Hello
everybody! Not as long as a delay in our update this time
(only two and a half months or so). I liked the format of the
last update so I’ll use it again here:
June:
-June 14th –
We drove up to Matt and Jana’s for a BBQ. It was really nice to see
our friends and their little girl Elle. Good food and company.
-June 21st –
We bought another Miata (#3). Let me explain. The plan
for this summer for Mia was to swap her anemic engine for a more powerful one
from a Miata of a later year. After the accident where the fender
was crushed via someone changing lanes into the car I reassessed the time and
money it would cost to perform such a major upgrade and decided we’d be better
off buying a Miata with the larger engine and selling Mia. The new
Miata is a black 1997 formerly owned by a guy living about 3 minutes from our
house in Roxborough. We named the car Debbie. Our next
door neighbor thinks we’re insane.
-The following
Thursday – We got home from work and there was water coming down the
street. We didn’t think much of it as sprinkler water from the
neighbors often flows in a similar fashion. Later in the evening one
of our neighbors knocked on our door and asked if we knew that water was coming
up from our lawn next to the sidewalk. Susan contacted the
Roxborough water utility who sent a guy to check it out. He managed
to turn off the water line which stopped the flow of water and also showed that
the leak was on our side of the valve and thus our issue to fix.
Long story short -
after getting insanely-high quotes from several plumbers we found a local
contractor who was able to send a couple of workers out to fix the leak on the
weekend. Lesson learned – one can save a lot of money by looking outside
the box when having home repairs made (the contractor did the work at 1/5th the
cost we were quoted by the plumbers, even with emergency rates applied).
-June 28th –I
took Debbie to Tires Plus for an alignment and oil change. After
several hours (I don’t know why I keep bothering to schedule our visits) I was
told that there was so much wrong with the car they wouldn’t align
it. The list of problems was great (needed new brake calipers/pads/rotors
all around, had bad tie rods, the tires were shot) as was the estimated
bill. I sighed and asked them to perform the oil change and leave the rest
alone.
This started us on a
month-long odyssey of fixing Debbie and making a few upgrades in the
process. By the time we were done with the work Debbie had newly
rebuilt front brake calipers, new pads and rotors all around, new tie rods, new
springs, new adjustable sway bars, and new tires. We also installed
a roll bar and swapped in a limited-slip differential from Mia. Tia also
received the same sway bars and roll bar. Note: roll bars are a pain
to install (it took us an entire weekend). Susan also wired
in lights that turn on when the doors are open and made a custom garage
door button for Debbie (it looks very cool and works well). Overall
it was an interesting experience and I’m glad we did the work ourselves
(besides mounting the tires on the wheels). We saved quite a bit of
money and learned a lot in the process.
July:
-July 4th –
I had to work (thank you quarter-end) but later in the evening we attended a
block party on Alvin and Kari’s cul-de-sac. There was BBQ to be had
and after dark we watched several miniature fireworks shows set off in the
street.
-July 5th –
This was to be a rallycross but we didn’t attend as I’d worked a lot of extra
hours in the preceding week and was exhausted.
-July 13th –
We raced the WRX in another rallycross down at PPIR. The newly
turbo-charged Imp was still not running very well so we decided to give the car
a break. It was a really fun event and I managed to legitimately
scare Susan a couple of times (as well as send several course workers scurrying
away).
-July 15th –
Susan went to a Goo Goo Dolls concert at Red Rocks. She relayed to
me that she had a good time. There was a chance there would be heavy
rain at the venue but only a few drops fell. It was a late night and
getting up for work the next day was tough but I don’t think Susan regretted
going to the show.
-July 26th –
We picked up a used fender for Mia from Colorado Springs. The color
didn’t match exactly but, once we finally got around to installing it, we found
it most satisfactory. I also found a used set of Miata wheels with
decent tires on craigslist (we wanted to keep the original wheels from Mia).
August:
-August 2nd –
We went to Vesta Dipping Grill to celebrate 11 years of marriage. As
always the food was delectable and we sat at our regular table next to the
front windows. While we were there we figured out that we’d eaten at
Vesta for our previous 8 wedding anniversaries. It’s also our go-to
restaurant for our “going out” anniversary and sporadic other
celebrations. We decided that the evidence suggests that we really like
the place.
After dinner we
ventured over to a fellow-rallycrosser’s home for an outdoor movie
night. He and his husband also brew craft beer in their basement and
are planning on opening a microbrewery restaurant in the near
future. We didn’t stay for the movie but did try watermelon flavored
beer which was a bit strange to me and a bit good to Susan.
-August 8th –
We bought a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX (car #6) and admitted to ourselves
that we may have a car problem. This car is simply called “the Evo”
and is to be our new rally car/winter driver. Yes, we already have
two rally car/winter drivers but unlike the other two turbo-charged AWD cars
the Evo is… yadda yadda yadda. What can I say? It’s
faster/better/cooler/funner/neater/impressiver. We’re going to sell
off the other two AWD cars as even we know that owning three rally cars at the
same time is silly (probably).
-August 16th –
We rallycrossed the Evo at CORE. The particular Evo we bought is
generally thought of as a cheater-car in rallycross as it usually dominates in
every class it’s in. Because of this we teased our local racing
community before the event by posting partial pictures of the Evo on
Facebook. At the event received a lot of approvals from the other
racers and the expectations were high that we’d do well. Of course,
we did not. We over-drove the car badly in the morning before
starting to figure things out in the afternoon. It turns out the car
is much more than we expected and we have to turn ourselves down some to
compensate. Very fun though and we’re glad we bought the car.
After the race we went
up to Matt and Jana’s to join them in celebrating Elle’s 1st birthday. We
were late due to the race but made it in time to see a mountain of gifts being
opened. Apparently Elle likes to push the keys on Jana’s keyboard so one
of the gifts from Susan was an old keyboard of ours. There was a lot
of family in attendance and it was pleasant. We were late
enough that the food was already put away and resorted to eating at Burger King
on the way home (it was actually almost as good as I remember it being as a
teenager).
-August 20th –
We finally sold Mia. That morning I got a call from a
southern-sounding guy named Gary who was interested in the
Miata. After work we met Gary, Gary’s wife, and Gary’s son at our
local Safeway where he proceeded to give Mia his critical eye. Mia
is the first car we’ve sold to an older gentleman and the experience was much
different. He was thorough in his review and we went back and forth
on the price as opposed to the other two young guys who gave our cars a cursory
inspection and paid asking price. I imagine car salespeople love
seeing young people walk onto their lots. We were very happy to
finally sell one of our cars. Now we just need to sell a WRX and a
heavily-modified Impreza.
-Miscellaneous (I did
not spell this correctly on my first try; it’s a very hit-or-miss word for me)
-Susan bought a baritone
saxophone. She played a bari in both high school and college and
found a good deal on a used one. For those that don’t know the
baritone saxophone is one of the larger saxophones and produces quite a loud
sound. Very fun.
-I’m still jamming with
Charles. We’re writing and recording some music but mostly getting
to know each other which is more important this early on (to me at least). We’re
currently looking for a drummer.
-Susan is helping organize this year’s Pugs in
the Park event that is put on by Colorado Pug Rescue. Besides
attending regular meetings she is amassing donated items for the silent auction
in our basement.
-The pugs are doing well. Besides
Satchel having a bad bladder infection last month they’ve all been relatively
healthy. Still cute and all that.
-We reorganized the garage with the help of
shelving from Costco and now can fit two Miatas in there. It has
been several years since this feat has been possible and we are proud of
ourselves.
-I recently finished my 100th audio
book since I started digesting books via this medium just over two years
ago. I’m not exactly proud of my “accomplishment” but am amazed at
how quickly the milestone arrived. I LOVE audio books and the
flexibility newer technology provides in listening to them.
We hope this finds you
happy and healthy!
Max and Susan
