Rob got some great photos of a Lada Niva when he was in Taipei—and they've interested me so much that I wrote an article about the car. Without the stickers, the Niva is a really neat little vehicle. Read the article over at AA....
I'm back, and I'm sore. Particularly, my right forearm is sore, ostensibly from falling on it (once) and from using it to pick myself back up from falling on my ass (many, many times). My legs are also practically useless at this point. Fantastic. The only thing to note is...
Snowboarding early tomorrow morning, then a full day of work. Story at 11 tomorrow....
Just because I'm stuck awake making sure the fire doesn't burn the house down, here's yet another traffic post. This is a traffic camera taken at the ever-so-useful Seattle Area Traffic Home. Note the timestamp, and note all the traffic. This is typical of most roads in the area tonight....
This is a photograph I took a few minutes ago outside my apartment. Yes, it's midnight—and if you look closely, you'll see that yes, there is still bumper-to-bumper traffic out here. There are brakelights as far as the eye can see in that photo. The road curves upward so that...
It snowed today. The roads are an absolute disaster. In comparison to major rains, which generally clog the major highways and arteries that run adjacent to them, the snows back up all roads. So even though the bulk of SR-520 and I-405 had cleared before Layla and I tackled them...
Some of you may remember my post about Family Guy and the Volkswagen Scirocco. Well, this time, they've tackled the Hummer. See the clip here (3.35MB WMV). This is marginally NSFW (see P.S. below). I'll leave that at that. Comment as you will. P.S. This was taken from a Canadian...
I've been meaning to perform this modification for a while. Here's the deal: the BMW E36 3 Series cars sold in the US (ti compact model excluded) have a somewhat counterintuitive stop lamp layout. These cars each feature three panels on each tail assembly; arranged horizontally, there's an inner, middle,...
...but black, only because that's the color of my largely fully-functional BMW. Dismantling the entire intake system again thankfully gave me the opportunity to right the two shortcuts I had taken before and actually let the car run without shooting fuel everywhere. There was a small issue with a huuuge...
At around 8am, I started attacking the list of items remaining to complete the BMW. Now, around six hours later, I've just started the car. ...and noticed it's sprinkling fuel from underneath the intake manifold. This is a huge pain in my ass, and will be something I'll tackle tomorrow....
Ha ha, just kidding. This is the transmission waiting to be installed back into my 3. It just so happens that it was sitting on a huge crack in the concrete floor of my garage. In all seriousness, the transmission is a surprisingly small component. All of the guts are...
I've finished my latest review of the BMW X3 over at AA. What's the verdict? Well...I wasn't too impressed. Frankly, there's not a lot of substance there for a car that will cost well over $40k once all the right boxes have been checked. If you're in the market for...
The usual wisdom goes that taking something apart is a whole lot easier than putting it back together again. For most people, this is probably true—doubly so if you're in the business of taking things apart with blunt tools or firearms or bulldozers or so forth. In contrast, I've found...
This is Fifo. Fifo is black and white. Fifo doesn't have any brown or grey spots. Our fireplace, however, has lots of brown and grey soot. Judging by the brown and grey spots on Fifo, I'm guessing he made an excursion into the fireplace. And judging by the pile of...
It's been a while since Layla and I last went out to Snoqualmie Falls, so with the family in town, we decided to take a trip out there. The thing is that the only convenient time was earlier tonight and, well, it's actually really cold right now. If given the...
This is exactly the sort of thing you can expect to find when you rent a minivan. Now thankfully, the local Avis had nine (!) reservations for minivans this weekend, and had called in some backups to supplant their fleet of Chevrolet Uplanders (yeuch) and Pontiac Montanas (yeuch). So instead,...
As mentioned previously, a whole pile of relatives are flying into town tomorrow to spend the weekend basking the all the wonder that is the pacific northwest. So odds are good that I'll be delay-posting for those days (through Monday) but may have some entertaining pictures. Who knows. Of greater...
I ran across English Russia earlier today and I'm absolutely captivated. This is a phenomenal photo blog of all things Russian—but captioned and explained in English. Plus, the blogger (who appears to be only one person, judging by the uniformity of language) seems to be a real car nut. Fantastic!...
This is one badass half-spray-painted, half-Rhino-lined Subaru that Layla and I spotted outside of a local Target. At least, I presume it's Rhino-lined...the black tag on the grey strip along the left edge of the trunk lid is a Rhino Liner logo. And the "support our *" ribbon? It read,...
I remember first hearing about this whole, you know, cup stacking phenomenon about five or so years ago—although in reality it's been around at least 25 years. Apparently the sport revolves around conning kids into developing near superhuman abilities in stacking and unstacking plastic cups. If you haven't heard of...
For those of you who haven't seen the TV comedy Arrested Development, do so. It's sharp and hilarious, and tragically cancelled. Those of you who have seen the show (or at least the third season) will probably recognize the name Bob Loblaw (say it quickly now), so-named was Scott Baio's...
I mentioned last night that I, err, got a helicopter from Layla. This is it. It's tiny. Tiny is awesome, because I can fly it indoors and use it to chase cats. It's actually quite clever—it's got counter-rotating rotors, which means that a tail rotor isn't necessary to keep the...
Part of the total awesomeness that Layla busted out for my birthday involved a completely sweetass radio-controlled helicopter. Thanks to a handful of AA batteries, I've spent most of the day tormeting felines. But the part I think you all will find most amusing is the cornucopia of Engrish smattered...
There was no response for the moment when I saw him pee in the sink....
Absolutely, positively mute your speakers before you start this clip. And then marvel in the sideways nuttiness. I particularly like the 747 landings—they had to be built with castering main wheels because the low-hanging outside engines precluded the extreme bank angles needed to land straight in severe crosswinds. Most of...
Another election season over. Hurrah for the unchanging forward march of change—and just how much things won't change because of it. There really weren't any hugely controversial issues at play here in Washington this election—the three biggest initiatives (I-920, to repeal the recently-instituted estate tax; I-933, to compensate landowners for...
That's right—today's silly old ads post involves not one, but two (!!!) commercials. The first is for the Pontiac LeMans, circa 1988. And the second is for the ... Daewoo LeMans. That's right—these are the same damned car. In an effort to combat the evil subcompact imports, GM rebadged tiny...
Oh kids, when will you learn that not even hilarious ad copy will save you from your oddball cars. This particular ad comes from craigslist (cached) and notes that this car:"was used in a Mexican street race gang." I'm still puzzled by the use of the word in—was the car...
I've long posited that the Volvo 240 wagon (preferrably in turbocharged or, ahem, blown 350 form) is the coolest of the Volvos. It's about as new as you can get without going Swedish-brickish, but it's still got that IKEAn style that made famous that company run entirely by tall blonde...
Layla brought this home from a shopping trip a few weeks ago—apparently some woman was wandering around the store in which Layla was shopping, randomly asking people if they spoke Spanish and then, if appropriate, handing them this flyer. Since Layla speaks Spanish, I've now got a hilarious flyer for...
Tonight's pictures come courtesy of Rob and the extent of my laziness. This is an E23 BMW 7-Series doped up in a totally bodacious paint-job (growl!) and the world's coolest wing. Oh yeah. That's how it's done....
These are the six bolts that held the pressure plate onto the flywheel of my BMW. The pressure plate, as you remember, busted out a rusty shiv Sunday night and carved its metaphoric initials into the back of my hand. Not to be made any bolts' bitch, I've since removed...
Some of you may have noticed that this site has been really damned slow for the past few weeks. I've been aware of it, but haven't really had the time to deal effectively with the problem—mostly because I really haven't had the time to look into it. But last night...
Now that Layla is participating in the 20/20 program, she's busy. And since we usually carpool, that means that I get to be busy, too. Wednesdays, in particular, are busy enough that I get into work around 8:30am and stick around until 8:30pm. That's a really long time. And so,...
