Bugs Palace!

Well, September is here, and that means one thing. Goodbye to summer 🙁  Luckilly for me, I am a huge fan of the fall season. Colours are beautiful, temperature is perfect for jeans and a t-shirt, and Major League Baseball is wrapping up, so the Yankees will be getting ready to win another championship 🙂  

Speaking of baseball, my tenure as coach of the Hagersville Midget Girls is officially over as of last weekend. Although we didn’t win very many games, Shannon and I had a very fun summer. Shannon was kind enough to take on the role of team ma nager again, and take care of all the bookings and paper work. I really couldn’t have made it through the season without her. Thanks babe. And thanks to all the girls who came out every week to play. You should be proud of how well you’s did (most of the time 🙂  ).

Also, last weekend, Shan and I visited our first MINI Meet. Met some new faces, and seen some pretty sweet cars. Pretty sure we will try and make this meet a bit more regularily.  HERE are the few pictures I took before going in to eat.

Bug Update: Not a heck of a lot to post about the bug. Been doing some hunting for place to do interior for bug. While in Simcoe booking my MINI in (more on that later), I inquired about having interior done while they had my Bug for a headliner install. The owner pointed me in the right direction. After speaking to his buddy, I now have a place to do my seat and panel recoverring. Also, if I take my headliner to him before I have him do my seats, he will dye them all to match. So when I take the bug in, It will come home with headliner and all upholstery done, installed and matching. And all at a reasonable price. 

On to the MINI. I figured for my one year anniversary with the car, I would buy her a new winshield with the optional tinted viser. Looks excellent. No more cracks or pits. Hurray for clear vision. Sadly, that week I had to spend a bit more cash on it too. My battery died in an exciting fashing with blinking lights and all sorts of fan fare.  On the upside, I was inspired to remove the back seat of the car, and turn it into a 2 seater with a nice carpetted hatch. Now I can haul more stuff as I often need to. And if i need to haul people, 20 minutes and voila. 4 seater.

A little bit of time last weekend, and many hours yesturday were spent on a new car audio task for Kevins car. As we get older we get more and more creative. This time, It was fiberglass kick panels.  HERE are some pictures of the project in progress. Not quite done yet, but its getting their. Crappy weather slowed the cure time yesturday. Damn it

Well, only other side effect of September being here, is … back to work full time. I have enjoyed my 2 day work weeks all of July and August. Sadly, those days are gone. One more 4 day work week, and its back to full 5 days. Garr.. Gonna take some getting used to..

Till nex time ..

Been a while since an update, and I have a bunch of them!

First off, congratulations to Foxxxy and Melissa! The two were wed last Friday at an outdoor service. Shannon and I had an awesome night. Lots of good friends, and even more laughs. Hope you guys are as happy as Shannon and I are. Pictures are HERE.

Two new vehicles in the garage! Well, newish, and one is actually ‘back’ in the garage. First, I picked up my old dirt bike from my Uncle Buddies house. Its a 1982 Honda XR80. Needs a bit of work, but Kevin and I were able to get it up and running in about 20 minutes. I need a new front tire, as it seems to keep going flat on me. Hopefully that will be replaced soon. I have a huge field next to the house just beggin to be torn up. HERE are a couple pics of the old gal. 

Also, Alex had a spare lawn mower laying around which he was so kind as to donate to me. After trying to cut the grass with it for the first time, I realized it needed to be lowered 🙂 Purely for function though, not just cause I like lowering stuff. It was only fanning the grass when I started. Couple cranks of my wrench, and the mower was slammed and cutting lots of green 🙂 Thanks Alex!

Speaking of the garage 🙂 . Today marks 1 complete year with my MINI CooperS. It has been one hell of a fun ride, I will say that.  Only a couple issues with the car; ABS sensor went about a month after I got the car, cracked windshield a week after I got the car (being replaced this Monday), and a ding in the rear quarter panel the day after I got it. Other then the first month, it has been pretty much problem free. (Touch wood!) During the first year, I was able to do quite a bit of modding. Many go fast parts have been installed, and also some stuff to help me handle and stop better too! I am by no means done with the modding, but I was lucky to get so much done in the first year. Hopefully next year will be even better! 1 year, and 50,000kms down, and a whole bunch more to go! 

Lastly I have a handful of galleries to add to the site from the past couple months.

• Trip to Niagara Falls with Jim and Alicia
• Car stereo install pics with Kevin
• LOTS of scanned images from the VanDalens photo box
• Grandma and Grandpas 50th anniversary pics

Happy Birthday to Donna! Ok, Happy Birthday two days ago.  was a busy day on my end, and I forgot to update my page. Hope you had a great day!

Speaking of celebrations, this weekend, we are having a 50th wedding anniversary party for my Grandparents.  Looking forward to having some fun with the family! Congratulations guys!

While driving home from work today, my MINI crossed the 130,000km mark. Now, I didn’t buy this car new, so I cant comment on the first 80K of driving, but the last 50K or so have been some the best times I have ever spent in a car. Aside from a ABS sensor, the car hasn’t needed anything but regular maintenance done to it. (touch wood!). Oil changes, recent brake job, and a soon to be replaced windshield are all par for the course when you spend 60K a year on the road.  Aside from that, the only money it has needed have been for modifications to make it faster 🙂 Reduced supercharger pulley, intake and exhaust along with some suspension work have really transformed the perky little MINI into a small beast, and I couldn’t be happier.  Here’s to another 130K of happy driving!

As posted before, I am in summer mode at the school board. Holidays have me down to two-day work weeks for all of July and August. During that free time, I have been able to pick  up some shifts at ALNC while Ian is away on holidays visiting his family. Because of these extra shifts, and the paycheck I deposited this morning, I am officially credit card free!  It took a bit longer then expected (wasn’t planning on dropping money on the brakes and washing machine, but oh well).  At long last the card is at zero.  I can get back to my old ‘use and pay it off in the same month’ mode.  Man I’ve missed those days. 

Now that we are caught up, and its looking like my bug is going to be a bit longer then we had hoped, I may spend some of my hard earned cash, and get my driveway paved sooner then later. I was planning on doing it next spring, but if I can swing it now, and not have to worry about shovelling a gravel driveway again this winter, I would be very happy.  Going to spend some of my time off tomorrow looking for prices. If the price is right, I may go ahead. Time will tell.