What's the latest in people's lives?

[Aaron]

Oh no! What did you do to it?

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

I've never been in a convertible per se, I've been on a motorcycle and a jeep which had no roof just a roll bar.

One of the few legitimately cool things about the Army was the Iltis in summer. Throw the top and doors in the stowage and drive around all day, off road with endless sky and wind.

Then you hit a stump and its all over.

My brother made the serious mistake of letting me drive it. He still loves me though.

Okay... how much of it is left.

[IanKennedy]

Drove one of these once, great fun:

[Teaos]

You drove a transformer?

[Angharrad]

Oh no! What did you do to it?

I learned to drive in Florida which is flat, where he lived has hills, I didn't know you are supposed to down shift on hills until he screamed at me "DOWN SHIFT!" I got flustered and shifted into a higher gear, the jeep turned sideways and we slide down to the bottom of the hill.

[Angharrad]

My brother made the serious mistake of letting me drive it. He still loves me though.

Okay... how much of it is left.

Considering HE has totaled 3 cars, (that I know of) he has no room to be critical of my driving skills. I've only totaled 1. And I didn't get arrested when I did it.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

You drove a transformer?

*Squints* There might be a Transformer with that as an alt mode, generally speaking.

[Reliant121]

So comes the rant of the day:

I've noticed a fairly dodgy sounding metallic squeaking coming from my new bike's front wheel. At first I thought it was the brake pads needing some adjustment but the pads are perfectly fine. After it got truly horrendous I took my bike to the nearest motorcycle dealer on my way to work; which just so happened to be a rather large Triumph dealer.

The mechanic there graciously had a look at the bike and determined the front wheel bearings, on both sides, are both utterly shot. Okay, fair enough. She then proceeded to weave a massive tale about it flinging me off the bike if they get really bad, how Triumph would have to order the part in direct from Yamaha and how it'd be a full day trying to repair the bike. At a very high labour rate I might add.

So, I took the bike for a second opinion to my local Peugeot scooter dealer/very well trusted local mechanic to boot. Without having all the hassle of having to wrestle a quarter of a ton of motorcycle onto a centre stand, he simply tipped the bike on its side, wobbled a wheel (and saw the frankly massive amount of play in the wheel), went "yup, thats broken." And then booked the bike in to have the bearing replaced the very same morning, within 3 hours of walking into the shop.


My rant concludes with: What the hell is it with big name companies that are scared to do anything? Have to make things difficult and inordinately expensive?

[Teaos]

Yip, its where the big money is at. It also comes from them being staffed with salesmen not mechanics now, hell I know someone who is trainging now in plain old fashioned auto mechanics... and it includes a sales portion.

Its not really the staffs fault, they are quite often under strict quotas ect.

[Jim]

On Monday May 6 I had a heart attack and a T.I.A. On Friday the 10th I was home and heading up to bed, I slipped on the steps and strained my Achilles tendon. Plus, as a cherry on top, my sister went to the grocery store, backed into my driveway to unload, misjudged the distance and hit into my garage door. It is a steel door so it is now bent and doesn't open and close right. Bad week...

[Tsukiyumi]

On Monday May 6 I had a heart attack and a T.I.A. On Friday the 10th I was home and heading up to bed, I slipped on the steps and strained my Achilles tendon. Plus, as a cherry on top, my sister went to the grocery store, backed into my driveway to unload, misjudged the distance and hit into my garage door. It is a steel door so it is now bent and doesn't open and close right. Bad week...

Jeez, man. That is some bad mojo. Hope things get better!

[McAvoy]

So I am babysitting my parent's house and their animals over the weekend. They give me a project to do. Replace two interior doors. The old ones come from the 1960's and need to be replaced. Well I got the two doors and went about making the indents for the hinges for the worse door (the door is so bad that is warped and and does not shut all the way anymore). Well like an idiot, I didn't check to see if the door frame was square. It isn't even close to be square. There is a 1.5" (4cm or so) gap in the corners. No way in hell can I make the door fit in there without making the door look like it came from a funhouse. Looks like I need a whole new frame. Luckily I have done that before, but I don't have the time to do it.

I never noticed it, but my parents house looked like it settled alot in the middle. But not two much to have a sag or be structurally unsound.

[Teaos]

I'd check for rot.

[McAvoy]

No rot. The house just settled unevenly in the middle. It is a 50 year old hour built in 1962. The house itself needs alot of work especially the kitchen which was dated when my parents moved in 1986. No central AC and the house leaks alot of heat out. Wiring in the kitchen and the TV room needs to be redone. Their needs to be more than two electrical outlets in the Living Room. The hardwood floor needs to be resurfaced. The front and back doors need to be replaced. The TV room needs to remove the wood paneling and put up drywall. The basement needs to be waterproofed again. Fireplace needs to be fixed.

All of this has be done if my parents want to move out in five years and not take a huge hit. Which is why they have me do some of the small stuff.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

On Monday May 6 I had a heart attack and a T.I.A. On Friday the 10th I was home and heading up to bed, I slipped on the steps and strained my Achilles tendon. Plus, as a cherry on top, my sister went to the grocery store, backed into my driveway to unload, misjudged the distance and hit into my garage door. It is a steel door so it is now bent and doesn't open and close right. Bad week...

Jeez, man. That is some bad mojo. Hope things get better!

Seconded. Hope they turn around STAT.