engine.  To remove the plug on the passenger side requires you to remove this coil module first and then the plug is buried underneath that.  I was somewhat deterred from performing the swap when I realized this. This was compiled with difficult access to the plugs on the driver side which looked like they would require me to use my recently acquired wobble socket extensions.  I also was concerned that since these are probably the original, 13 year old plugs that they would be practically welded in the sockets at this point.

Well I had the new plugs, I may as well jump in, or so I thought.  I ordered the new plugs online from Autozone at the same time as when I ordered the new IAC valve.  At that time I plugged in my vehicle specs to make sure I got compatible plugs.  I even went upscale and got the Bosch Iridium plugs.

When I pulled a plug out of the box I scratched my head, it was a single electrode plug.  On the timing belt cover on the truck it specifically says to ONLY use twin electrode plugs in the engine.  WTF?  Well that was enough to scuttle the project for me until I could find out exactly what model plugs I should put in the truck.  I figure I should also grab plug wires while I am at it this time.

I then turned my attention to the van, adding some antifreeze.  As long as I have had the van it has always had a smell of antifreeze coming from the engine compartment although I have never seen any apparent leak.  I once again filled up the reservoir tank, started the van and looked for any signs of leakage.  Once again I saw nothing.  I am wondering if the smell is coming from the radiator cap which is in poor shape.

After completing the normal indoor chores I turned attention to my desk, specifically my top two desk drawers.  These drawers have become a dumping ground for various items over the past decade.  For whatever reason I decided it was time to finally clean them out.

Methodically I went through the various items.  There were a lot of screws, computer parts and other knick knacks that I just didn’t need so into the trash they went.  After about 45 minutes of sorting/organizing I had the drawers cleaned up to my satisfaction.

I found some old ID cards during the process, including my Meridian security id that I used when doing PC maintenance back in the 90’s.  It’s always weird seeing old pictures of yourself.  It feels hard to believe that this picture is now 17 years old, geezus…

Saturday night we went to a birthday party for one of the elder statesman of our running club.  He will be 80 years old this week.  Despite being around for going on eight decades he is still very active and mentally all there and then some.

The party was held at our running club president’s home, I had never been there before.  All I can say is wow, the house was borderline palatial.  It was just massive and beautiful.  The house needed every available square foot of space though because there were a TON of people there.  I bet the number was damn close to 100 at one point.

Of course big crowds and I don’t typically mix very well.  I tried to address the problem by drinking a few beers, including a brand I never tried before, Stella Artrois?  It wasn’t good with a bitter after taste but it had the required ingredient of alcohol.

I didn’t go balls to the wall like I did at the GCR Xmas party since I knew I wasn’t going to let Ali relearn stick shift in the SSR if I was too hammered to drive.  I had maybe 4 beers total, enough to take off some of the edge.

Even with the alcohol it was a lot of people, I just have a rough time functioning well in that environment.  After the cake was cut and happy birthday was sung Ali and I headed out.  She was fine with leaving as she was tired and we had the plans to be at the water park at 7:30 am Sunday to do the 90/60.

So I woke up with the alarm at 5:30 am on Sunday.  It was not one of those pop out of bed mornings.  I was feeling pretty low energy and lightly motivated, something that has plagued me for the majority of this month. (more on that later) Regardless, I drug myself out of bed with the orders to wake up Ali around 6:15.

After I informed Ali it was her designated time she came out to me in the office a few minutes later and asked me how invested I was in doing the workout.  I told her that I didn’t really care as I was feeling pretty crappy myself between the alcohol the night before and residual ear issues.  We officially called it off and Ali went back to bed.

Even though I told Ali I was fine with missing the workout, which I thought I was, it bothered me for whatever reason.  When I saw 7:30 come up on the clock I thought how we would be getting ready to head out and then when it was 9:30, how we would be well into the run, on the way back to the water park.

The fact that we decided to bow out of the work out made me feel like a failure as odd as that seems.  It’s just the way I am hooked into exercise I guess.  My entire Sunday felt somewhat tainted by the omission of our morning 90/60, which was supposed to be followed by some hanging out at the water park.

Late in the morning we decided we would take the dogs to the swamp.  We had a nice walk although the dogs both were obviously struggling with the temperatures that shot up quickly to the low 80’s.  We saw several gators, a turtle, a hawk and a number of butterflies.

Sunday afternoon I decided to tackle another long standing organizational task.  I wanted to clean up the workbench/pegboard that I have in the garage.  I use this area frequently, as a result it has become a bit of a mess from stuff haphazardly being piled/hung wherever I could find space.

After pulling both vehicles out of the garage I set up our fold up table as a temporary holding spot for the tons of stuff I had in the workbench area.  I decided the best plan of attack was to pull EVERYTHING off the bench and pegboards to start fresh.

This method also allowed me to do some additional housecleaning, getting rid of many worthless or unneeded items.  It seems like over the years whenever I had some left over fasteners from an item or project I kept them for a rainy day.  Well a huge number of those things wound up in the trash since I still have thousands of various size nuts, screws, nails and washers waiting to take their place.

I tried to be more thoughtful and logical when putting stuff back into the area.  I was pleasantly surprised that when I was done I actually had a little spare peg board real estate available for future expansions.  I probably spent around two hours on the project altogether.  Cleaning shit up feels good.

I tried to make up for not doing the cardio session in the morning by taping my first attempt at hard mode for this month’s Bar-barian challenge.  The 17 reps I managed weren’t great, but not horrible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFL6gmjhFk8

I think my beloved lunch box that has been my trusty sidekick for somewhere around 22 years is getting close to kicking the bucket.  The plastic that surround the handle inserts is deteriorating rapidly.  Today walking in from the parking lot the box abruptly dropped off the handle onto the asphalt below.  I am sure I looked like an idiot to the passing vehicles as I reassembled my lunch box on the spot.

Once I got inside I tried to McGyver the lunch box by applying some super glue to the broken plastic to try to reenforce it.  At best I expect this to only buy me a little more time before the box becomes completely unusable.  In the past I have searched for a replacement box but only saw smaller models at retail stores that would not serve my needs.

I did a new search today, I saw some used boxes that appear to be the same size as my beloved lunch box.  I would have no issues buying a used box since I know how long they can potentially last.  Regardless of my ultimate direction, the day I dump my old lunch box in the recycle bin will be a sad day indeed.  I’ll always remember when it was a brand spanking new red box sitting by my side as I rode around in the Goodwill delivery truck picking up old shit that other people didn’t want.  This box has been by my side for literally half of my life.

My March has been pretty crappy so far.  It started out nicely with my surprisingly good performance at the half marathon, soundly knocking out one of my 2012 fitness goals.   However after that the month has slid downward.

I had the annoying issues with the Tacoma, culminating with the inflated bill to ultimately fix it at a garage.  The ear infection of the past week was a downer as well and knocked my sense of well being down several notches.

But even without those items I have just been feeling like I am lacking otherwise.  My motivation level feels low and my overall outlook on things is not rosy.  The rut is feeling pretty deep.  I am not sure where to turn.

So over the weekend I had a chance to test my latest repair effort on the Tacoma, which was replacing the engine coolant temperature sensor on Friday.  I brought the engine up to temperature, turned it off and back on and once again, the horrible sputtering idle returned.

I have now officially given up diagnosing the problem myself and am taking the truck to a place I have used before that is run by two ex-Toyota dealer mechanics.  It just isn’t worth the hassle/danger I have been dealing with since the problem started several months ago.

Saturday morning I got up bright and early with Ali who was going to the club run.  I wasn’t going to the run but I had an early morning destination as well, I was heading back to Tire Choice.  I wanted to have something simple done, the slow leak fixed in the driver side front tire of the SSR which has been a problem since I bought the truck.  Every week or two I have to add air to the tire as the pressure drops all the way down to 20 PSI.

You may recall I ranted about my last Tire Choice visit where I wound up waiting nearly three hours for them to fix a nail in a tire after being told it should take about 90 minutes.  I followed up that visit with a complaint email to their offices which was responded to apologetically.  I even got a call from the manager at that location saying they were interested in making it up to me.

So anyway, I looked online and saw the garage opens up at 7AM.  My plan was to get there right after they opened, figuring it should be an easy fix.  I pulled into their parking lot at 7:08 and walked into an empty customer area.  The chime on the door prompted the clerk to come out to greet me.

I told the guy that I simply had a slow leak I needed fixed.  The guy tells me there are already two people ahead of me, two people that evidently were not waiting in the lobby I assume.  When I asked him how long it would take to get in he said 90 minutes to two hours.  Once again he used the line I have heard almost every time I walk in the place, “I only have one guy here right now”

I pushed him about this since I hear this line so much, asking if someone called in sick.  He said no, they only schedule one guy first thing in the morning and then bring in other crew as the day goes on.  What really got my annoyed was he said this after a few sentences ago he stated that they are ALWAYS busy first thing in the morning, especially on a Saturday.  He said it is normal to have people waiting at the door.

Well what the fck then?  If you know that it is always busy first thing in the morning, why do you not staff for it?  It is like you are deliberating creating a back log first thing in the morning. That is ridiculous.  I told him I couldn’t wait that long and got the F out of there.

So on the way home I knew there was another garage/tire place that I could check out.  Maybe they would be able to do the repair without a massive delay.  Well this place was even worse.  I was told they only worked by appointment on Saturdays and the earliest they could look at my slow leak was 11:30, some 4 hours in the future.  Haha, f that, no thanks.

Well I was ready to take my slow leak back home with me when I remembered there was another garage, a Tuffy, right around the corner.  As I pulled up I saw one thing that looked promising, there were at least three mechanics there.

So I went inside and met up with Brad, whom I later found out was the manager.  Brad’s first impression was not good, not good at all.  I asked him if he could look at the slow leak and without so much as a “hello” or “can I help you”  he just blurts out “give me your keys”.

Well although I was put off by the lack of a friendly greeting it was balanced by the fact they were going to take my SSR in right away to look at it, cool.  My view of Brad didn’t get much better when a guy came in stating his wife got an oil change there recently and now the check engine light was on.  Brad was very indifferent about the issue and sort of just mumbled something although once again, he immediately took the keys from the guy and took the SUV in to look at it.

As I was waiting in the lobby with the oil change guy we traded different war stories of dealing with local garages, it seems like shitty service is more the norm than the exception.   As we were talking Brad came back in and joined the conversation.  He offered up a few opinions about other garages.

For example when I told him that Tire Choice told me there would be a two hour wait to look at my slow leak, Brad said that was because they don’t want to do that sort of work, there is no money in it.  However he said he approaches it differently.  He thinks that if he takes the time to handle the little issues that customers will come back for the bigger issues as well which will benefit him in the long run.

I was quite surprised to hear that come out of his mouth based on my interaction with him up to that point but it made me all of a sudden view him quite differently.  Despite his outward indifferent/grumpy exterior maybe he actually gets what makes a service industry work?

As an example, Brad said he didn’t plan to charge me for the slow leak repair.  I was shocked by this, and told I have no problem paying for it.  He said it was fine, as the manager he has the ability to do this in certain situations.  Maybe he just liked my cool truck? 🙂

My additional reservation by oil change guys issue was lessened when Brad found out his wife did not JUST get the oil change, it was a month ago and the check engine light was simply due to a loose gas cap.

The mechanic that was working on my wheel called me out to the garage area to take a look at the bare rim.  The inner surface was pock marked with severe pitting/blistering, another side effect of the poor quality chrome job that was laid over the original factory satin wheels.  The blisters were preventing the tire from forming a good seal.

The mechanic said he can grind the blisters off to fix the seal.  He and I agreed that the other three wheels surely have something similar going on inside.  I really need to get some factory chrome wheels at some point for the truck.

So in all I bet the shop spent between 30-45 minutes fixing my problem and true to his word, Brad didn’t charge me a penny.  The only thing he asked was I take one of the cards on the counter that had their website on it so I could fill out a positive review which I did shortly after getting back home.  The reviews on them were about a 50/50 split negative to positive.

When Ali got home I relayed my surprising story of good customer service.  She could hardly believe it either.  You just don’t see many places that go out of their way to impress a customer.  I plan to give the place a chance to further impress me in the future with my other auto repair needs.  With a fleet of four vehicles those needs come up pretty routinely, even with me trying to play junior mechanic from time to time.

Ali was going back out during the afternoon to help at a social event.  I stayed behind to buzz through various items at home.  I was QUITE busy.  I even attended to some low frequency maintenance items like changing the oil in the tractor and generator.

The dogs got to go on two different rides in the process.  The second ride was to pick up some more sod to put in a couple areas of the yard that had ugly looking bare spots that used to be occupied by weeds that died off during the winter cold snaps.

I finally took the time to redo the neighborhood email list sign that was looking ratty.  Originally I used stick on letters covered in packing tape.  The weather conditions eventually made them almost completely fall off.  After removing the old letters I redid the sign by painting the info on.    I originally was going to use stencils to do it but could not find the set I bought awhile back.  Instead I just drew the outline in magic marker and then painted inside the lines.  No it doesn’t look classy but it will get the job done.

Saturday night I suggested to Ali we check out Zookie’s, a sports bar that is not too far away from us.  The place is always busy at night, Ali and I commented multiple times we needed to check it out so we finally did.

We arrived around 6:15 to a predictably full parking lot.  Our initial experience with the hostess was not a great one, she appeared to have poor communication skills.  We walked in, she asked for our name but didn’t say anything about a wait and then walked over towards a table so I assumed we were supposed to follow her.  She then rather rudely told me, “Um no, there is a wait”  Ok whatever, Ali and I had a seat at the large bar.

Looking around there were a couple dozen tv’s, lots of memorabilia, a pool table and a few other games.  In addition there is a no frills conventional seating area.  I was pleasantly surprised when the tab for my draft beer was only $2.25.

The poor people skill girl came up to the bar maybe 10 minutes later and said indifferently, “There is a table open now if you still want it”  Of course we want it.

One thing that was obvious from looking at the almost entirely female staff was Zookies was trying to steal a page from the Hooters formula.  Every woman was wearing short shorts with a top that emphasized whatever they were carrying up above.  Hey why mess with a formula that obviously works, T&A in a sports bar?

Thankfully our waitress although very busy, was nicer than the hostess.  Ali ordered a custom thin crust pizza and I got some tomato basil pasta.  We both were very pleased with our meals.  Unfortunately I wound up wearing a nice portion of mine when a piece of pasta dropped off my fork and rolled down my shirt.  I have a long history of food collateral damage.

We boxed up our left overs so we had room to split a piece of very good peanut butter pie. We both left there with an overall positive outlook of Zookies and I am sure we will frequent it again in the future.

Sunday morning Ali was supposed to do a big brick involving 90 minutes of bike time followed by 60 minutes of running.  She was surprised that I offered to do the entire thing with her, especially since I was banged up early in the week from the half marathon.

We got started early since we had two and a half hours of cardio in front of us, we arrived at the water park around 7:30 am.  The time felt even earlier due to the time change this weekend.

We hopped on the biked and headed down the road to the near by neighborhood area that Ali prefers to bike in.  I let Ali set the pace which for the most part was on the slow side, but fast or slow, sitting on the bike for that long isn’t much fun.  By the time we got back to the water park 90 minutes later we had put in between 21 and 22 miles.

Christy had agreed to come meet us to do the run portion of the brick which would be the big 10k Oakes loop around the park.  After hydrating, changing our footwear and taking a Goo we headed back out.  I wasn’t looking to break any land speed records.  I just wanted to run at steady pace and hope my legs would feel ok, which they did.

After we stopped to drink the water we planted ahead of time around the halfway mark Ali ran ahead and I stayed back with Christy who was feeling a bit fatigued.  Since I was just taking it easy I had no problem keeping her company.

When we got back we thanked Christy for running with us and then headed into the water park.  I wanted to make my training day to be similar length-wise to an Olympic distance triathlon which includes a 25 mile ride, 10k run and .9 mile swim (1500 meters).

I hopped in the pool and knocked out 1600 meters in something like 34:45, completing the circuit.  It was a tough swim since I have done very, very little swimming in the last 6 months.  To be able to pull off a 1600 out of the blue was encouraging.

After I was done I was understandably beat.  Ali was nice enough to wait in the incredibly slow moving food line at the water park while I vegged out at a table.  After eating our lunch we headed home with a pit stop at Dunkin Donuts for an XL coffee that I hoped would help replenish my energy stores.

Ali retired to for a nap shortly after we got home.  The coffee helped me for a short period of time.  I even had ideas of starting my garage/workspace clean up/organization project.  Well as soon as the caffeine surge wore off I was dead and retreated back to the bedroom as well for a two hour nap.  I was quite glad I got everything done on Saturday because very little got accomplished around the house on Sunday.

Last night I pryed my eyes open until 1:15 am watching season 2 episodes of 24.  I am getting close to the end, it’s very addictive.  Yes, I am tired.

So last night Ali needed to get down a container from the hobby room.  She came out with a confused look on her face.  She asked me if I bought her some Under Armour shorts.  I had no idea what she was talking about.  She took me into the hobby room and showed me three pair of UA shorts that were on top of the container.  Then I remembered.

I bought those shorts when I went to the outlets with Randall.  They were indeed intended to be Christmas presents for Ali, I just forgot that I stuck them up there as a hiding place.  Well I wished Ali a Merry March Christmas.

So this morning I had to stick around the house to wait for the wind mitigation inspector to show up.  He had a window between 8AM-11AM.  I figured the odds of him showing up right at 8 was very low so I decided to make my spare time productive.

The first thing I wanted to do was put in the new ECT (Engine Coolant Temperature) sensor I bought for the Tacoma.  I am hoping this sensor will succeed in fixing my warm start issue where the IAC valve failed.

Replacing this sensor was a bit of a challenge.  I had a hard time just getting room to pop the electrical connector off the sensor.  In order to do so I had to temporarily remove a small piece that connects the two sides of the fuel rail together.

Once I got the connector off I had another issue, my 19MM socket was nowhere near deep enough to fit on top of the sensor to turn it out.  I grabbed the dogs and made a quick run to the hardware store where I found a deep enough socket and a 1/2″ extension bar.

With the proper tools removing the sensor wasn’t very tough.  I really need to get a good torque wrench though, doing this by “tight enough” feel is not a great thing.  Putting the fuel rail connector piece back on was a bit of a challenge because of the tight space and dual washers that are used.  After about 10 minutes of futzing around I got it back on.

The truck started back up and ran fine, but it always does when it the engine is cold.  I can only hope I have finally squashed the warm start problem.

Another less annoying issue has been my Hayward pool cleaner.  I have had an issue for awhile where it is moving about very slowly in the pool, not coming close to covering the entire area.  So far I have made two attempts to fix the problem, first by replacing the rubber feet on the bottom of the cleaner and then second by replacing the vacuum tubes since the old ones were brittle and had plastic breaking off in the connector portion of the hoses. Neither of these things fixed the turtle-like pace of the cleaner.

I just bought a maintenance kit that includes the feet, the wings, the front and rear flapper and the “pods” which are all of the items that get worn from the friction with the pool.  If this doesn’t fix it I will be giving up and buying another pool cleaner.  I don’t think I will be going the Hayward route if I do.

So the wind inspector guy showed up about 9:45.  Originally I had anticipated a somewhat confrontational encounter with this guy as I viewed him as the enemy, sent out by the evil insurance company to try to f me out of money.  It took me all of 15 seconds to change my viewpoint.

Mark was a big, chubby, friendly guy who let me know right up front that he is just contracted out to do the inspection, he was just there to document what we have.  He let me know that my self installed anchor/plywood system which successfully protected our house through various storms in 2005 would be flagged.  He said that they want anchors EVERY 6 INCHES!  I laughed out loud, that sounded just ridiculous.

His inspection was very simple.  He just took some pictures around the house and in the attic.  He said he wouldn’t think this inspection would reveal anything different than what the state funded inspection did since nothing significant has changed in that time period.  He was a nice guy, we talked pretty much non-stop as he walked around the house.  I definitely got no sense he was going to try to screw me in anyway whatsoever.

Of course the same can’t be said about my insurance company.  It will be quite interesting to see if they try to ramp up my rate based on what the inspection did or did not show.

This weekend we have no races to run or time.  I am hoping we get to go to the water park at some point.  I have stuff to do around the house but not a mountain size collection of items.

The lower half of my body feels significantly better in the span of the last 24 hours.  I had a decent gym session yesterday and I am no longer limping.

Because I didn’t get a chance to install the new idle air control valve in the Tacoma yet I decided to take the SSR to work yesterday.  It gave me a good opportunity to give my radio install it’s best test yet.

As I was cruising to work, streaming Sirius via Bluetooth via my Iphone and using the GPS to estimate my arrival at work while watching the rear view of the road via my back up camera, I was quite pleased with the end result of all of my work getting the new system installed.  The SSR now has basically the same techno-geek coolness that I like in the new Camaros.

Hell I like the new radio so much it makes me want to put a similar head unit in my daily driver Tacoma.  The second time around I am sure the install would go much smoother.

The SSR has some more needs, the first of which will be replacing the bent panhard bar, the end result of some carelessness when the vehicle was lowered.  That actually is a potential hazard if I would try to corner hard.

I also need to get an upgraded radiator fan for the SSR.  The factory cooling system is underpowered, allowing the engine temps to hit 235 when stuck in traffic.  It should ideally never cross 210 or so. I may also add a front air dam to push more air over the radiator.

In addition I plan to get a Magnaflow muffler and some upgraded exhaust tips which should beef up the exhaust note considerably. After that the only other longer term item would be to replace the pitted, shitty chrome job wheels with factory chrome wheels that will hold up much better.

So last night I wanted to get the new IAC valve installed on the Tacoma, hoping this will be the final fix for my warm starting woes.  I had to work quickly since daylight was going to be at a premium, so after making the dogs dinner I hurried outside to begin.

My experience removing the original IAC for cleaning was a huge help in performing the swap this time around.  I knew exactly what I had to do.  I managed to have the job totally done in the span of 40 minutes.  I also swapped out the PCV valve while I was in there, something I don’t think has ever been done.  I read somewhere that could be another potential trouble spot.

I have a new set of spark plugs for the Tacoma as well, I figure the 13 year old plugs that have 135,000 miles on them are overdue to be replaced.  I will probably replace the spark plug wires as well but I didn’t have time to do that last night.

Unfortunately I will not know if the new IAC fixes my warm start problem until I leave the gym today, when it typically occurs.  I am crossing my fingers hard that I have squashed this issue once and for all.

Let’s start with the SSR audio upgrade project which at this point I am considering to be finally finished.

Those of you that are familiar with the project know I had the radio in the car but there were a number of warts with the install such as very low voice guidance volume as well as low overall radio volume, fit issues where the faceplate of the radio was causing the dash to bulge out just enough to cause the HVAC controls to bind, sound that was bouncing back and forth between the speakers and I hadn’t done any of the work to mount the rear view camera.

In my research regarding the volume problem the first step recommended was to tweak the potentiometer on the GMOS-04 adapter to increase the signal fed to the amp. Of course to do this I had to rip the entire dash apart again.  I actually went a step farther and removed the top dash cover.  The reason I did that was to allow me better access to the back of the radio, hoping to be able to better place/organize the huge collection of wire/connectors/modules that are associated with the install.

Turning up the dial on the GMOS-04 did indeed appear to address my volume issue.

In addition to the top dash pad I had the “waterfall” removed as well.  I read there was a fuse box behind there where I could splice in the reverse signal wire, the wire that flips the radio to rear camera view when the truck is put in reverse.  At one point I had the interior of the truck so ripped apart that I was feeling a bit despondent, I questioned my ability to get everything back together in an acceptable manner.

I then turned my attention to getting the rear camera installed.  I had scrapped my idea of getting my reverse signal from the waterfall fuse box.  The location of the wire I was supposed to tap into was really in a bad spot.  I instead decided to just tap into the back up light harness in the back of the truck and then just run that wire along with the camera wire back to the passenger compartment.

Based on a SSRFanatic’s advice I put both wires inside of a wire loom to protect them from the elements.  Routing them up to the front of the truck was a bit challenging, it was tough finding a route that did not get close to the exhaust system.    I used zip ties to hold the loom in place along the way.

Once I got up to the passenger compartment I needed a way to get into it.  I didn’t see any easy way to do so, so I made my own, drilling a small hole in the floor of the SSR under the passenger side sill cover.  I then fed the wire loom through that hole.  The camera wire went to the control box I had behind the passenger seat, the reverse signal wire was routed up to the radio harness.

Originally I had ideas of maybe soldering my wire connections in the harness instead of just relying on wires twisted and then crimped in bell caps.  I decided to not go that route, instead I used small wire ties around the wires to further provide stress relief.

So I finally thought I was in the home stretch, I had everything back together and was ready to call the job DONE.  I took the SSR out for a quick road test and was immediately annoyed.  I was annoyed by the distinctive sound of alternator whine coming through the speakers.  The sound followed the rpm’s of the truck.  I hadn’t heard this noise before because all of my testing was with the engine turned OFF. Well I knew this would drive me nuts so I had no choice but to rip the dash open AGAIN.

Upon reading on the internet about alternator whine it indicated this can often be caused by a faulty ground.  Well I tested my ground, it appeared rock solid.  I then took turns disconnecting one connection at a time on the harness to see if I could isolate one component causing the issue.  I spent a TON of time screwing with it but got nowhere.  I was really frustrated.

Well on a whim I decided to try backing the potentiometer on the GMOS-04 back down a bit.  When I had the volume problem initially I could turn the radio to max volume and not have things all that loud.  After my tweak at half volume it sounded like it was ready to blow the speakers.  So I backed the dial back about halfway between where I started and where I finished.

That seemed to help, I heard a faint whine but hardly discernible, I could only guess the GMOS-04 was just adding too much gain.  I put the damn thing back together one final time and called it good enough.

At one point when I was in the midst of installation hell I was mildly complaining to Ali about it.   She said to me, and correctly so “Well this is what you got it for right?”  I did indeed want a vehicle as my hobby.  Part of that hobby is getting your hands dirty.  This project certainly left me thoroughly cruddy.

Along with Ali’s lack of compassion for my plight she also seemed to lack any appreciation for what I navigated to get the truck back in one piece.  I can’t blame her I guess, it would be like her telling me the complex calculations she had to do with a tube feed at work I guess.

Anyway, if you would like to see all of the pictures I took along the way you can see them here.  I also shot some video of the mess I went through, the 24-25 minute adventure can be viewed below. Anyway, the moral of this story is in the big picture, although I learned a great deal about how to take my SSR interior apart, in a practical sense I would have been much better served just paying an installer to do the work.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6x2qFblMh4

Saturday we timed a 5K, it went fine, let’s move along.

So the Hooters Half Marathon was Sunday morning.  I was feeling upbeat about the weather forecast when I first saw it with predicted lows on Sunday in the low 50’s, great temps to run in.  Those hopes were later dashed when I saw that low temp was not going to hit until Sunday NIGHT.  Sunday morning the temperature at 7Am was supposed to be a balmy 75 degrees, shit.

When I woke up Sunday morning it was extremely windy.  I saw there was actually a wind advisory for later in the day.  Oh boy this is going to be fun.

We arrived at the race site a little after 6AM, the race started at 7.  After getting our bib number and race packet we hooked up with some of our fellow GCR members to hang out.  Most of the talk was about how tough the conditions were going to be with the wind.  I had decided ahead of time I was going to run shirtless because of the higher temperatures.  It would help keep me cooler and eliminate the painful nipple chafe I had last year.

As daylight increased we got a better look at the skies overhead, they looked quite menacing with low gray clouds zipping overhead at a rapid rate.

The race actually started about 10 minutes late which is pretty bad.  They made some long winded announcements that no one could hear as well as playing both the national anthem and Gold Bless America.  Ali and I wished each other luck and off we went.

So despite my severe lack of serious training and assorted nagging injuries leading up to the race I took off with the idea of still breaking the two hour goal I set as one of 2012’s to do’s.   It didn’t take long until that goal seemed to be very much in question.

No more than a few minutes into the race the skies opened up, it started to rain very, very hard.  The cold rain was wind blown and actually stung my exposed face and chest.  In no time at all the roads were bodies of water.  Everybody was thoroughly soaked from head to toe.

One of my first thoughts was “oh man, this is going to just crush the spirits of Ali & Christy”, both of whom were less than enthusiastic going into the event anyway.  Ali generally hates getting wet I could only imagine what she was thinking as each stride splashed down beneath her.

I was quite surprised when I found out later that the rain really didn’t bother her at all.  She said in fact she sort of enjoyed it.

The running with sopping wet sneakers immediately flashed me back to the Tough Mudder experience.  Thinking of that race also helped me mentally, realizing that compared to what we went through in the TM, getting rained on wasn’t a big deal.

The rain continued for a good 15-20 minutes.  In a way it was a good thing as it helped pull the humidity out of the air somewhat, helping to keep my body temp down.

Early on I was trying to find a run pacer target. The guy on the left was my first potential pacer.  He looked like a serious runner and was checking his pace often on his watch. (something I didn’t do the entire race)  He also appeared to be somewhere around my age.

For maybe a mile or so I stayed just off his back shoulder but then he started to slow down a bit and I felt like I needed to go faster if I was going to hit my goal so I passed him for good very early on.

A little later on I spotted another potential pacer, a younger muscle bound guy with a t-shirt that seemed to indicate he was part of a fire department.  I wound up following him for even less distance before I determined his pace was also too slow.

During the downpour there were a few brave spectators that didn’t mind getting wet to cheer us on which was really appreciated.  The most noticeable of all was the guy wailing on his bag pipes in the middle of the deluge with absolutely no cover overhead.

So since I couldn’t find what felt like an adequate pacer I spent most of the first half of the race just using rear ends as my “carrot”.  I slowly but surely picked off one rear end at a time.  In general I did almost exclusively passing for the race.  I bet for every one person that passed me I passed 15 more.

So I was coming up on the most difficult part of the race, the up and back over the 1 mile long bridge.  This was made exponentially more difficult by the very strong wind from the west that was smacking you in the face on the run out.

Usually when you get to the top of the bridge and begin the descent on the other side your speed picks up considerably.  Well this was the hardest I ever worked running DOWNHILL in my life.  The wind was so strong it resisted every step.

Of course the good news was on the way back across the bridge this wind was now helping to push you along.  The wind also was at your back for a good portion of the remainder of the race.

Once I got off the bridge at around the 9 mile mark I knew my two hour goal was in reach.  I also happened to finally pick up pace partner on the bridge.  Once again like last year, it was a woman.  I realized all I had to do was stick with her after she told me how she did two ultra-marathons last year as well as qualifying for the Boston Marathon.

Being able to carry an off and on conversation with her during the last third of the race really helped making those tough miles fall off pretty easily.  I was physically uncomfortable of course but not dying.  The skies had remained overcast the entire race so this really helped keep the temperatures reasonable.

Like I mentioned I hadn’t hardly looked at my watch other than to check my time at certain mileage markers.  Patty was doing it for me, telling me that we were running a strong 8:30 pace and that hitting my two hour goal was basically assured.

With about a mile to go I ran into one of the other GCR board members who was taking it easy by running an easy for him 2 hour pace.  I thanked Patty for helping me along and accelerated some more leaving her a little behind me.

At first I was having a bit of a hard time keeping up with Craig, I now was feeling pretty damn beat, that last half mile or so felt very long.  Once the finish line was a few hundred yards away I kicked in what I had left, leaving Craig behind as well.  I was very excited when I saw I could finish almost a full 5 minutes ahead of my what seemed to be ambitious 2 hour goal.  I crossed in 1:55:17, more than 16 minutes faster than my time last year. Here are the official results.

After collecting my finisher medal from the good looking Hooters girl I leaned over on the railing and briefly took in my achievement.  To smash my goal even with those type of race conditions was really something special to me.  I have always preached that actions are much more impressive than words.  It felt good to back that up.

So after downing a finish area Snickers bar and chugging a bottle of water I started looking for Ali.  Like I said, with the weather conditions I had no idea when she would finish.  I started walking back out on to the course, hoping to intersect with her and then help run her into the finish line.

I back tracked somewhere between a quarter and a half mile before I saw her.  I turned around and started jogging in with her.  Ali said nothing, I could tell by her heavy breathing she was really trying to finish hard.  When we got close I saw we were actually close to her 1/2 marathon PR time.  She wound up finishing just 21 seconds beyond her PR, a disappointment for her but based on the conditions and the course it was a really strong effort.

Like I said, before I saw her at the end I was almost positive the early rain and wind was going to suck the motivation right out of her.  Surprisingly she said she felt quite good almost the entire race.

We then waited for Christy who finished about 12 minutes behind Ali, putting in a strong showing for her as well, again made more impressive by the elements.

Ali was stoked to hear how well I did.  I told her that it was quite weird, when I woke up Sunday morning the number 1:55 literally was the first thing in my head.  I kid you not.  I thought it was odd I would even think about a finish time in that neighborhood.  It was amazing it came to be.  Visualization is powerful I guess huh?

So after the race we hung out for awhile.  At this point the cold front was blowing in, temperatures had dropped a good 10 degrees from the start of the race.  We stayed until maybe 10:30 before heading out, we were both cold and exhausted.

On the way home we both talked about various aspects of the race.  We were both happy with the way things turned out although Ali wished she could have found a spare 22 seconds somewhere.  It is hard to believe that I was not even going to do the race as late as last week and still managed to put in that showing.  So much of endurance racing is in your head, although I still attribute my significantly higher overall fitness level compared to the year before as a major contributor to my final result.

As you can imagine the rest of our Sunday was pretty tame.  I laid down for a couple hours with Ali but couldn’t get any real solid zzzz’s.  I wound up spending the rest of the day mostly toiling on the SSR audio project.

When I woke up Monday my stomach was feeling pretty awful and I was limping around severely.  My IT band felt like it was a foot too short.  I called off work to give myself a recovery day.  I feel much more human today.

The new IAC for the Tacoma showed up yesterday so it looks like I will get no break from my automotive upgrade/repair follies.  I want to get the new IAC in ASAP.  My hope is to be able to do it after work tonight.  I am hoping since I have run through the process once I can do it quickly this time around.

Just for the hell of it I punched in my work address in the 930BT this morning to test out the navigation function of the radio.  I was pleased that my parking brake bypass evidently works, allowing me to use the navigation system when the truck is moving.  I however was not pleased that I couldn’t hear the voice NAV guidance.

I was getting annoyed when it sounded like the podcast I was listening to via wireless bluetooth seemed to be bouncing between the right and left speaker.  What I realized was this bouncing was when the navigation voice was speaking, it was just so low that I couldn’t hear it.

When I stopped to put air in a tire I verified that I have the voice volume option turned up to max volume.  However it almost sounded like the voice wasn’t coming through the speakers as all, it almost sounds like it is coming through the GMOS-04 adapter that is buried in the dash which has a small speaker used to replicate the factory chimes.

Why this would be the case is beyond me although it must mean I have something miswired in the harness.  I guess it is a good thing I plan to rip the entire thing apart again anyway.  I need a whole day to dedicate to nothing but getting this project cleaned up.

So I have been taking it a bit easy at the gym this week doing no running or leg weight work in anticipation of the extreme workload I will be placing upon them on Sunday in the half marathon.  Knock on wood my left knee/calf has felt ok for the last couple days.

Last night after work I filmed a video to introduce March’s BB challenge.  I am not quite sure how it wound up being over 8 minutes long.  For some reason in exercise videos where I am speaking to a camera I am far more chatty than I typically would be in most conversations with a flesh and blood human being.  Anyway, here is the video.

As I mentioned yesterday this weekend promises to be quite busy, trying to wedge in house chores and SSR audio work around timing one race and running another.  Oh well, it is better than sitting around collecting dust.

I was amazed when I saw the new pair of New Balance running sneakers Ali snagged for me were actually made in the USA, something that is simply unheard of anymore.

Now NB only manufactures about 25% of it’s sneakers in the US (7,000,000 or so) but that is 25% more than anybody else.  It definitely will make me lean towards buying New Balance for all my future athletic footwear.

So although I have the new Pioneer stereo is installed in the SSR and all functions working, except for the rear camera which is not hooked up yet, I will be ripping back into the car sometime soon.  There are several issues I am not happy with and want to address.

The first is the fact that the radio appears to be just a fraction of an inch too far forward, causing that area of the dash to not go back together as it should.  My plan to resolve this is to totally pull apart the dash AND the top dash cover so I can get a bird’s eye view of what is going on behind the radio.  This will also allow me to make sure I am not inadvertently pinching something that shouldn’t be.  After my car totaling electrical fire in the 71 Buick years ago I am a bit sensitive to this possibility.

I also want to enable the system to automatically flip to the rear camera view when the truck is put in reverse.  In order to do this I need to connect a wire in the radio harness to a supply wire that is hot when the truck is put in reverse.  I found out there is such a wire behind the fuse box that is located behind the passenger seat.  Unfortunately to gain access to it I have to remove the “waterfall” and the fuse box case.

Of course I also have to actually mount the rear view camera which I think will wind up going right above the license plate.  I also need to decide exactly how I want to route the cable from the camera to the control box.  Obviously it needs to be out of harm’s way with minimal exposure to the elements.

I am also considering removing all my crimped wire connections and soldering them since that is the best way to ensure nothing works it’s way loose long term.

Anyway it all adds up to a bunch of additional hours digging around inside the SSR.  I’d like to get to to work on it this weekend but free time will be a bit hard to come by since we have to time a race Saturday and then run a half marathon Sunday.  Plus the replacement IAC for the Tacoma should be showing up soon.  That needs to be replaced ASAP.  Driving the truck after a warm start is downright hazardous at this point.

Last night I made my final attempt at the February Bar-barian challenge.  This was my third video taped attempt.  I wanted to try something different.  For my other attempts I was doing larger numbers of reps early on with some small breaks in between the exercises. This time I was going to try a strategy I saw others use successfully, mini-sets.

Basically I did a decent sized first set with 15 pull ups and 30 push ups.  After that I just bounced back and forth between each exercise, trying to just do as many reps as I could without taking a long pause during the set.  It worked out well, netting me 5 extra pull ups over my previous attempts but a few less push ups.  Overall it worked out to my highest point total of the month.

I have started watching season two of 24. It has been entertaining so far but it sort of seems like Jack has absolutely lost touch with reality.  I mean how is he allowed to shoot, kill and behead a federally protected witness, even if they threw in the qualifier that the witness was into kiddie porn? It was pretty insane.  Regardless I am strapped in and ready to enjoy the ride.

So yesterday I finally signed up for this Sunday’s Hooter’s Half Marathon. I did so with some trepidation.  As I described previously I have had some issue with my left calf/knee although today was the first morning I woke up without feeling that cramping sensation which is a positive.

I also have not trained as much for the race as I did last year.  Last year I did a number of 10 mile training runs and even the full 13.1 distance once before doing the race.  This year I have run 10 miles a couple times and several 7 milers.  I am going to have to rely on my lighter body weight, higher overall fitness level and some mental toughness to pull me through the event.  I still have a less than two hour goal in my mind, I wish I had someone like Matt or Patrick doing the race so they could help keep me on point.

Last night we heated up the last of the spaghetti we had left over from the weekend.  There was a little left over so I decided to give the dogs their first taste of pasta.  I am not sure how we never gave them spaghetti before.  Anyway Nicki definitely approved, gobbling down a couple forkfuls in no time at all and was looking for more. Sadie was funny when she ate hers.  She sort of sucked it down like a little kid would do.

Today is leap day.  I don’t have anything witty or unique to say about this day that happens only once every four years.  Personally I plan to utilize the extra day to make one more attempt at the February Bar-barian challenge.

I checked in with both my brother Patrick and my dad yesterday  on their respective journeys home.  Pat said he got back to his place around 1Am (had to work the same day).  Dad’s drive north had an unexpected detour when all of the idiot lights on his brand new Subaru started flashing unexplainably. A trip to the dealer revealed the problem to be a defective gas cap which seemed odd to me.

I have heard of gas caps that aren’t on all the way throwing a check engine light but I have never heard of it causing a Christmas Tree of lights on the dash.  After he got a new cap he was on his way.

Dad also spent about an hour on the side of the road arguing on a conference call with reps from the insurance and drug company over some prescription snafu.  Dad evidently introduced obscenities into the stream of discussion which is never a good thing.  With as mad as I have gotten on the phone with various inept businesses I have never started swearing at them, it is outside the lines of reasonable behavior in that situation to me. It also will do very little to make your ultimate goal be realized and in fact may instead have the exact opposite effect.

So my family cleared out late morning yesterday.  Ali was off yesterday so she got to see them off.

I was pleasantly surprised when I got home last night after work to see that Ali had been busy getting the house cleaned back up.  Nearly a week of 2 additional dogs and 4 additional people can make things a bit chaotic as you can imagine.  I really appreciated that Ali took the initiative to do that,  I wasn’t looking forward to having to do it myself.

It felt sort of weird as I sat on the couch with Nicki and Sadie, the lack of noise/activity felt foreign.  For the past week or so the 4 dogs were a near constant source of entertainment.

Sadie definitely seems a bit mopey since her dog and human friends left.  She just LOVED having so many options to interact/play with.   I think she snuggled up to everyone at one point or another.

So I had committed to just doing the damn half marathon a couple days ago.  However I still have this weird left calf ailment going on.  Once I get up and going it feels ok but when I wake up first thing in the morning it feels like I have a strain right in the middle of it.  It would really suck to do something like tear a calf muscle during the race.

On the plus side, the pain each subsequent morning has been slightly less so I am hoping by race day (Sunday) it will be good to go.  I will probably bite the bullet and sign up today.

This morning I woke up when Ali got up to do her early AM swim practice.  It’s amazing how much you can get done before work if you get up at 4:30 AM.  Hell I even had time to shave my head.

The head shave timing served two purposes.  I have a dermatologist appointment this week. A shaved head makes it easier to examine my cranium since I have had 3 problem spots in my scalp so far.  Secondly a high and tight hair cut works out well for sweaty endurance events like a half marathon.  My hair will look the same at the finish as it does at the start.

Now that we have a number associated with my tax refund I can start pulling the trigger on a few items.  Unlike many years past where the refund went toward home projects or to pay off loans, this year we don’t have any big ticket intentions which is kind of nice.

The list of things I need to buy is pretty mild, including some maintenance items for the Scooba and the pool cleaner.  A replacement IAC for the Tacoma and the 90,000 dealer service for the Camry Hybrid.

The Camry service will be the biggest chunk but I will be doing some investigation/negotiation to get those costs down.  I think they try to steal close to $1000 from the average Joe for that service.  There are a lot of things they do and since we have no plans on getting rid of the car, which has been bullet proof so far, I figure it is smart to get the maintenance done.  I will be getting a list of what exactly is scheduled to be done and analyzing it line by line.  If a lot of it is “fluff” that I can easily do myself I might take the car somewhere else to get the more involved things done and still come out many dollars ahead.