I've seen a few photos like this on flickr, and I have been wanting to try one.

This was a lot of fun to do, especially listening to my daughter giggling as I struck each pose.  Patty was nice enough to take all the pictures.  Although you only see 10 of me, there were 13 shots taken, its just that the me at the front of the car and the me at the back of the car are blocking the view of three other me's in the background.  But ten Chucks isn't bad for a first effort.  And I learned a couple things along the way (beyond the obvious: plan out the shot!)

One is, even with the camera on the tripod, it still moves a teensy bit with each shot.  I really should have set up the cable release for Pat.  Next time we try this, I will.  The other thing is whenever I've seen this shot done, the photographer tries hard not to have anything in the picture that moves... like say a car.  When I sit in the front seat, she leans a little forward, when I sit in the backseat, she leans a little back, and so on, each tiny movement creating seams and edges that don't line up as I try to stitch things together.  So either I should leave the car out of the shot, or put sandbags in the front and back as I move about to even out the weight.

But still it was a lot of fun and I liked the end result.  Y'know when I look at Vanessa, many thoughts cross my mind.  "Clown Car" isn't one of them.

One of the nice things about new cars is that it takes a long time before you need to shell out big bucks to fix them.  For the first couple years or so, there are generally no major problems.  Well Vanessa is about 4 years old now, and that time is gone.  She's been running hot lately, the engine fan is always on, she has a check-engine light coming on, and she is overdue for a manual transmission fluid change.  The dealership where I purchased her is no longer in business, so I took her to a different dealership yesterday to get these issues looked at.

The check-engine light is on because there's a certain emissions-related component which has failed.  Replacing that component will cost $250.

The car has been running hot because the water pump is going, the water pump is covered by the extended powertrain warranty with a $100 deductible, so that will cost another $100.

The manual transmission fluid change will run another $150.  (That is a lot, but apparently the job is difficult to do on this model.  I had previously taken it to Jiffy Lube and they tried but could not do the work.)

The techinician who took the car for a ride said that the engine fan is much louder than normal, which he takes as an indication that the fan is going and will ultimately bind up.  When that happens the car will overheat.  The problem is that the component is extremely expensive ($500+) and installation isn't cheap either.  To replace the fan will run me another $820.

It took 66,000 miles to get to this point, but yeesh, that's a whole lot of damage, and financially speaking, life sucks for me and mine right now.  So, I told them to take care of the first 3 issues but leave the fan for another day.  With the waterpump functioning properly, the fan won't need to be on as much, and hopefully I can get by without having to replace it for awhile.

I hope they finish fixing the car soon.  I miss it already.

Visited the mall the other day to get some fresh new tires on my baby. I had called Firestone the week before to see if I could bring my car by. "Sure come on over right now," they said enthusiastically. "Well, do you have any 205/50R17 tires?" I had to ask because my car takes a weird sized tire. "WHAT size was that?" So in the end I had to wait a week for the tires to be shipped from Pennsylvania. When I got there I also asked to have the oil changed and the alignment checked. Which left me with two hours to kill at the mall...   more »

Chevy knows cool when it sees it, and I've been very impressed with the vehicles coming out of Chrysler for the past few years on looks alone. Chevy of course has the Corvette and the SSR, but the gauntlet has been thrown down in the battle of the It-Cars. I saw one of these rolling down Middlesex Turnpike the other day and for a moment I thought I was looking at a modified PT...   more »

So on Wednesday I was stuck in a traffic jam on route 2 and glanced over at the vehicle next to me.  It was a red subaru with a vanity plate that said ETHICS.  I wondered why someone would put that on their plate.  Are they trying to make a statement?  Could the driver be an ethics teacher or preacher or something?  Curious.

The next day I was stuck in a traffic jam on route 2 and glanced over at the vehicle next to me.  It was a red subaru with a vanity plate that said ETHICS. 

Weird.  Somebody trying to tell me something?

I posted a new photo to Photos/Miscellany/CarPictures.

A survey of US gasoline prices conducted over a two week period has indicated a record average price of $2.31 per gallon. Most expensive prices were in San Diego (sorry Brian) while the lowest prices were in South Carolina. Out of a desire to keep Vanessa happy and running smooth, and on the recommendation of the owner's manual, I only purchase premium gas. Ouch...   more »