Cueball

Are you a morning person or a night owl?

I used to be a night owl.  I'd think nothing of staying up 'til the break of dawn, then sleeping until the late afternoon.  I enjoyed it, but I never got anything done.

Now, however... I get to bed before midnight, and I tend to wake up around 7am.  I don't really get anything done in the morning, even though I've got the time- I don't have to be at work 'til 10am, technically- but I do get to just futz around the house.  Usually, I end up watching a bit of TV from the night before or making some headway on whatever video game I'm currently playing.

Occasionally I sleep a little late- but I think it's been two years since I last slept later than 10am.

My friend Rob finishing a duathlon, on the summit of Mt. Bachelor. File this under "Things that I will never do."

If you mentally extend the road behind him, out to the horizon... that's roughly where he started, 25 miles away in Bend.

Photo_090206_001.jpg

I did quite a bit over the weekend.  I hate it when that happens, 'cause it just means that the weekend feels short.  Right now, with not much to do at work, I hate going into work.  Once things pick up, I'll start enjoying my job again.

Anyway, on Saturday I did a bit of body modification on the Element.  One serious design flaw for the Elements is that the radiator grills are completely exposed in the front- which means that one bounced rock in the wrong place can puncture your radiator.  This is pretty bad, especially for a vehicle which is vaguely encouraged to go off-road.  It's an easy fix- you can buy aftermarket kits for about $150 or so, which cover this area but still let air into the engine to cool it off.  Or, you can do what I did, and spend about fifteen bucks and an hour or so, and fix it.

A trip down to Lowes resulted in a can of black spraypaint, some plastic twist-ties, and a brown vinyl gutter leaf guard.  I cut the gutter guard down to about thirty inches, and sprayed it black.  While I let the paint dry, I took the nose off the truck... and then used the twist ties to attach the gutter guard to the inside of the fascia.  Once I got it reattached, I had a radiator grill that looked factory-installed.

It's a shame that Honda can't fix this themselves- it's an easy fix, but they've had this problem ever since the first Elements rolled off the lot.

On Sunday, I went out into the desert with a group of guys from work.  I, personally, don't like guns- but I needed to do some research for the effects in the game I'm working on, so I took along my camera to record the effects of their various guns on various surfaces.  We culminated this with blowing up a few small propane tanks.  Don't worry, we had fire extinguishers... then, once we knew all the fires were out, we blew up the extinguishers.

I got some decent video.  Our sound guy got some decent sounds.  I even fired off a few shots.

The dust out there was pretty incredible- it's basically monoatomic, so it's incredibly fine and gets into anything- where it then sticks.  I had to wash the truck a bit when I got home.

Sunday night, after a quick shower, I joined some friends at McMenamins to watch The DaVinci Code.  I went in with low expectations- I'd listened to the audio book on the drive from Texas to Oregon, and hadn't really enjoyed it.  The story and details weren't all that great, but it's amazing what a good director can do with a good actor and bad source material- I enjoyed it.

Now THAT was a long, exhausting weekend.  Friday night, I drove out into the Cascades for a friend's birthday camping trip.  We camped right alongside a twisty mountain road, near a gorgeous creek.  Did a  good bit of swimming in the creek, even though it was pretty damned cold.  Stayed there 'til Sunday morning- then drove home, emptied the truck a bit, showered, changed, and then drove to another friend's wedding up in Redmond.  Partied there 'til 8pm... then came home to watch some TV and crash.

Stargate SG-1 200 (the two-hundredth episode) was really funny.  I loved the Team America ripoff, and it was a lot of fun to try to catch all the references to other sci-fi shows.

Man, the puns- they just write themselves, don't they?

After nine hours of driving and negotiating, I finally got to drive my new Element back over the mountains to Bend.  Sure, it was a long-ass day, but I saved three thousand bucks.  Now I know what my time's worth, I guess.

I'm liking it, a lot.  The stereo definitely goes to eleven, so much so that I'm actually a bit concerned about my hearing- I'm going to have to keep an eye on my ears when I'm on roadtrips.  Speaking of, I'm heading to a friend's birthday camping trip tonight- instead of sleeping in a tent, I'll be sleeping in the E.  (Did you catch that?  I said "E", instead of "Element".  I'm so hip it hurts.)

Work's been massively boring lately.  Can't really get anything done until the designers finish their work, so I'm spinning my wheels.  I'd much rather be slammed with work than bored- I actually quit a job several years ago because I only had fifteen minutes of work a day.  When the hell did I develop a work ethic?!

Dropped by the bank yesterday, to deposit the bonus check and to see about getting a loan through them.  Initially denied, which is silly- aside from the house, I don't have much debt at all.  They forwarded the application onto the financial department, and should hear more about that today.  I may have to finance through Honda, but that's not a bad thing- they've got some really good deals going right now, since they're trying to dump the '06 stock so they can start loading the lots with '07s.

Took an Element for a test drive.  It just pretty much confirmed what I'd already suspected- this is the truck I want.  Now I just need to buy one.  I sent emails to dealers as far away as Portland, and the best deal I've gotten so far is just over $19000.  At the test drive last night, I asked the salesman how much it'd cost for me to drive one away, and he pointed at the MSRP.  I don't think so, dude- I'm not going to just give you almost three thousand dollars just 'cause you're the only dealer in town and you think you've got a lock on everyone here.  I'm perfectly willing to drive to Portland (or further) to save 3K.

That'd be a real hassle, however, as my current truck is pretty much undriveable at this point, as the brakes sound absolutely horrible.  If I have to buy the Element elsewhere, I'll have to offer the truck as tradein if they can get it from Bend to <wherever>... and if that doesn't work, I'll just donate the thing to charity.  I'm only going to get maybe a thousand bucks on tradein, anyway.

Whatever I do, I need to do it fast- if I'm going to have a truck to take on this weekend's camping trip.

Just got back from the bank.  I'm trying to finance a new truck- my current POS is having brake problems.  Fixing the brakes would cost about $500, while if I trade it in, I'll get maybe $1000... if I'm lucky.  It's pretty embarassing driving the damn thing around right now- it squeaks constantly.  I'd like people to notice my ride as I drive by... but not because it's emitting a high-pitched scream as it goes past them.

I'm leaning towards a Honda Element.  Reasonably cheap, lots of space, good gas mileage, and it handles the snow really well.  I'm going to take one for a spin tonight.  Hopefully the bank'll give me the loan for it- I don't have much debt beyond the house.  Otherwise, it's up to the dealer, and I'd really rather not do that.

I love that word. Moblog moblog moblog.

Photo_081506_001.jpg

This is only a test.  Had this been an actual blog entry, it would've been interesting.  That may, in fact, be wishful thinking on my part.