New, New Chat Thread

[trularin]

Okay, you all can quit. I fixed the relay and went out again.

I am tired of the dirt roads though.

I think I am going to do a little editing.

Great shots Warren.

Ron, how are the puppies?

Fred, are you surviving the heat?

HLC, now here is a person that has more to do than a one legged man in a butt kicking contest.

Dropping off one of the boys tomorrow.

[Ron61]

Tru,

The pups are doing great. Glad that you got the relay fixed and I can agree about the dirt roads, though most of them around here are smoother than our city streets are. They haven't paved a street here in 20 years and all we have is broken chunks of asphalt laying along the road bed. I quit trying to keep my comets wheels aligned as it is cheaper to buy new tires every so often than to have them aligned every week.

Ron

[392cobra]

Was it a case of just a worn out relay ?
With your background,I bet it took about 5 seconds to figure out the cause an effect.

We have only had 4 days of above 100* this summer.Unusual.Been hanging around the mid to upper 90's. Not bad.

[wtm442]

Fred - mid to upper 90's are bad! 100+ is torture!

Ron - sorry, Turtle has never gone for a ride ... he is not potty trained.

Had to turn off the fans last night - temp was down to 53°F. But forecast for the next 10 days is 8 sunny days with high temps between 74 and 83°F. I may get tired of going for rides. Naaaaaaaaaaaaa.

It seems like every other day there is a front page story of someone getting shot or killed in Boston. But today, the lead story (and a big picture) is that a bullet broke threw one of the windows at the state house. The window is one floor below the governors office. Guess that we will really see more police on patrol around the state house, and probably bullet proof windows ... at least in the governors office.

[4RE KLR]

Warren,
That last picture looks like your car is a polished aluminum bodied car. Great shot. Too bad it is too chilly for a night ride. not!

It is warm here. I went outside at about 12:30 or so last night. I heard a noise outside. Turns out it was the kid next door was drunk and trying to sneak back in the window. What a goofball. Anyway, it was still smoking hot outside.

Tru, Does your relay / fuse box have a vibration damper on the mountings? I put some on mine for that very reason. I called MSD and bought four of their mounting bumpers for an AL ignition and mounted them on a plate under the fuse box. Worked great. I did it because the road close to our home at the time was worn out like in Ron's neighborhood. It was always causing problems.

[trularin]

The relay is a "Painless" product where is was too small for the designed application.

I put a bigger GM relay in place and it seems to work well. Actually has a tighter activation band than the "Painless" one did.

I have never like Painless for wiring as I noticed they push the limits of their harnesses and many of their products get hot or smoke. This relay smoked and almost caught fire.

Luck I was pulling in the garage when we noticed the fumes.

[4RE KLR]

Wow, I'd be on the phone chewing someones butt out.

I have not heard good things about painless in the last few years.

[Ron61]

Below is an article written by Rick Reilly of Sports Illustrated. He details his experiences when given the opportunity to fly in a F-14 Tomcat. If you aren't laughing out loud by the time you get to 'Milk Duds,' your sense of humor is seriously broken.

'Now this message is for America 's most famous athletes:
&! nbsp;
Someday you may be invited to fly in the back-seat of one of your country's most powerful fighter jets. Many of you already have . John Elway, John Stockton, Tiger Woods to name a few. If you get this opportunity, let me urge you, with the greatest sincerity... Move to Guam
Change your name.
Fake your own death!
Whatever you do.
Do Not Go!!!
I know.

The U.S. Navy invited me to try it. I was thrilled. I was pumpe d. I was toast! I should've known when they told me my pilot would be Chip (Biff) King of Fighter Squadron 213 at Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach.

Whatever you're thinking a Top Gun named Chip (Biff) King looks like, triple it. He's about six-foot, tan, ice-blue eyes, wavy surfer hair, finger-crippling handshake -- the kind of man who wrestles dyspeptic alligators in his leisure time. If you see this man, run the other way. Fast.

Biff King was born to fly. His father, Jack King, was for years the voice of NASA missions. ('T-minus 15 seconds and counting ..' Remember?) Chip would charge neighborhood kids a quarter each to hear his dad. Jack would wake up from naps surrounded by nine-year-olds waiting for him to say, 'We have liftoff'.

Biff was to fly me in an F- 14D Tomcat, a ridiculously powerful $60 million weapon with nearly as much thrust as weight, not unlike Colin Montgomerie. I was worried about getting airsick, so the night before the flight I asked Biff if there was something I should eat the next morning.
'Bananas,' he said.

'For the potassium?' I asked.

'No,' Biff said, 'because they taste about the same coming up as they do going down.'

The next morning, out on the tarmac, I had on my flight suit with my name sewn over the left breast. (No call sign -- like Crash or Sticky or Leadfoot. But, still, very cool.) I carried my helmet in the crook of my arm, as Biff had instructed. If ever in my life I had a chance to nail Nicole Kidman, this was it.

A fighter pilot named Psycho gave me a safety briefing and then fastened me into my ejection seat, which, when employed, would 'egress' me out of the plane at such a velocity that I would be immediately knocked unconscious.

Just as I was thinking about aborting the flight, the canopy closed over me, and Biff gave the ground crew a thumbs-up. In minutes we were firing nose up at 600 mph. We leveled out and then canopy-rolled over another F-14.

Those 20 minutes were the rush of my life. Unfortunately, the ride lasted 80. It was like being on the roller coaster at Six Flags Over Hell. Only without rails. We did barrel rolls, snap rolls, loops, yanks and banks. We dived, rose and dived again, sometimes with a vertical velocity of 10,000 feet per minute. We chased another F-14, and it chased us.

We broke the speed of sound. Sea was sky and sky was sea. Flying at 200 feet we did 90-degree turns at 550 mph, creating a G force of 6.5, which is to say I felt as if 6.5 times my body weight was smashing against me, thereby approximating life as Mrs. Colin Montgomerie.

And I egressed the bananas.

And I egressed the pizza from the night before.

And the lunch before that.

I egressed a box of Milk Duds from the sixth grade.

I made Linda Blair look polite. Because of the G's, I was egressing stuff that never thought would be egressed.

I went through not one airsick bag, but two.

Biff said I passed out. Twice. I was coated in sweat. At one point, as we were coming in upside down in a banked curve on a mock bombing target and the G's were flattening me like a tortilla and I was in and out of consciousness, I realized I was the first person in history to throw down.

I used to know 'cool'. Cool was Elway throwing a touchdown pass, or Norman making a five-iron bite. But now I really know 'cool'. Cool is guys like Biff, men with cast-iron stomachs and freon nerves. I wouldn't go up there again for Derek Jeter's black book, but I'm glad Biff does every day, and for less a year than a rookie reliever makes in a home stand.

A week later, when the spins finally stopped, Biff called. He said he and the fighters had the perfect call sign for me. Said he'd send it on a patch for my flight suit.

What is it?? I asked.

'Two Bags.'

Ron

[HI Cobra]

Ron,
Great story - sounds like he really enjoyed his ride!

[Ron61]

Hey Flip,

Good to finally hear from you again. You must be busy as I haven't seen you posting much lately. How is your weather over there? We are really starting to have water problems here as there was no rain last Winter and no snow pack to melt, so the lake is really low. But we have had a cold August with the temperatures just running in the 95 to 105 range. Weird as we should be having 115+ now, but we had a bunch of that last month.

Ron

[wtm442]

Had to survive another ride today. It was 80°F when I left and 71°F when I returned. Gorgeous day. Sunset was fantastic, but I did not get a chance to take photo.

Hey Flip, long time no hear.

Ron - great story. I copied it and sent it to a bunch of friends. I'm sure if I ever got a ride in an F14, they would probably call me "3 bags full".

I do not know if I can take more of this weather ... nine more days in a row with daytime high temp of 75 to 84°F

[HI Cobra]

Aloha Ron and Warren,

You are right - I was in Canada for a long weekend, back home for less than a week then off to North Carolina to finally see my grand daughter. Both
trips were great but I have been tring to catch up here ever since.

The weather here is the usual 70's at night and 80's by day, with some
occasional showers but not enough. Saw a full on lunar eclipse last night
that was cool. The moon didn't disappear but kind of glowed, like a real
weak light bulb. This morning on the way in to work it was bright and huge,
a beautiful way to start the day.

[Ron61]

Flip,

Glad you enjoyed the trips. I wish we had weather like yours. It hasn't been at all bad for August here but the lack of rain and snow last Winter is really making for some serious problems. Even the cactus have started dying.

Ron

[trularin]

I don't want to fly with that guy either.



If I am gonna fly, I would prefer to have a smooth, non-event filled flight where I walk off the plane with all of my faculties.

Have you niced flighing has become a serious topic of humor and drama???

[4RE KLR]

Morning everyone.

I had a strawberry milkshake late last night with my son, I was up all night with a sugar high. I haven't had one of those in twenty years.

[Ron61]

Darn Steve,

Now you will have to go to a rehab center for withdrawal from strawberries.

Ron

[4RE KLR]

How does that song go???

They tell me to go to rehab, I say NO No no...

[trularin]

Son number 2 is at school.

It is like 90 plus outside and going to rain in a couple of hours.

[4RE KLR]

We had a really good thunder storm here. It rained really hard for a couple of hours. Everything in the yard was under water. No flooding as it run off quickly but it was raining so hard it got dark outside.

[hey,littlecobra]

well on the other side of the metroplex we got a lot of clouds, thunder but hardly any rain. darn. we needed it!!

so tru..... when does #1 leave?? this weekend?? what are ya'll gonna do with all that 'free time'???
i could send you a couple of boys...

or better yet... how about a couple of girls?? you'd love that!!!
flip-flops and cheers all the time! laughing hysterically one minute; crying hysterically the next....
keep us posted.
K