Month: August 2006

The 45,000 Most Beautiful Cars Ever

Mickey D'sA co-worker shared his September issue of Automobile magazine with me today. The cover story was titled “The 25 Most Beautiful Cars Ever.” When you talk style and design everyone has an opinion and I can agree with most of their assessments, but they needed to drop one of the ones they picked or have made it twenty-six because they forgot to include the 2001-2005 Mazda Miata. 🙂

I even have no quibble with them listing the current Pontiac Solstice as a future collectible that you can buy now. It is not a bad looking car, but it will be a collectible because the total number of Solstices produced won’t be very many. If they make them for more than five years I’ll be surprised.

The biggest bewilderment was smack in the middle of the article, between the 1990-96 Nissan 300ZX and the 1954-57 Mercedes Benz 300SL Gull wing was a 4 page fold out on the new Chrysler Sebring. WTF? This car is one ugly thing. Matter of fact its looks could be improved by adding one or more of the article’s big styling dont’s, fake wood grain siding, a vinyl top or some opera windows.

On the way home from work today the Emperor surpassed the 45,000 mile mark. Hey, isn’t that some sort of service milestone?

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
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How the Mighty Have Fallen

Mickey D'sLadies and Gentlemen, Bob Dylan is playing in Lake Olmstead Stadium right now. Yep, the real Bob Dylan is playing tonight in a Class “A” Minor League Baseball Stadium in Augusta, GA. But he hasn’t fallen far enough for me, maybe I’d pay an Andrew Jackson, but they want 48.50 for a ticket. I never was much of a Dylan fan, the only CD of his I own is “Blood on the Tracks.” I’d probably be more interested in hearing one of his opening acts, Junior Brown. I love his Surf Medley…

Washed the Miata this evening in preparation for Saturday’s Bug Splat Rally. Didn’t get done until it was too dark to take a photo of the shiny car, but I did manage to take a picture in the McDonald’s parking lot where we went for one of those fabulous $1 sundaes.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 334

Halfway Home

Donna DrivesDonna is getting 33 radiations treatments for the breast cancer, so every weekday she works 5-1/2 hours then drives herself to the Cancer Center, gets zapped, drives back to work where I hop in the car and drive her home. I go back to work and finish out my 8 hour day. This is her coming back to pick me up this afternoon, today, Wednesday and it is “Hump Day” in more ways than one. Not only are we half way through the work week, but today was Donna’s 17th radiation treatment putting her at halfway through.

So far she is tolerating the treatments pretty well. She has been complaining of still feeling nauseous and the radiation guy has told her repeatedly that it can’t be the radiation because she isn’t getting any that goes anywhere near her stomach or esophagus. He and the oncology doc are thinking it might be gall bladder. Today when she went in she questioned the radiology techs that if no radiation is going anywhere near her esophagus why was the skin in the upper center of her chest turning reddish brown and why was she getting a mild sore throat. One of the techs took out a marker and drew a green box on her chest to show where the radiation was hitting. Well that box surrounds the area where your esophagus is. Now tomorrow when she goes in for her treatment she’ll ask to see the doctor and play show and tell.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
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Bloody Pirates

The DescentThe image you see here is from the opening credits of the movie The Descent which finished last weekend 8th on the box office money list taking in $4.62 million. It didn’t get any help from me because I have a copy of the DVD in the laptop right now. I may or may not finish watching it, I just shut it off about halfway thru after one of the women spelunkers fell down a hole and suffered a compound leg fracture. Last night Donna and I watched a slightly muddy copy of The Break-Up with Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston. I don’t think this movie is still in theaters, but you can’t rent it yet. These movies were borrowed from someone at work who bought them at a local flea market.

Matter of fact a co-worker (Hi, Mark!) said his son bought Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest the Saturday after the movie was released in theaters. Bloody pirates.

Jack Sparrow: The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do and what a man can’t do. For instance, you can accept that your father was a pirate and a good man or you can’t. But pirate is in your blood, boy, so you’ll have to square with that some day. And me, for example, I can let you drown, but I can’t bring this ship into Tortuga all by me onesies, savvy? So, can you sail under the command of a pirate, or can you not?

Started down, went up, back down, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 329

Back To School

Goody'sToday was the first day back to school for the kiddies here in Aiken County. I hate this time of year. Not just because of the psychological damage done by having to go Back-To-School clothes shopping with my mom as a wee lad either. It is mostly because of the increased traffic on the roads to and from work. Blurry eyed moms delivering their kids to school in the morning frighten me (with good reason) and the harried parents picking them up after school are no picnic either.

Went out late this evening to do a little shopping, Donna needed some new slippers, I needed some bananas for breakfast and we both needed a chocolate shake from Brusters.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
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Town Hall

Municipal BuildingIn spite of my best efforts to do nothing at all today but lay about the house, my lovely wife coerced me into a 2-part, approximately 12 mile jaunt on the tandem this morning.

The first part consisted of some random travels around our side of town with the final destination being the city building to pay the water bill. While we were cutting through Citizen’s Park on a newly created roadway connecting the 2 existing ball field complexes to the newly opened 3rd, I started expounding on just how useless the several speed humps they placed on the road were. They are about 3 feet wide and maybe an inch and a half high. They would hardly register in our low slung, tightly sprung Miata, let alone the typical SUV or minivan that would be traveling this road. Of course they were marked with bright yellow signs proclaiming “Speed Hump” just in case someone did notice a slight tremor in their Starbucks coffee cup they would be assured it was an actual road hazard and not the offspring of someone they might see in the pick up line at the Montessori school. Donna asked where my camera was, so that a picture of this extra layer of asphalt could become this blog’s POTD. I said it was at home, so that is where we went next.

After slipping the camera into a jersey pocket it was back on the front of the bike for part two. It was getting late enough in the day that I thought it better just to head downtown to take care of our real business instead of going back to take pictures of a road. We more or less headed directly to City Hall. But a couple of early church services must have just let out because traffic was as bad as it gets in our little town. We did a couple of rights on red so as not to have to wait on lights surrounded by nicely dressed old folks in big cars. We finally ducked in through an alley and arrived at the Municipal Building and the front of the place was thankfully deserted. I propped the bike against the curb and took a few shots. Fortunately most of the church goers had cleared the roads, so we had a pleasant little trip home.

I didn’t avoid the bike ride, but the lawn remains unmowed and the car is still filthy inside and out.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 324

The Wedding Photographers

The Wedding PhotographersIt rained. A lot. It rained hard from early morning ’til midday, cancelling our plans for walking or rollerblading.

It didn’t cancel plans for the MMC’s Pool Party. Mainly because the food was already bought and side dishes were already made and lucky for us the people who have the pool also have a house where we could eat said food. The rain finally quit, but the unseasonal cool temperatures kept all but 3 out of the pool. Most stayed on the porch playing Scrabble or just yakking away.

This evening’s wedding of a co-worker was indoors so it didn’t matter whether it was still raining, but it wasn’t. After overeating grilled hot dogs, hamburgers and desserts at lunch, the thought of another food extravaganza quite literally turned our stomachs, so we skipped the reception and went to Chick-Fil-A for dinner. As luck would have it we saw a couple people we knew in the restaurant and when they asked about our natty attire, we replied, “We always dress up on Saturday night and go out to Chick-Fil-A for dinner.”

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
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