So what is everyone doing this weekend?

Lions game tonight!  Goooooo sports team!

Saturday my obligation is to keep the boy out of Mrs Monohue's hair. It was hotter than the hinges on the gates of hell here and my knee is still pretty hinky from last month's stunt show, so all I managed to do was contain the child and replace an exterior doorknob. Repinning the new lock to match the others did impress the missus, though. She doesn't ask for much, and I make sure she gets it.

Today was cooler, but not nearly cool enough to make replacing the blower motor in the 5 anything resembling an attractive proposition. Instead I gave up early and switched to a little cosmetic cleanup. The previous owners left a few pretty good scratches on the hood (among other places) and I managed to tune most of them up with a little buffing pad chucked up in the cordless drill. Got the perpetually cloudy headlights shined up at the same time and even mopped a little wax on the newly shiny parts with a power waxer received in a GRM New Year's Game box. Circle of life.

I have to say, none of that is fun to watch unless you are drinking alcohol. I am, courtesy of the store that sells it.

Yesterday I ran a 5K!

In reply to classicJackets (FS) :

You ran it pretty fast too! Good job. 

My weekend was getting one of my houses ready to sell and get the miata running. I got the basement taped off and got a good start in actually getting the paint applied. I'll finish that after work this week. 

On the other side, I did the first start on the turbo miata post engine change. It started right up and purred like a kitten so very happy there. Just waiting for the PPF bolt to the rear diff to come in so I can drive it. I forgot the bolt wasn't in great shape and I needed to order a new one but never did. So first drive hopefully will be next week. 

Saturday it was kind of rainy and it had been a long week, so mostly I sat on the couch and played videogames with DW.

Sunday, fortunately, it was berking beautiful out.  We ran a short road rally that ended with a BMC club picnic cookout at a local state park.  It was fun, everybody had a good time, and a number of folks who had never run a rally before told me how much they enjoyed it.

Took whole family to cars and coffee Sat. AM then continued the car theme by finally getting out to the local Kart track for a bit with the oldest.

Had a great time judging at Lemons Road America.  

Irresponsibly spent some money to do something outdoors for the first time since the crash in May and went to DriveFest at Mosport. It was OK.

We’re a week away from autumn. Here in Southern New England we’ve had a stretch of great mid-summer-like weather. Today was 83 degrees. Right now at 7:30 in the evening it’s still 78 degrees. I’m on the deck with a glass of Montepulciano listening to Erroll Garner on Spotify. Life definitely is good.🤞

Took off Friday to focus on personal projects.  Ended up spending a chunk of the day at the doc, then today half at a CT scan and half laying around feeling like complete E36 M3.  Trying to turn the tide tomorrow.

I have been fighting a SUM issue in teh R for a long time.  The suspension was stuck on full stiff, headlights pointed all the way down, because of a ride height sensor issue.  And even when both sensors are working, the SUM won't take a calibration because the car sits too low because it's lowered.

Someone Important is going to be borrowing my car a lot next month.  I don't want her having to drive a car that feels like it is going to fall apart over every bump.

I am not proud of this.

With a small handful of 220 ohm resistors and some wire, I made a ride height sensor bypass that returns 2.5v for both sensors.

The SUM took a calibration!

No more suspension warning light, and the struts are no longer forced full stiff and I probably will be able to see at night too.  And it's quiet over bumps!

With that out of the way, I then replaced the heavily broken strut mounts (thanks to Cleveland roads and suspension riding full-stiff) and finally felt secure enough to swap my dodecagonally bent winter tires and wheels over to my perfectly round summer wheels.  Driving on the Blizzaks all summer has made them rough enough to cut lumber and the noise was horrible.

We decided to start a small renovation project by removing a half wall (cat for scale) that was dividing our dining room and living room. With most of the demolition completed I can start patching up the wall this week. 

Still trying to finish this motor swap in the Monte Carlo...she's angry at me for all the pounding I did on the crossmember and she's fighting back. Oil dipstick tubes shouldn't be this difficult...

I painted a set of mounted steelies using the card trick for the first time. I still got a little overspray on one of the tires, but overall I'm pretty happy with the results.

I almost pulled the trigger on a set of alloys for these tires, but when I went to order them from Tire Rack, the ones that I wanted were out of stock. So I saved $650 plus mounting and balancing.

I used Rustoleum Hammered Silver. The Hammered Black is some of my favorite rattle can paint. The silver came out pretty nice, but not as hammered as I was expecting.

Good enough for now. 

I used Rustoleum Hammered Silver. The Hammered Black is some of my favorite rattle can paint. The silver came out pretty nice, but not as hammered as I was expecting.

Good enough for now. 

Coached my sons baseball game, watched my daughters softball game, assembled a garage cabinet ($139 Amazon FTW), tried to organize the garage, changed brakes on my wife's minivan, and played in a coed softball game with my wife - that was Saturday. 20k steps and 4500 calories burned if my Fitbit is accurate.

Volunteered at a BMWCCA driving school at Mosport, pretty good as volunteering goes.

We took the MX-5 out for an early autumn drive this afternoon and ended up at ... wait ... a vineyard of all places. Son of a gun. 🤣 It was "Kingdom of the Hawk" in North Stonington, CT.

Annie's pic was better:

This place is really nice:

Now back at home with our first indoor fire of the season:

Completed my first Olympic triathlon yesterday, then vegetated today. 

Went to two car shows in the Molvo. One at night was more exciting than the daytime cruise.

Put the Z project to the side and started on our spare bathroom remodel.  Picked up a pallet of new tile. The old bathroom had a Door County, Wisconsin theme that's going away. 

Packed my MtB into a sweet carrying case and flew to GSP. Teaching SAE Applied Vehicle Dynamics Monday thru Wednesday, then biking Thursday and Friday before flying home Saturday.

1)  Played a 2-hour 2-man saxophone show on Friday night at the Wright Opera House in Ouray Colorado, on Soprano, Alto and Tenor sax to an appreciative crowd.

2)  Worked as conductor at a two-day narrow gauge railroad event at the Ridgway Railroad Museum, helping to run RGS Galloping Goose #4, RGS Motor #1, RGS Inspection car #1, and a historic D&RG 1880s caboose (the 0575) behind our Plymouth switch engine.  Many fun laps around our demonstration track with visitors from all over the US and Europe.  After all that, I'm whipped (I'm 78) and plan to do as little as I can get away with tomorrow.  Then it's up into the high country to view the aspens and do a little 4-wheeling, followed by staining my deck before winter hits.

In reply to AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) :

What bag did you use?

I keep thinking about doing this from time to time but those I know that have done it have not had the greatest luck.  I hope your trip goes smoothly!

Where is GSP?

In reply to TravisTheHuman :

https://evocsports.us/products/bike-travel-bag-pro-1

GSP = Greenville Spartanburg, in upstate SC.