Hurricane Ike
admin September 15th, 2008
Click on the photos to view a few pictures of my adventure in Lampasas Texas
Mepis 8 (beta)
World Water Week
admin August 16th, 2008
With the world fighting wars for oil it’s amazing that all some folks want is fresh clean water.
Here are couple of links of interest, World Water Week and Sanitation is Dignity
History of Lotus Elans and Me
admin June 22nd, 2008
I have liked small British sport cars even before I could drive. I saw this Bahama Yellow S3 at Laguna Seca probably in the seventy’s and knew someday I would have one of my own.
My brother and I went in on this Elan that was about $1500. At some point I bought him out as he wanted to get a piano. It was fun to drive even tho it would start shaking above 60 mph so it never got much use.
Along the way I got preoccupied with family and houses but I held on to the Elan even bringing it out to Texas from California.
I finally got rid of my family, (or they got rid of me), and I started to think about gettng the Elan back on the road.
The humidity really took it’s toll on the car and I was thinking of how much time it would take to restore when I found this almost identical car. Same year, just a few thousand serial numbers later.
Congressman McCaul says $1.85 a gallon Possible
admin June 17th, 2008
From the Bellville Times, June 5th, 2008
My Republican Congressman Michael T. McCaul in his dicusssion…”blamed Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leadership with unethical handling of economic issues since Democrats took majority control last year. It is no coincidence, he claimed, that gas prices soared when the Dems took office.” A Republican plan “could bring gas prices down to $1.85 again…”
Again from his own Congresional email McCaul Minute of June 10, 2008
Dear Friends,
In the course of one short week the Democratic leadership controlling Congress proposed the largest tax increase in American history, and their lack of an energy plan caused the price of gas to eclipse $4 a gallon. I voted against the tax increase. And I keep pounding away at my American-Made Energy plan that balances more domestic drilling with alternative energy so that we can achieve energy independence and bring gas prices under control. Gas sold for $2.33 a gallon the day Democrats took control of Congress in January 2007. The price has increased more than 70%.
The tax proposal came on the same day that Houston-based Continental Airlines announced extensive job and service cuts directly related to the price of fuel because of what it calls the worst crisis since 9/11/94. Every business is hurting and every household is hurting, every time they fill up their cars or go to the grocery store. With a struggling economy, the last thing our country needs is to increase taxes.
Taxes under the Democrats’ plan would go up an average of $2,755 for every Texas taxpayer in 2009. It is in part because of record spending, and because the plan either fails to extend or diminishes numerous crucial tax cuts including the Marriage Penalty, Death Tax, Child Tax Credit and Sales Tax Deduction. It also increases your income tax and the tax you pay on capital gains. I will continue to support a budget that keeps more money in your pockets and in the economy and less in the hands of the government.
MP3 Player
admin June 17th, 2008
I just got my first mp3 player a Creative Muvo T100. Simple and cheap. The only problem I have is with their web site, kind of confusing with links going in circles. All I wanted was a manual, I kept looking for a pdf download, turned out to be a Microsoft help file. I got a firmware update but it again it’s a Microsoft centric executable file. Fortunately the player works like a USB flash drive so no special software is needed. As you can see I play it thru a cassette adapter in the car.
Lotus Elan Crossmember
admin May 12th, 2008
I’m pulling the engine from my 1965 Lotus Elan S2 and I can’t get the rear cross member off. Check out the picture below and let me know if this is right? My solution for now is to pull the motor out and either hope the crossmember clears even if I have to drop the exhaust, or I can get at it along the way out.
With some help from the folks at Lotus Elan dot Net I was able to find the hidden bolt and get the part removed from the gearbox. Thanks guys.
My New Car, Audi A3
admin May 12th, 2008
Actually bought it used. Really nice, fun to drive, and gets 30mpg,albeit with premium fuel. The station wagon or avant as Audi likes to call it, even makes it practical.
My Elva Courier
admin May 10th, 2008
This is my 1961 Elva Courier Mk II, which I figure is as good as any to start the Elva pages with here. It’s also my first use of the Lightbox plugin.
Digital TV Review
admin May 3rd, 2008
I recently got a Zenith DTT900 Digital TV Tuner Converter Box. After rebate it cost me about $25 at Radio Shack. I live west of Houston in a rural area where my only option for TV is over the air or satellite. I use to have Primestar but when they were bought out by Direct TV I dropped the service. I still miss ESPN and Speedvision but not the $60 a month I was paying. So I’ve been using an outdoor antenna and a few years ago subscribed to Netflix for movies. I should also mention that I have a 12 year old 27″ Sony TV in my living room, and it’s my only TV. I have a lousy DVD player and a VCR. For the big sound I use a Marantz stereo receiver. I’m mostly happy with this setup and not inclined to spend money just to upgrade.
Enough, here goes the review…opening the box and take out the Zenith converter. Small and nice, a few cables and yet another remote. I’m pretty low tech here so why do I have five remotes? I follow the Quick Connect instructions, and it is as easy as could be expected. I had a couple of problems related to my equipment. I needed a short antenna wire, and not recognizing Zenith’s supplied cable I decided to disconnect my antenna amplifier and plug directly into the box. That was a mistake, as during the initial scan, I found only 9 channels. This was my worse fear. I stayed cool and checked it out anyways. First thing I noticed was the lousy sound quality. There was an audible hum even when the volume was low. When I turned on my DVD player the broadcast channels interfered. the VCR was fine.
So I decided to change it around a little. First I switched the converter box to run off of channel 4 instead of 3. That didn’t help, but moving the box input from the Video-2 to Video-3 solved my DVD problem. My VCR was plugged into Video-3 so now I don’t have a VCR. I thought my TV had 3 inputs, but I’m guessing that S-Video and Video-2 are actually the same, just different connections. I don’t use my VCR much so I’ll deal with it later. Now my DVD player doesn’t interfere with broadcast channels and my sound is better, but still I hear an audible hum from having the volume set high on the TV.
I look around for a short piece of antenna wire to hook up my booster amp and found the one supplied by Zenith, guess I should read the instructions better. With it all hooked up properly I scan again for channels and pull in about 26 channels. Which includes all the channels I normally watch. I loose a few channels, most of which I don’t watch anyways. I did gain some new channels, a religious channel and PAX. Some channels broadcast extra channels, but three of them are weather channels, and two are spanish language.
The picture quality is better in that some channels, especially like KPRC channel 2 was always snowy and some of the UHF channels were bad depending on the weather. Now if a channel comes in it’s clear, but I do get pixelation and sometimes the channels stop for a second and then resume. Some go away all together. Especially channel 55 PAX, it’s very weak.
I’ve got the sound to work okay, but I don’t notice any improvement. Now my only complaint is having an extra remote and how turning on the TV and moving thru channels is a bit more confusing and slower. The channel guide is okay but really not that helpful. Overall the Zenith is good enough and works as promised. My only suggestion is that it adopt a more green attitude and power itself completly off. As far as HDTV goes, I could live without it. Yea maybe when my existing TV dies and I do buy a new larger plasma I’ll enjoy it more. High definition DVDs might be worth it, but so far I’m unimpressed. Check back in a couple of years and ask me again, maybe I’ll change my mind.