No-wax, easy maintenance, bacteriostatic, and anti-slip.
Friends,
This is becoming tragically absurd. Now a 7.0 magnitude earthquake has hit Indonesia about 65 miles outside of Badung. As you might expect, the Indonesian government is on the case…
“Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono visited Cianjur, and vowed to free up nearly $500,000 (5 billion rupiahs) for emergency response efforts, according to the state-run Antara news agency.”
That should just about cover it.
– bob
Friends,
More bad news on the cranky earth front. This time from the southwestern edge of Peru near Bolivia. This earthquake weighed in at decent 5.9 but there are no reports of damage or casualties.
This could be because everything’s just fine, or it could be because it’s all been destroyed! omg! they’re taking their time to carefully and methodically assess the situation.
– bob
Friends,
Tragic news from American Samoa this morning, where a tsunami triggered by a magnitude 8.0 earthquake has killed over 100 people. Many more are missing.
The airport has now been cleared and relief supplies are slowly arriving, but now would be a good time to donate to the Red Cross to help out the victims, don’t you think?
– bob
Friends,
I’m anticipating a pretty decent snow season this year, so I headed down to the Festival of Dirt to obtained new, non-bald tires. Yesterday, Costco’s tire center gave me the business suggesting a two hour wait after work. I called shenanigans on that idea on the puppy dog’s behalf. She expects her cheap cuts of critter in sauce over kibble at a specific time—well before that job would be done.
Naturally, I took two hours off of work to be first in line at the tire center today. You would assume this because they made me mad yesterday and I’m nothing if not petty.
Costco sent out a coupon book that offers $70 off a set of four, but good gravy are they expensive. I bought the tires, bought some pizzas for the coworkers, and got out. Add a tank of gas to that. Where are we? Six hundred or so?
Then, on the drive home, the engine in the Jeep dies at speed. Dead. Power steering, gone. Power brakes, gone. I coasted into the Mountain Center Post Office parking lot and managed to stop (not assured, btw) before hitting the life-sized fiberglass cow. So I whistled the alert to the passing tow truck, he stopped to ask about the problem, then soon returned with a flatbed.
So there she sits. The once mighty Jeep Grand Livingroom, now just pile of useless sheetmetal, with a new set of tires and a broken wheel stud (thanks Costco!), parked in the middle of my driveway.
I have a thought. Maybe the check engine light is burnt out…
Your pal,
bob
UPDATE: Back about fifteen years ago, you could pull codes from engine management computers by flicking the ignition switch back and forth a couple times. OBD-I, everybody. It’s kinda neat to see what the computer thinks is wrong (“too much speed!”) and armed with that information (“engine too fast! yikes!”), I concluded that the problem lie in the crankshaft position sensor.
Now that Fiat doesn’t necessarily care too much about the old cars Chrysler used to make (“too old!”), the aftermarket has caught up and has deigned to reconstruct the vital life-giving sensors to keep old Jeeps alive. Witness this very fragile crankshaft position sensor. One has failed before on the thing, so there’s some history. This tiny tube with the three-wire pigtail is almost a hundred dollars. What’s our tally now?
ANOTHER UPDATE: Oy. That thing is really hard to replace. It’s in one of the toughest places to deal with. The sensor is under the firewall cutout for the bellhousing. My forearms are torn up but the sensor has not been replaced yet. Cripes. Maybe I should take Monday off to get the thing done.
Friends,
This story, from Namco fan and Press-Enterprise star reporter Dug Begley, has everything you’d ever want in a news report. We here at Jaunty Central took a look at this story a couple months ago, but we know that you’re craving an update. Here’s Dug’s report in its entirety.
Charred remains of suspected copper thief ID’d
By PE News on July 27, 2009 7:00 AM | Comments (0)After nearly two months officials have identified the second man electrocuted during a suspected copper theft in San Jacinto.
Brian Kersten, 48, of San Jactinto was identified despite no usable fingerprints or dental records, according to the Riverside County Coroner’s Office.
His charred remains were found June 2 in a vacant lot on Idyllwild Street.
Police said Kersten and William McDonald, 52, of San Jacinto had broken into a utility vault, presumably to steal copper wiring. Both were electrocuted in the mishap, which drew the attention of neighbors who reported fireworks and a small fire on a utility pole.
— Dug Begley
Yup, it name-checks my little town, misspells the name of the site of the attempted theft. As if that wasn’t enough, the story also features crispy criminals and also, let’s not forget, reports of fireworks.
What more could you ask for in a news story? (maybe something about the obama family dog? – ed That’s so three months ago. We’ve moved on.)
– bob
Friends,
It saddens me to report the loss of my friend Kevin O’Hagan. Apparently, he passed away last night after suddenly losing control of his motorcycle (UPDATE: See below). He was on his way into Seattle for a little vacation.
It was the Cap’n, who in the early 90s saw promise in an aspiring computer engineer with no formal training and brought him in to his prosthetics practice. I was hired out of a little frame shop on Ocean Beach to build a 3-D imaging system at his practice in Chula Vista because he believed that such a thing could be done inexpensively. We actually built a working prototype back then, proving that his crazy dreams weren’t really that mad after all. If I have only learned one thing from the man, it would be that it’s fine to make wild plans, but you better be willing to put some backbone in to make those plans a reality.
Your pal,
– bob
UPDATE: The news today, Friday the 10th, is that he suffered a heart attack, steered the bike to the shoulder of the highway and passed without endangering anybody else during the busy evening commute. I find this new information stunning while confirming what I already knew about him. As I reflect a bit on his life, my suspicion is that the universe could only tolerate one Kevin O’Hagan at a time. My wish is that another one, an irascible, inscrutable, closet genius, is waiting in the wings. That the next one is ready to make another lasting impression on the lives of untold thousands, the way that Kevin did. I’ll miss you, Cap.