Miata Mileage

146,000 Blue Pixels

Next Miata 2

Thursday, when we got in the Emperor to drive to work, I noticed the odometer read 146034. Hmmm…, we had driven to work in the Miata on Wednesday, so subtract those 13 miles and you still end up with 146,021. That means we must have gone over the 146,00 milestone sometime last Saturday when we took the MMC on a 50 mile drive after last Saturday’s breakfast. Just didn’t notice.

I posted yesterday’s image of a blue next gen Miata over on the Miata Forum and it has garnered a few responses. One of which wondered how it might look with a lighter background. Far be it for me to deprive the public of what it wants.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1432

145,000 New Parts

As I pulled into the Valve Store(tm) parking lot the Emperor’s LCD odometer twitched past 144999 to 145000.

Tonight is the unveiling of what might be our next Miata. There is a live reveal on YouTube of the 4th generation car that is going to happen any minute now. Looks will have something to do with whether we buy one in a couple years, but most important will be if they return the passenger leg room back up to something resembling the driver’s. We do road trips in the Miata and when I’m not driving I need to be able to somewhat stretch out.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1418

144,444

144,444

As promised 2,144,444 seconds ago (24 days, 19 hours, 40 minutes, 44 seconds) here is a picture of the Emperor’s dash last night after we pulled over into a church parking lot.

When we got home from work yesterday and parked in the garage, I noticed the ODO reading was 144420, so I told Donna we needed to go for a 24 mile drive after dinner. “Twist my arm,” she said. It was much past dinner time and almost ready for bed time when I twisted it. We headed south on Banks Mill, took White Pond over to Whiskey Road and started back towards home. We we still about 5 miles from returning home when the digits changed to 144444 and I had just shy of a mile to find a spot to stop.

253,670,400 seconds ago the Emperor’s odometer read just 44,444 miles. That is 8 years and 2 weeks in the past and if you take the 100k miles and divide it by the number days elapsed you get an average of a touch over 34 miles a day.

It took the Purple Whale 1192 days to get to 44,444 which equates to about 37-1/4 miles a day average. At that rate it will be 7 years, 4 months, 4 days, 13 hours, 45 minutes and 46 seconds, which is January 5, 2022, to get to 144,444.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1403

A Thousand Gross Miles

There really are no gross miles in a Miata, but when I parked the Emperor in the garage tonight after getting home from work there were exactly 144,000 miles on the odometer. Twelve dozen is a gross, so a gross is 144 and that means a 1,000 gross is 144,000.

Speaking of gross, here is an update on the FRS’s pennant push. The Orioles since the break are playing slightly better ball, going 8-4. If they continue on to the end of the season playing like they have played so far, they will finish with a won/loss record of 92-70 or 2 games better that previously noted. Meanwhile the Red Sox have gone 5-8 in the same stretch and they are now 13 games out of first place. To get to 93 wins and end up ahead of the Baltimore club they only have to win 43 of their last 56 or roughly 77% of those games. While not mathematically eliminated, the chances of that happening are statistically impossible.

If the FRS continue playing as they have so far this season, I figure they will give me the gift of divisional elimination on my birthday the 27th of September way before Donna’s birthday in late August.

44,444

44444

We pulled off I-95 at Exit 278 in Florida just so I could drive one mile east, then turn around to go back towards I-95 South and on the way, take this picture.

Sometime in the last week while searching Mr. Miata Dot Net for something or other I came across the post about hitting this little landmark while in the Emperor. Because I’d taken a photo then and I knew we were approaching it in the Purple Whale, I had the camera at hand.

Stay tuned for a picture of the Emperor’s odometer soon, as I think it is getting close to the 144,000 mark which means that 144,444 can’t be too far behind.

143,000 Cars On The Interstate

Destination - Dude Ranch

We started the drive home this morning from Ocala on I-75 with plans to make a little time and get off on to the back roads north of Lake City. Donna was driving and all three lanes were pretty full, so I started map perusing to look for a way off the Interstate earlier. We hated to have to drive thru Gainesville on surface streets, so she gutted it out until north of the home town of the University of Florida.

We have really been racking up the miles on the Miata with this whole Motoring Challenge thing, added another 1200 miles since last Thursday. The Emperor actually went over the 143,000 mile mark yesterday around Groveland, Florida, but I forgot to write about it yesterday. It seems like I forgot to write about when we went over the 142,000 mile mark too, but it probably had to be over the Memorial Day weekend…

Started up, went down, back up, back down, up again, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1376

Numbers

141414

Day 10: Columbus, GA to Aiken, SC – 278.7 miles

Not too far out of Sandersville, Georgia we changed drivers at a spot I picked, just so I could take the above snapshot.

Today’s drive was 38.7 miles longer than our pre-drive Google Maps estimate and our total trip mileage was 2894.8 or 390.8 miles more than the 2504 pre-drive estimate. That is an average of almost 40 extra miles each day coming mostly from detours, both of the planned and unplanned variety, the rest from dinner drives and shopping expeditions.

We filled up with gas 11 times on this trip, on average every 246 miles. I pumped an average 8-3/4 gallons each time at an average price of $3.85. The highest price paid per gallon was $4.27 today in rural GA and the lowest price per gallon was $3.50 at a Kroger in Fort Worth, TX last Wednesday. The Emperor averaged 28.1 MPG for the 10 days.

On the Motoring Challenge front, we photographed the car, one of us and that silly poster 46 times. We nabbed 12 Counties or Parishes, 11 Cities, 9 of the “Destinations”, 8 States and 3 national Forests. We also took 3 Sneak Peek photos, only two of which can be submitted.

Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1357