Hello again!
Late in August Susan started having a sharp pain in one of
her back teeth. A visit to the dentist
determined she needed a root canal and a filling. Soon she got her temporary crown but due to
scheduling issues the permanent crown wasn’t “installed” until after Labor
Day. It was around this time that one of
my crowns popped off due to me chewing on Mentos. I luckily didn’t swallow it and the crown was
reattached a couple of days later with little drama.
On August 30 we raced at a rallycross event down at the US
Truck Driving School (USTDS) south of Colorado Springs in Fountain, CO. Normally the parking lot that acts as our
course is flat and stable but the unusual and almost daily summer rains had caused
many ruts and other unsafe areas.
Fortunately there was still plenty of space to race on safely and we had
a grand ole’ time on the low-traction course.
It was a very close finish with me missing 1st place by a whisker
over a tenth of a second (0.107) and Susan coming in 5th out of 13
drivers. USTDS is always hard on tires
so we used our older rally tires which took quite a beating during the
event.
We had originally planned on camping at Chatfield Reservoir
over Labor Day with our neighbors, Gregg and Sandra Tiedeman, but ended up just
hanging out with them on Saturday instead.
In the almost seven years we’ve lived five minutes from Chatfield we’ve
not yet visited there. While Susan had
been there before as a kid I’ve never gone.
You might think I would have been excited to go over Labor Day but not
really. Despite my poor attitude we
packed up our Subaru with camping chairs, coolers of water and wine, umbrellas,
and fishing poles and headed over to the Tiedeman’s campsite. They recently acquired a pop-up camper which
they have utilized several times already and it was in attendance again. I don’t know that I’d ever want to own one
but I see the allure. We hung out and
talked with them for awhile and then drove to one of the fishing areas.
Susan was the sole fisher from our home as I decided to sulk
nap in a camping chair under an umbrella.
Susan and Sandra fished and I slept.
Susan seemed to hoard all the luck along the shoreline and caught four
fish while we were there (those around us averaged far less than one catch per
person). I woke periodically when she
reeled them in and we deemed two big enough to eat. We headed back to the campsite to cook her
spoils.
Susan did eat most of her fish though she said they were
mostly tasteless. I settled on a hot dog
and some oddly prepared sides. Their son
Tristan came by later to hang out. They
started a fire and we played a couple of rounds of Exploding Kittens as the sun
went down. For some reason (probably a diabolical
one) the wind and smoke colluded to make sure my eyes were constantly watery
and my throat dry until we left. Though
it may not sound like it I did have a good time. Luckily for Susan she had a better time.
The weekend of September 19-20 was a busy one with racing
and Colorado Pug Rescue’s annual Pugs in the Park. That Saturday had us rallycrossing at
Colorado Off-Road Extreme (CORE). There
are two available areas to use for rallycross and we were in the lower
one. The courses were set up to be
faster than normal and I had to shift into second gear many times throughout
the day (shifting out of first gear while racing is rarely necessary in our car). I was putting down times that no one could
touch when I had a run where just about everything that could go wrong did go
wrong. I managed to get the back tires
off in the fluff on one sweeping turn which caused such a large cloud of dust
that I blinded myself two turns later and had to come to a complete stop while
I waited for it to clear. Once I got
going again I overcooked a turn bad enough that I went off-course (almost
hitting a shovel of all things) and had to back up to get going again (I also
managed to hit a few cones). Despite that
miserable run I fought on and finished in 2nd place less than four
seconds from 1st with Susan right behind me in 3rd out of
12 drivers (her highest finish of the season in our very competitive class!). We took our sweet time packing up after the
event and were the last to leave. It was
as we were pulling onto the highway that I noticed the car’s clutch was
slipping badly. The sky might have
darkened and maybe some lightning flashed overhead at the same moment I felt
the car not accelerate when I pushed down on the gas pedal, I guess I don’t
really recall clearly. I’m sure
something foreboding occurred though. On
the way home we stopped at Applebee’s for dinner with the Miller’s (another
racing couple that live in our neighborhood).
Good times indeed.
The next day we packed up the Subaru with our small PA
system, chairs, and umbrellas and headed for Central Park for Pugs in the
Park. As we did last year we provided
the PA system used for announcements and volunteered under the foster
tent. We got there early enough that we were
able to help set up the multiple pop-up tents and tables used at the
event. After things were more-or-less in
order we convened under the foster tent.
Volunteering at the foster tent entails managing the young volunteer
pug-walkers (a disappearing kid+pug last year prompted Susan to make a sign out
sheet which was mostly used) and answering questions from prospective adopters
and potential future foster parents. All
of the available foster pugs were in high demand and I think most had more than
one person applying for them by the end of the day.
Some of the other activities at the event include a
pug-licking contest, pug-racing, a hotdog (hotpug?) eating contest, a pug-drop
(a pug poops on a grid and people buy “land rights” to the squares within; the
person who owns the fertilized spot wins actual money), and a pug-costume
contest. There were also many different
venders selling various wares, a food truck, and a frozen-ice truck (a neighbor
of ours). As we were primarily the only
adults at the foster tent we didn’t venture out much but did make a journey to
see the vendors and bought a couple of plots for the pug-drop (the poop-gods
did not look favorably upon our offering and someone else won the poo-prize).
It was very busy with hundreds people attending and/or passing
through (it was the best-attended in years which may have had something to do
with the fact that the event wasn’t on the same day as a Broncos game which it
has been in previous years). After the
event was officially over we helped pack up and went home to hang out with our
own pillage of pugs (not the correct term for multiple pugs but, really, it
should be).
Knowing the next race was only three weeks away and that I’m
a mediocre (at best) and untrained mechanic I began the process of replacing the
clutch on the rally car the Tuesday after the event at CORE. I started by asking a couple of fellow-racers
who own auto shops how much they’d charge to do the work. The first guy literally laughed at me and
said our particular car’s clutch was one of the worst to change out and he
didn’t want to mess with it (the official dealer-specified time to complete the
job is almost 11 hours). The second guy
gave me a quote but it was high enough that I decided to tackle the project
myself. No need to go into too much
detail but I did work on the car almost every weeknight and weekend day since
and I just finished up over two weeks later.
It was indeed a painful experience (both physically and mentally) but
very much worth it. I learned a few
lessons throughout (like my long hair soaks up gear oil like a sponge) and know
and respect the car more than I did before.
I also hope the clutch never goes out again. Ever. 4/10,
I might do it again.
Alvin and Kari bought some property on Deer Creek Road and
are going to build a house in the next year (hopefully). They had a BBQ to show off their land on the
last Sunday of September to which several racers and old friends were
invited. We brought “Max Sticks” (cheese
sticks wrapped in roast beef and, yes, I did name them) and some salad. Everyone got a tour of their basic plans and
we hung out and talked with friends for hours.
By the time we left there was only one Max Stick remaining to which I
was proud. We are very jealous
proud of Alvin and Kari on their purchase and future plans.
In other news the pugs are doing alright. We’re pretty sure that Sophie is now completely
blind and we have to help her get from place to place. It’s sad but she’s a trooper. Bella is crazy for ice cubes and Tweetie has
done her best to get in on the chilly treats (though she still seems confused
when she does get one, like she’s thinking, “what’s the big deal?”). Satchel has decided she’s too good to use the
training pads if any of the other pugs have made prior “deposits” and, after
several mistakes, we’re much more proactive in putting new pads down for her
(slowly but surely Satchel is training us to be the perfect pug-parents). She’s almost completely deaf now but still
gets around alright, albeit with a limp.
Susan is extremely busy with work right now and has been
putting in overtime along with working at home in the evenings and
weekends. The timing has actually been
pretty good since her work getting hectic began around the time I started
working on the rally car’s clutch (it’s less of a bummer when both of us are
busy). Quarter-end just occurred last week
so my busy time is ramping up at my reporting job which is fine by me.
Susan knits from time to time and I play my guitar from time
to time. We are looking forward to
Barbara visiting us in early November (both for her company and the excellent
excuse it provides to clean the house). Susan’s
grandmother Norita just had her 91st birthday on September 28th
and is still going strong!
We hope this finds you happy and healthy!
Max and Susan
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