I’m Kind Of A Big Deal
You’ve gotta love some of the “titles” you can earn in Guild Wars. Amongst being “Not Too Smelly”, “Slayer of All”, and a “Drunkard”. I’m also now, “Kind Of A Big Deal” (Anchorman inspired). So I’ve maxed 5 different titles. Of course there’s 40 possible titles… so there’s a lot of folks that have done a lot more than I have.
Supposedly things like this are supposed to contribute somewhat if you decide to link your Guild Wars account to the upcoming Guild Wars 2 game. The more stuff you have in your “Hall of Monuments” the better goodies you’ll get upon the launch of Guild Wars 2. To what extent it is worthwhile, remains to be seen.
For now it’s just been kinda nice to have time to play Guild Wars again. But to be honest, now that I’ve achieved KOABD… I think I’m going to get back to Final Fantasy XIII. Haha!
The Blazer has a name!
“Lazarus.” It’s almost even spelled like Blazer. So after a hot day under the car port and with Andrea’s help, we got the Blazer going again. The fuel pump we sent back as bad, probably wasn’t bad after all. I ordered a new sending unit that comes with new wiring for the pump inside the tank. So after dropping the gas tank for the 4th time, and swapping out the units… vroom! Fired right up! Runs just like it did for the two weeks before it died last time. It’s a relieving feeling.
Andrea doing some of the grunt work.
So after all this… I think we’re selling it. No way will we ever get for it what we have put into it financially, I’m prepared for that. But after fighting us every step of the way, I’ll be honest, I really don’t even like it any more. It’s like somebody who you just get off on the wrong foot with, and after that first impression, it’s just too hard to give them a second chance. I mean, heck. The ENTIRE fuel system is brand new now on this thing, but I just don’t trust it. For somebody else, it could go another 100,000 miles, I dunno. And we originally settled on Lazarus because it was cheap and available. We really wanted a pickup truck in the first place anyway.
So I think I’m going to ask $900 and see what we get. We’ll lose some money on the deal, but we learned a lot. I’d never dropped a gas tank before. Fairly good at it now. Never tore this deep into an engine before, and will be a little less timid to do it in the future. So it’s not a total loss. Or maybe that’s just what I’m telling myself. Haha!
06.8.10Victory over redneck!
You may have heard, but the Blazer is fully operational! Got the new fuel pump installed on Saturday and lo and behold she fired right up and didn’t miss a beat!
Dropping the fuel tank was not a fun job. Not hard, but awkward angles and tight spaces when it comes to disconnecting all the lines and hoses off the fuel tank. But with a good bit of patience it is all pretty easy. With the tank out everything looked good, but apparently the old fuel pump just couldn’t put out the pressure needed to fire off the fuel injector. Swapping out the old fuel pump for the new one was pretty straight forward too.
I admit I was nervous to fire it up. I really didn’t know what to expect, after all the work we’d been doing and nothing really got better, I was almost convinced that it was just never going to run right. So it’s a huge relief to be able to just hop in and drive it whenever.
The next hurdle will take some time. I still don’t trust it. I still sit at a stoplight and hope it doesn’t die when I hit the gas, or cringe just a little bit when I turn the wipers hoping I don’t blow a fuse. But should time prove it to be a somewhat dependable old truck, I think it will be a worth while investment even though we probably ended up paying quite a bit more than it’s worth considering all the parts we bought.
Go, Blazer Go!
04.25.10First real drag races. (lots o’ pics)
Well nobody thinks of Great Bend as the place where there’s tons of stuff to do, but we’re getting better and better at seeking out things to do. A while back during our radio auction I scored a pair two day passes to the Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series here this weekend. You could think of it as the Nationwide Series of NHRA drag racing.
Saturday, was rainy off and on and windy like a mofo. We switched sides of the track to get out of the wind and were much more comfortable. But soon enough the rain shut everybody down and we went home. Sunday was still windy but otherwise beautiful. Perfect day!
It was awesome. The superstock cars were cool because they still look (for the most part) like cars you’d see on the street, but they are friggin’ fast. You think they’re loud too, until the Top Alcohol and Funny Cars roll out. Yeah, I tried not to hold my ears, but after the first pass… well it was in our best interest since we were only about 20 ft. from the track and no sense going deaf for no reason. Plus when you plug the ears, you realize how the sound shakes every bone in your body.
They weren’t the cheapest tickets $50 for both of us (auction price). But man it was worth it. Seeing something like that on TV is one thing. But seeing something as insane as human beings in screaming machines being hurled 1/4 mile in a little over 5 seconds with your own eyes is just too damn cool.
Now tons of pictures. Check the picasa album for tons more!
EDIT: Found out this is a Dodge Diplomat with a Slant Six engine. Pretty cool!
The smell of burning rubber.
68 Cutlass vs. Chevy Nova
Two clean rides
They’re oldies, but they shine up alright!
Washed the cars over lunch today so I ended up not eating anything. Which made me really really hungry by the time I got home after work today. We’ve had a brisket simmering in the crockpot since this morning and MAN was it tasty. A long with cornbread, veggies, mashed potatoes… I’m STUFFED. Gonna relax for a bit then head to a play at the Crest Theater here soon. Haven’t seen a stage show in such a long time, I’m looking forward to it.
It’s been a good day so far!
12.31.09Only one word to describe the following…AWESOME!
PS3 and Madden 10
08.20.09
Mmm…
Good supper tonight. Some High Life beer brats and… well some High Life.
This is probably could have easily just been a tweet. Oh well!
06.10.09The Poker Den
Well another project tackled (for the most part). I’ve been wanting to turn our unfinished into a little hangout spot. I’m liking how it’s shaping up so far, but I need some more quirky junk to decorate with. I need to hit up some estate auctions or something for all sorts of weird stuff. We scored a brand new folding poker table off of amazon.com for a reasonable price. It’s more sturdy than your average folding table and I was pretty impressed with the quality for as little as it cost.
I didn’t want to just set a poker table in an empty unfinished basement though. I wanted it to look halfway lived in, so I’ve been trying to find some of the stuff that has been tucked away (or just never unpacked from move-in day). Found some of the old Deep 6 stuff from the band I was in during high school. And a few car parts I had laying around. I guess those are decorative… better than a concrete wall I guess. I want to get a bunch of the old tin signs and things like that. And old neon sign from a bar or something would be sweet, but those things are expensive!
Eventually I want to get a nicer stereo to put down there. I just have a little am/fm radio right now. It’d be cool to put a small couch or loveseat down there, but I don’t know if it would fit down the stairs. If you haven’t seen the entrance to my basement, it’s just like a trap door in the floor of my utility closet, and I really don’t think any real piece of furniture would fit through it! But it would be nice to have some kind of comfortable seating down there and I could move my old 25″ TV down there with a Nintendo and/or DVD player so that players that get knocked out of a game have something to do. Come to think of it… I bet a futon sofa would fit nicely!
So there’s the latest I’ve been up to. Still a work in progress, but at least I’m not ashamed to show it now. So come on over and help put it to good use!
05.30.09The Finished Product…
Need I say more? Just check out the pictures!
*sexy meow*
The HOT new lights!
Rear View 😉
The sexy new fender Stangs
They're really shiny close up!
Will it grow?
Well I said after we got back from Hawaii that I wanted to plant a palm tree out front. Turns out that it’s possible… but not too realistic. Well for a few weeks now Wal-Mart has had these palm plants sitting for sale for $12 and I’ve been tempted but convinced myself to walk past ’em. I mean sure it’s just $12, but then you have to buy a pot and soil. All a gamble because knowing my track record, I’m going to just kill the thing anyway!
But Andrea has been encouraging me to just buy it the last couple times, so we hauled that thing home on my lap in her Mustang! I’m sure that was a sight to behold. So there she is. Hopefully it can get enough light and I’ll keep it wet. We’ll see if it grows or if it dies!