'Phira Is Being A Bitch

She's taken to throwing P0420 codes at random (and then rescinding them a few days later).  FYI, all a P0420 is is a notification that the kitty is working below threshold efficiency.

"Cycling In New Orleans" or "How Would You Like To Die Today?" (Part 2 of 2)

So I've been riding bicycles for a while now.  Had my first mountain bike when i was 7 or 8, a blue Schwinn Frontier 24" and by high school I had graduated to my dad's old 3-speed Collegiate and been gifted a customized Schwinn Cruiser Alloy SS

(white wall tires, chrome fenders and a 7-speed hub)

I wasn't commuting, that's for sure, but I knew my way around the city.  And there's one thing that I learned very quickly:  New Orleanians don't know how to drive...period.  

Now I'm sure by now you're thinking "Well he covered that in the last post."  You'd be correct.  But I covered it from the viewpoint of someone driving a tiny sportscar.  You know, with 2300lbs of sheetmetal, crumple zones, seatbelts and airbags surrounding him?  But what about cyclists?  They have none of that.  All you have is a styrofoam helmet and your wits to protect you from awful motorists but even worse, they also have to protect you from yourself!

"From myself?"  you ask?  Yes, from yourself.  You see, now that I actually have commuted to work on a bicycle (its about 8.5mi each way for me) I can tell you for sure that the temptation to bend the rules of the road is there constantly.  This is the bike that I commute on:

(2008 Schwinn Coffee 3spd w/ vintage Schwinn Accessories)

Unfortunately it really isn't cut out for commuting.  With only 3 gears it can be a bit of a mule to pick speed back up on after coming to a complete stop, especially since I've never been able to get the chain tension just right and hard cranking pops it off the sprocket.  So when I come up on an intersection that's going red or a stop sign, the temptation to run it is definitely there.  That's something that no amount of legislation or infrastructure improvement will be able to fix.

Here's something that can be fixed though.  Assuming cyclists were obeying all the motor traffic laws as they're meant to, there's still the matter of the inattentive, inconsiderate or just plain incompetent motorist.  My route to work is a perfect example.  Much of it is covered by bicycle lanes of one sort or another.  Some are on grassy medians, completely separated from motor vehicle traffic.  The longest stretch however is on shared pavement with 1 lane of 35mph traffic to my immediate left and parallel parking to my immediate right with only enough spare room to pass a slower cyclist if they let me.  

As I mentioned in my last post, a common problem with bicycle lanes in New Orleans (because of how they are set up in the roadways) is that taxicabs use them as hack stands, pulling into them and idling while the pick up or drop off fares.  Its bad enough to come up on one of these when you've seen it ahead from two blocks back but they do one worse, passing you in traffic and the pulling directly in front of you, cutting you off with less than a second to find an exit strategy.  This would be fixable though the creation of hack stands on each block when a bicycle lane shares pavement with a single lane of traffic.

I'M STILL HERE!!

Sorry if I'm a bit remote lately.  Working on school, work, and juggling a bunch of other stuff including this blog which, to be honest, comes last of all those in terms of importance.

Finally got 'Phira back from the mechanic.  She's got a whole bunch of new kit on her including new seals, new shifter bushings, clutch, lightened flywheel, bearings, engine mounts and MORE but she still needs a new clutch master/slave job which will have to wait until next month i think.  Until then, clutch engagement is about 1" off the floor, haha.  THE ROLL BAR IS IN!!  And aside from protecting my noggin' in the event she turns over, its also provided a very noticeable stiffening effect on the chassis which pleased me a lot.

(Its a Hard Dog Sport DD with custom geometry to fit aftermarket glass-windowed tops)

TTYL,

Taylor

"How This Blog Works" or "Go Watch This Other Thing Too"

So by now if you're a regular viewer (and it looks like I might actually have one or two even) you've noticed that I don't post super-often.  Usually once every week or so.  So instead of checking constantly (which lets get realistic, is boring and annoying as hell) why not go follow me on Instagram and/or Twitter?  I post a lot of stuff over there as well, some of which doesn't make it here all the time, and I also plug new Blog posts as soon as I post them up.

My Instagram is:  miata_taylor
My Twitter is:  MiataDragon

T

"Oh no!" or "What just happened here?"

So as I may have mentioned, 'Phira is a definite work in progress.  Her previous owner maintained her but just barely.  When I got her the O-ring on her cam angle sensor was completely deteriorated and hard as a rock, she had several seeping seals on the front of her engine, a radiator that was on its last leg, a leaky top, toasted suspension bushings (and with double wishbone all around, that's a lot of bushings), old rubber hoses, etc.  She was basically a 16-year-old car that had been moderately maintained.  The downside to that was I was getting her right when stuff was about to start wearing out.  The upside is that once I finish her I'll have a great, shiny little sportscar for the total investment of a Honda Civic LX plus a little which, lets be honest, is the total cost of that car anyway since you can't just leave it for stock.  My old FA1, "Gracie," ended up with an extra $5-6k invested in her after all.

So anyway...I'm heading to work Sunday morning and she bogs a little pulling out of the driveway.  I don't notice it since she does this occasionally when she's starting cold and doesn't like the temperature outside (too hot/cold).  I'm about five minutes out of work when the steady CEL i've been seeing for a while starts flashing.  The engine's working okay and I don't hear any funny sounds so I continue to work, park and look it up.  Of course the forums say I probably should not have done that since I've likely killed my cat but I'm pretty sure it was already dead to begin with so I'm cool with that.

'Phira being loaded onto a AAA flatbed.  You can see her peeling clearcoat best from this angle.

'Phira likes being tied down, but don't tell anyone

She's now sitting at Motorsports For Miatas in Jefferson waiting for the work to begin.  I'm really not looking forward to this bill.  Maybe I should take paypal donations, haha.  (I am BTW.  Use roadsterland@yahoo.com)

"Driving In New Orleans" or "DodgeCar" (Part 1 of 2)

You're driving along an 8-lane boulevard with a median at the posted 35mph speed limit when suddenly a man jaywalks across the street to the bus stop (there is no bus in sight).  He crosses two lanes with breathtaking speed...then slows and walks the last two, forcing you to brake below the speed limit.

The Mercedes behind you has its fog lamps on...on the clearest night of the year.  Conversely, the next night, The brand-new Audi driving toward you in the dense fog has no fog lamps on but instead the high beams have been activated.  Better yet, the Honda Accord sedan to your right has its fog lamps on but one is burned out...probably from being left on all the time.

The guy who lives across the street from you is forever leaving his master fog lamp switch on in his Land Rover, unaware that it also has REAR lamps that blind anyone unfortunate enough to be stuck behind him in traffic.  His wife tends to be equally dense, forgetting to hit the button in her Mercedes Benz GL500 to fold the side mirrors back out and never realizing it until you mention it.

Driving home one night you are cut off by a 1985 Oldsmobile with a temporary tag and no functional rear lights other than the high mount brake light on which your eyes now bore a hole lest you miss it and careen into the rear of the driver's latest in a long line of bad life choices.

USAToday.com recently featured an article (Worst Drivers By State) detailing a survey undertaken by CarInsuranceComparison.com that found the State of Louisiana had the worst drivers by compiling a large database of various applicable statistics such as citations by type, accident reports, and fatality rates.  

This may be shocking to drivers in states like New Jersey and New York but it is not uncommon for drivers in Louisiana to hold up two lanes of 45mph traffic to illegallly cross four lanes and a solid white to get to a u-turn. Rather than go an extra block. Stop signs?  Merely suggestions.  Yield sign? A vague construct abstracted from an idea once postulated by a man and his dog whilst waiting for the Streetcar...in the late sixties.  Designated, striped bicycle lanes?  Cab stands and passing shoulders of course!  Stop lights?  Well if you can't see anybody coming...

Add to that lackluster maintenance of traffic infrastructure (signals, crosswalk lights, etc), the New Orleans Police Department's underfunded, confused and apathetic traffic division and a population with a borderline SUV fetish (and a confirmed ridiculously-huge-wheel fetish) who generally only have a turn signal on because they "bought the car that way" and you have a recipe for disaster for drivers of anything smaller than a minivan.  

Mamoru Hosoda's "Wolf Children"

So I just watched Mamoru Hosoda's "Wolf Children" and I was struck by two things. Firstly, how incredibly beautiful a movie it is. I mean really, in all aspects. I'm a very emotional person so it's easy for a movie to provoke strong emotions like anger or sadness but this film in particular triggered a lot of emotions that I don't really even have names for. It seemed I was always trembling on the edge of something but never quite toppling down into it: an eloquent waltz of emotional balance.

Secondly, now this is kind of sad. I know people personally, grown men and women, who would have taken one look at the preview, specifically the part where Ookami reveals his half-wolf form to Hana, and said "Oh that's weird, you like watching stuff like this?" and then given me a funny look and laughed uncomfortably, as if I were suddenly strange in their eyes and they needed to cover the awkward moment somehow. How sad that people can get hung up on silly insecurities like that when there's such a wonderful, thought-inspiring story being told...

I was always taught as a child "You'll hurt yourself jumping to conclusions" and only recently have I really come to know what that truly means. When we judge people or things without truly knowing them first, we perform an injustice to that person or to the people who made that thing. I remember, as a teenager, offering to lend my copy of Jim Carrey's "The Majestic" to an adult friend who refused simply because he was in it and because she didn't like his earlier work. I was confused, being younger, and puzzled. After all...I'd watched the movie. I knew it was NOTHING like his crazy comedy films and I wanted to share that with her because I knew that she would like it. But she wouldn't watch it. Not because of a bad review, but because she had judged Carrey's whole worth as an actor by a few silly films he had made earlier in his career, never giving him a chance to show he could do anything else.

TS