Mostly lemon based

Category: I’m a mechanic me…

  • And another request arrives…

    So, having performed a surgical mould extraction on Brick, well, some of a surgical mould extraction I came in and was confronted by Nikki, who complained that there was only one photo of the new car online.

    Anyway, so I found the rust that I suspected was lurking. It’ll need fixing before the MOT, and is slightly annoying because it is just a few inches further along than I got as far as checking when I bought ‘im.

    It’s probably about a 6″ square area that *needs* replacement, and maybe 6″x8″ that it’s desireable to do. The non-surface rust seems fairly localised – and it’s clearly been damaged by some twonk allowing water to get in through the failed windscreen rubbers – and to sit in the soundproofing – keeping that metalwork wet. I’ve yanked a load of sodden soundproofing and slung it. I suspect I should really get the seat out and have a look there for wetness, but I’ve checked the rear footwells, and they’re dry (thankfully).

    So, yeah. It’ll have to be in the not too distant future, and it’s kinda something I expected to find. I’m not even deeply peeved, just slightly tired, and frustrated at losing more money that should be going on Rebecca.

    I also discovered that the other wing mirror which I presumed was complete isn’t. So I’ve got a very low bid on a pair of replacement ones from e-bay, because having only one wing mirror does drive me nuts. Anyway, here’s the (many and unexciting) shots of Brick.

    In other news, my mum headed off to Switzerland today – I ran her down to the airport this morning; I’m really nervous about her going – she’s not been abroad on her own for, well, a long time. We got to the airport and it was all automated check-ins, which I think unnerved her a little. She’s not good with IT. Anyway, that navigated I took her suitcases and she checked her baggage – I’m also worried about her having to move those heavy cases.

    :-/

    But she is insanely independent – I guess I know something about that! Anyway, she’s over there for ages; she wanted me to sign her Life Insurance before going (!), but kind of thankfully we couldn’t really get it witnessed, what with it being 10pm. Somehow, it makes me feel less worried about her which is silly I know, but it freaks me out when she does stuff like that. I worry that she might do something silly, or uncaring. I dunno.

    So yes, that trip to the airport though, after driving so much yesterday in vibrato-mog left me feeling somewhat drained. So I slept. And then got very confused about what day it was and which day I’d been up to see Kathryn and when I was next in work, and what I was meant to do today.

    After an exceptionally slow morning, a large chunk of which I slept through I got out and did Brick, the washing up, and sorted out a bit of recycling – and I finally got around to connecting up the CD player (waves thanks for CD at Kathryn). It appears that I’m down one socket – or more accurately I need another extension lead (!). It’s the lights that did it, they’ve taken up two sockets…
    In other news, my homehub still isn’t working properly. I’ve not heard from BT. They have ’til the end of the day to reply to the official complaint I sent them (that’ll be 2 working days) and then I start hunting for a different supplier.

  • It’s not a fleet, it’s more a small collection.

    So, today I ended up getting the Viva. It’s tatty, but looks sound and mechanically seems to be okay. The journey back was nearly trouble free – we had a little electrical issue – the rotor arm looks sorely in need of replacement but a good clean seems to have temporarily solved the issue.

    Sadly that wasn’t the *only* issue. No, I got to tesco after a 120 mile jaunt and nipped round doing my shopping. Probably took me less than 20 minutes. Came back out and Brick (as I’ve decided he (I think) is called) wouldn’t start. Fiddling with the rotor arm didn’t help. There just seemed to be no desire at all to even try.

    Lots of turning – enough that the oil pressure light’d go out. But no, not a hope. And just as I was about to declare failure and ring the AA – it started. Smooth as butter and no churning of the starter – it just *started*. Thinking that it was maybe a technique issue, I headed off to Halfords (It needs two new wiperblades; sadly I didn’t realise the cheeky bastards sell them as singles in *big* boxes; so I only bought one. Still, being able to see out of half the windscreen is still a big improvement). And lo, she’d not start. Starts fine when cold. Not too bad when hot, but warm? Warm is a complete dog.

    Still, hopefully we’ll get it all sussed.

    Anyway, here’s Brick, after a long journey home:

    1971 Viva

    Incidentally, if anyone has a spare car radio kicking around, and some speakers, that’d be quite handy.

  • The crackling is the static in my life

    Some days you just think ‘oh for goodness sake’, don’t you? I got up this morning, struggled through my morning routine a bit quicker’n normal so as I could pull on my bike gear. Hopped on Cherry and headed out, filled her up with petrol and got to work. Work, fine (Foot still hurting).

    Headed home, and y’know what? Everything was fine…but you know how this story ends. Last set of lights before my house, I filter round the cars, shoot through the lights as they change to green and as I’m riding, I think ‘hrm, the back end is getting awfully squirrelly, I wonder if I’ve hit some oil’. Over the next couple of seconds it gets worse, so I pull over and look round and lo, I have a puncture. Glass? Nail? Who knows, it’s nearly flat. Tubed tyres do not maintain their state well when they have a hole. I did *try* and gently ride on, but it was somewhat like having a sumo wrestler leaping about on the pillion seat as I attempted to make forward progress.

    Admitting all forms of defeat I pushed my sad little cherry red bike back to the house. It was not fun. My bike remains ‘heavy’ – especially with a flat. However, it was good that I rode the bike to work. Why?

    Well, obviously the flat tyre puts the bike out of action until at least the next early, so I looked at the ‘new noise’ situation on the moglet.

    The starter motor, the one that had inconveniently cracked the cast metalwork? Well it’d managed to work loose, so it was more sort of decoratively hanging than actually attached. I’m shocked that it worked, and shocked that it didn’t fall off. Very lucky is what I am.

    I’m a bit nervy now though, the moglet is obviously not a happy creature if she’s shaking ancilleries loose, and the bike is out of action for another couple of days. I may, if I’m feeling enthusiastic and it’s dry, attempt to get the wheel off tomorrow, then I can run it to a tyre place. I am however in another ‘argh’ type situation – the tyre’s not worn out – it’s probably got a good few hundred miles in it… ‘cept… well, if I’m paying for someone to remove the tyre and put a new inner tube in… well, aren’t we into the arena of ‘might as well replace the nearly worn out tyre’. Hrm. I guess I’ll see – if they’ve got something nice and mid-range in stock then it’s probably replacement time, otherwise we’ll go with the tube.

    My life is just too exciting for you all I expect…

  • The problem with promises…

    I promised my GP I would spend my time off relaxing and healing. I’m unfortunately at that frustrating level of ill where – whilst I’m aware that I’m not well, and standing up for long periods definately leads to woozyness in the head department; I’m also terribly, terribly bored.

    I’ve got plenty of books I could be reading, but there is an insistant desire to be *doing* something after days and days of lying around.

    However, I’m being good, mostly though that’s ‘cos my head feels like it’s attached to my body by wobbly string. The new remote arrived – cheap and cheerful as it is, I wasn’t expecting it to be quite such a behemouth. Still, when I’ve got 4 charged batteries then hopefully I can get it all set up. I fear it’s battery usuage too. I’m quite looking forward to being able to watch all my DVDs though.

    In other news, I’m debating another minor – if I’m offered it at a price I can afford. Rebecca’s engine really sounded attrocious yesterday, I’m not certain how long it’ll last – so a cheap second minor to run me round while I get Rebecca properly sorted would be handy. The one I’m considering though, has somewhat of a reputation, so, we’ll see. It’s not been a bringer of great luck.

    In other news I finally worked out how to get coverflow up on the Windows machine’s iTunes. Okay, it’s obvious – but if you don’t *know* it’s there. What’m I meant to do, click on random buttons? *sighs*. I love macs, I love my mac, but sometimes *get a clue guys*. It’s not, incidentally in the help file anywhere.

    Does anyone know (before I spend hours hunting) of any utilities that allow you to add more art for CDs it doesn’t recognise. I don’t expect it to know about AM / Underground or AM / This is me dancing. Or indeed quite a lot of my more eclectic music, but I’m sure I can dig out covers (or at worst, photograph the originals (yeah, yeah, I’ll get a scanner again one day)). I can’t see an *obvious* way to do this, and I’d rather not do each and every one manually. The original coverflow pulled covers from various sites, but the one embedded in iTunes can only use the iTunes store, which is a bit pants. That and the embedded one won’t go full screen. Come on Apple! Give me fullscreen album art lovin’!

    What else? Hrm, dunno. I’m meeting someone on Friday – and as is normal for meeting someone new for the first time my body has responded – it’s produced a spot the size of frickin’ Mars on my bloody nose. Am I not old enough now to not get spots? Seriously.

    *sighs*

    I guess that’s enough of an update for y’all.

    Oh, but before I disappear, falling into the ‘humour’ catagory, just like last year – severe weather warnings…

    Snapshot of the BBC website's severe weather article

    Oh my goodness no. Not 2 entire inches? Good lord. What will I do. I best break out the snow plough, the snow machines and start preparing to shovel my drive ;-)

  • Most accidents happen within 3 miles of home

    So, it snowed. I took my motorcycle to work… to say something suprising, I did not freeze to death. No, really. I wasn’t even very cold. I was pretty chilly coming back, to be fair, but I think that was more down to poor preparation on my part. At any rate, there I was doing my best michelin man impression, wearing Thermal top (Canadian), Thermal longsleeved T (Alaskan), Hoodie (cheers Trey!) and my motorcycle gear in it’s winter configuration (extra layer of insulation). My fingers, they got quite chilly; my toes were cold, (only can squeeze two layers of socks in there). The ride, though, was not nearly as bad as I was expecting – and my little Cherry Red Zed, she took me all the way to work without missing a beat. Leaked oil everywhere, but ran like a little ‘zed should.

    I sat in an interesting course about wound management all day. Should you be feeling particularly keen, I’ll tell you about it :-)

    And then at 4:30 I put my bike gear back on and headed off, by now the snow which was covering the ground and making things a bit dicey this morning had gone. Gone gone gone. So I pootled. At the first corner, things nearly went sideways. The bike slithered slightly on the (presumably diesel soaked) road – gently backing off very slightly we made it round, and I flew down the M25. A bit of filtering in some stationary traffic and I was off, onto the M4. It was about halfway down the M4 that a thought hit me. It was the kind of thought that made me as paranoid as the devil in god’s hottub.

    I’d left a rather important piece of my safety gear propped at the end of my bed. Where I’d moved it so it’d not be ‘as cold as the wall’ in the morning. My back protector. My favourite bit of motorcycling kit. After this revalation I rode like a saint. Unfortunately, these revelations have a tendancy to wear off, especially when spurred to forget (as I was) by the bike going “…and no”. Which it did, when it ran out of fuel. Fortunately I was in the slow lane and headed off the highway onto the hard shoulder. I wasn’t quite quick enough switching to reserve, so had to hop off and re-kickstart the bike (you loose these skills). After a brief interlude we were back and back protector all forgotten, filtering like a demon. Well, a very civilised, quiet demon; the kind that still sticks to rules like ‘no more than 15 miles an hour faster than the surrounding traffic’ and so on.

    I came off the motorway, made it through Slough and up to near my house, where there’s a motorbike overtaking lane (or hashed area) and almost always a queue. Taking advantage of this lane I trundled up the queue and indicated left as I approached my *KEEP CLEAR* junction. The lights ahead were red as I drew level with the car at the head of the queue, stopped for the ‘keep clear’ zone. Some part of my animal brain alerted me, the driver had started to move, my left-turn, dubious as it was before hand was now going to be a left turn into a moving car…

    …I braked hard, and sometimes luck is your pillion, despite the front wheel locking and me having to release some braking effort I came to a stop. The driver carried on, unaware, because he didn’t bother to check his mirrors.

    Fortunately, the driver behind let me through…and I made it home without further incident. I fully admit, I should not have done that left turn, tiredness and a desire to be at home in the ‘warm’ overrode very basic bike skills. I am, as I would say, a dumbass. But it underwrote the importance, to me, of wearing my bike gear… and when I’m driving, of checking those mirrors and blind spots, because while I only do it when I’m dumb, couriers and take-away delivery guys, they do it all the time…

    So yeah. Safe, but very lucky.

  • ’tis the end of another week

    And I’ve got my ‘zed back; well, one of ’em. Cherry (or ‘the red one’) is back outside my house, covered by a tarpaulin (sp.). She’s not a happy bike, with a top speed of 100km/h; Dave reckons I should change the base gasket again, but the whole tedium of the job fills me with a longish dread.

    Of course, Rebecca needs a new exhaust, which is rather more pressing, ‘cos her MOT is due the week after next. Despite her leaky exhaust, she managed to pull me, my mum, and what appeared to be the entire contents of Ikea back down the motorway; Ikea now being a distressingly long distance from my house.

    And next time I will be paying for delivery. Hearing the cheery thunk of bookcase-on-roof for the first ten miles as I repeatedly pulled over to retie things and re-arrange things was painful. Getting sprayed with road-muck, stood on the side of the M25 in the rain, retying stuff again (the wind was wrenching things off the roofrack), and so on was really not worth it. Although seeing my books on the bookcase… Hrm. But hey.

    So I assembled part of it. The kitchen, incidentally, wasn’t on sale, so we didn’t bother getting it now. So yeah. I got my tickets though, or ticket, for Metric. Anyone else going? Anyone…?

    What else. I spent far too much in Ikea; or at least, I spent what I intended, but as usual came out with more things than I was intending to buy. Technically, I guess, only the one thing. But…

    …it’s a light, to go on the stairs.

    Unfortunately I need to drill a hole in the ceiling to allow the light cable to go the roof, and across, to join the stair light. I want them both to come on at once, I think.

    And in other, other news… err… I forget. Apparently one bottle of cider, plus incredible tiredness, takes me to drunk much quicker than I’d expect.

    No, yes, I got rid of – or at least, selected for disposal, about half a box of books, from the 4 boxes I unpacked. Which isn’t too bad. I think there’ll be more, later.

    Oh yes, we ordered the Sofas for my lounge, I need to organise delivery (not ’til mid feb); and presumably removal of my old sofas… So, that’s news.

  • Another day of painting and music

    So, the door frame by the front door is now painted in undercoat. Hopefully I can throw a couple of nice coats of white gloss on, so for the party I can throw the door back on quickly. It won’t shut, but it gets it out the way. Then it can stay on until I’ve decided what I’m going to do with it. I’ve also thrown paint onto the last bit of wall which had escaped painting. It’ll get it’s final coat tomorrow, yeah. I think. Argh. It’s all a bit of a logistical nightmare, the housewarming approaches and I’m totally trying to schedule every task I can get in beforehand without bodging anything. The kitchen doorframe won’t be done, but I will put the door back on; or upstairs. I may put it upstairs, actually…

    No, so, yeah. I am pretty wrecked, I did supermarket shopping today, and my shift, obviously; and then some prep work, and then some painting.

    I also painted the first wall in the corridor; the dark blue one. Seeing it on the wall it may actually be ‘too dark’. We’ll see. Unlike the red which as soon as I saw it I knew I’d made the right decision, the blue is possibly too dark given the nature of the space.

    Anyway, enough house stuff; should I slap a house filter on? So people don’t have to endure my house rambling?

    So – there’s a shiny new Best of Bootie CD for 2006; I’ve not listened to it yet, just bits and pieces; I don’t think it’s hit me the same way as the Best of Bootie 2005, it’s still got some interesting stuff; and the Bonus Tracks are pretty entertaining.

    In other news, the BT HomeHub continues to suck. Although, perhaps it’s the wireless card also sucking slightly.

    In other OTHER news, The L word Season 4 has started! Why did no one tell me! ARGH! I can’t get behind already…

    And in finally other news, I actually mailed someone off OKCupid; so yeah, wish me replies :-)

  • News from the Kate-i-verse

    So, Xmas and Boxing day and so on. Yup.

    Xmas – I worked the morning, and then went to my sister’s in the afternoon. This is the first year I’ve not got Xmas dinner, probably in my entire life. It’s weird, I’ve actually *lost* weight over Xmas (which is good), but I still feel pissy that she (that is, my sister) invited me for Xmas dinner, and then proceeded to cook and eat it before I even left work for the day.

    Fortunately I had nutritious, healthy, traditional ‘left over Xmas Eve Pizza’ to eat; so I didn’t go too hungry. She did cook an awesome xmas pudding. Then boxing day, I spent that with Claire and Michelle, and their 2 kids, and their respective families. I had a great day, but I must admit it was a trifle odd to spend Boxing day essentially as a psuedo-family member. I had a great, relaxing evening, it kinda reminded me of Alaska – in the whole – being part of a family that’s not my own.

    I spent some time thinking about my own family that day, and that night. And my dad, and the destruction his loss and illness has wreaked upon my family. Where once we seemed such a nuclear family, now we’re all feuds and arguments and it seems so odd. It’s not like my childhood was idillic or anything. But compared to the disaster that is my family now? I guess I find it all a bit weird.

    My BT Broadband connection / Homehub continues to be fairly atrocious; if you put the wireless bit under any kind of load then you rapidly seem to loose all connectivity. It also appears to need to be beaten with the power-switch of doom on regular occasions. this, once must say is less than impressive.

    That thought was brought to you by ‘oh look, I’m disconnected again’.

    Anyhow, so, I met up with Amy, or more hunted her down in the store where she works. Impressed, I must admit, was not the first look that crossed her face. In fact, the meeting was ‘difficult’ at least, from my side. She doesn’t want to see me again. That, I have to admit, is another new experience for me. Not one that I’m keen to repeat. So, yeah. Her loss, and incidentally, from her revelations on that night I’m quite *pleased* that I’m not seeing her again.

    My car, that’s now got electronic ignition; she’s running a lot better now. She’s also serviced. She’s still not *right* though, I’m not quite sure why, I suspect I need to read that Timing lamp’s instructions again, and the instructions in the haynes manual. She’s definately running better. The handbrake however, remains a bit of a mystery. The cable seems to have stretched, and is, I suspect on it’s way out. But I’m not sure that the rear brakes are really doing that much… I think I may have to resort to the ‘someone with more experience’ looking at it.

    I also need to find out when the MOT is, just so that I can work out how much to panic about the now missing new exhaust.

    Oh, and I’ve painted the woodwork in the lounge…

    One thing that has been odd in my little world, I’ve taken to listening to CBC Radio 1, which is what I listened to in Canada; I’m particularly fond of the Dead Dog Cafe, but generally quite enjoy listening to Canada’s equivalent of Radio 4. But it’s odd, because I read Torontoist, and you start to feel a real connection, or a greater connection to the place when you’re reading the news, and hearing the news, and it’s difficult to explain, particularly in my current really quite tired state of mind… but it’s odd.

    Yeah.

    So that’s been my last few days, what’s happened in your world?

  • There’s this point right…

    …where the personality you put into something starts to cross with a real suspicious set of traits from that object, which starts to make you really feel that the object has got some kind of soul.

    I guess, after 37 years on this planet, my car’s collected enough quirks and fiddley bits, and having been hand built, largely, has quite a lot of personality. But this morning, I’d spent a solid 10 minutes trying to coax her to start. We’d passed through ‘no longer going to be early’ and ‘on time’ to ‘do I ring them and say I can’t get my car to start’?

    I’d got a work lamp outside, a 1lb lump hammer to ‘tap’ the sticking starter and she still wasn’t starting. I’d get one shot at the starting thing, and it’d then stick, and then I’d curse, run out and tap it. Sometimes it’d free off, and then I could have another go.

    Finally, in desparation I sat there and I said:

    “Please Rebecca, I *promise* I’ll fix you tomorrow, I *promise*. Please start.”; Turned the key and was met with the completely unexpect and slightly startling sound of the uneven beat of my engine… Not only that, but she idled while I packed away the work lamp, extension lead etc, and washed my hands.

    I actually made it into work a mere 2 minutes late.

    And I’ve kept my promise, well, actually I worked on her when I got home from Xmas shopping (still not got everything, not managed to send my cards to ‘merkians (bloody post office shut 2 minutes before I got there)). And found much to my distress: uneven running – related to crap points I suspect. Poor starting: points now so worn away that there’s virtually no heel left. they are wearing *insanely* fast. I never got the ‘running well through correctly set points’ phase. Starter motor – casing has cracked. Starter motor sticking due to insufficient lubrication. New graphite applied (thanks to Trey’s habit of ‘saving’ pencils from work, I have a moderate supply of graphite).

    In other news, someone poo’d in my hand today – while I was wearing gloves and had a wipe in my hands, thankfully.

  • Lazy Sunday

    At least, the idea in my head was ‘shift, run to mom’s, collect tools, home, write xmas-cards’. In the end, when I ran home I ended up chopping wood. I was late leaving work, and I’ve brought home more tools than I meant to. It’s actually left me feeling pretty knackered.

    Especially given Friday night was the work Xmas do (excellent fun!); Saturday my mum came and we did uber-shopping for tools, floors, paint, and I found the bits I think I want for my Bathroom…

    And then James came round. And then I worked an Early this morning. And now I’m waiting for pizza to arrive.

    My life is so dull…

    The girl I met, the cute one with whom I [DELETED]; she’s not texted me back, which is rather depressing. Well, maybe not so far as depressing, but certainly disappointing. She was cute damnit. Cute and [DELETED]. So, yeah.

    Apparently, my chinese dress provoked some comment at work yesterday, I think I pulled off the look pretty well at the Xmas do, but I’m always one for Paranoia, so hey. Who can say.

    This really is an astonishingly dull post, isn’t it? Well, we’ll continue the dull… My poor car is due a service, well, was due a service some time ago. It’s now past due a service. It’s really struggling to start in the mornings, I really do need to get the electronic ignition fitted – but that needs a strobe to set up the timing, and I’ve not got a strobe. *sigh*. Anyway, that’s my sunday. What’ve you all been up to?