4401

That looks really cool, DennyA. Although, while looking at that pic I noticed the, uhhhh, interesting one involving you (I think?), a “flamboyant” Jack Frost, and a photo booth. You look quite uncomfortable. Care to explain that one? :)

4402

Thanks guys! He took the car and trophy to school and was so proud. I hope he doesn’t think we’ll ever manage to win again. (Unless we move to another city so we can enter that fluke car again!)

And Ninyu, I’d make a joke about visiting the North Pole, but it would be at my own expense…

4403

FWIW, try powdered Graphite on the wheel axles, my Dad and I used that trick to win 2 years in a row.

4404

Oh yeah, that’s standard now. The hobby shop has pre-shaped weights, graphite powder, bling and decals, even pre-carved bodies. It’s become an industry!

Apparently in some races, the kids actually reapply graphite between rounds. Our pack wasn’t that hardcore. We turned in the cars on Sunday and got to touch them again when the races were over last night.

4405

Wow, when I was a kid, I had to drill the body of the car out, take a blow torch and melt down fishing weights, and fill the body. Then we weighed it, then had to use a power drill to drill out the lead weight until the proper weight was reached. Sounds like they are spoiling the kids fun now days. Hmmm…

4406

I had to take one of our cats to the vet today for the final time. We tried everything to cure her of peeing on the floor (of our pretty much all carpeted home). Everything. Since we have five other cats (yeah, we’ve taken in a lot of strays over the years), we ran out of options. Now we have to hope that a thorough cleaning will prevent the others from doing it. Meanwhile, I keep crying every time I think about it. Never seems fair.

4407

So sorry to hear that, Robert. Horrible situation to find yourself in.

4408

Well, you’re not supposed to buy the pre-carved bodies or any of that stuff. And I didn’t notice any of them there.

But yeah, this is what we used for the weights. Way easier than melting lead with a blowtorch. :)

What’s funny is that, when we turned the car in, it weighed just under 4.8 oz. The cubmaster was somewhat incredulous that I didn’t take up his offer to add additional weights. “Nah, that’s close enough.” We didn’t think we were even going to place, anyway, so why be anal about it?

4409

I was only a boy scout for one year but we did enter one big race. I waited until the last minute and ended up painting my square body, attaching the wheels and while not doing that well, I actually won a couple of heats. My car outweighed everyone else’s by 1/2…kinda funny.

4410

Food poisoning. ugh.

4411

Heh, it’s amazing how easy it is for parents now, my Dad was an engineer, so therefore he had a vendetta against the other Dad’s. Me personally, I love propane blowtorches by default.

4412

Filed taxes jointly as a married couple for the first time this year, holy shit does the government cut you breaks when you make things legal.

4413

Here ya go:

4414

Err, I was talking about the fact that we got a huge return this year not a penalty.

4415

Well I messed up my toe, to the point I had an open wound underneath it. I’m trying to keep it clean but in the meantime, it’s been a bitch to walk on. I went into a sporting goods store, meaning to look for some bike shorts. I tried on these training shoes and lo and behold! my toe didn’t hurt anymore and I could walk without a limp. Came out of the store with both the shorts and the shoes. Now to get some clip bike shoes and I’ll be good to go riding again.

4416

The government only “cuts you breaks” when your incomes are relatively disproportionate.

For couples that have relatively equal earning power and two decent salaries, marriage is generally a penalty. The married tax scale was structured to provide a break to the Leave It To Beaver single earner family, but screws modern dual income families (only in the upper mid to high brackets for the time being).

My wife and I never made it official for this reason. Being legally married would cost us around 5K a year.

4417

I watched the world premiere of National Theatre’s play Nation broadcast live in HD from London to a movie theatre in my home town of Oulu, Finland. As I was sitting and watching the London audience 1,300 miles away take their seats and waiting with them for the play to start there was one thing foremost in my mind: This is magic.

4418

And you tell us this now? After I professed my love for the novel in the book thread? I can see, that it was also shown in Copenhagen… hrmpf.
Well, that was the same night I missed Henry Rollins spoken word, so I’m just gonna erase that date from my memory.

4419

Well, if it’s any consolation the play itself did not impress me much. I’ll read the novel at some point to see if the problem lies there or if there was just far too much content to cram into a 2h 10min play. The play wasn’t bad but I expected more.

4420

I’ve spent the last two weeks making theatre lights.

Having spent 5 years dicking around with data sets, arguing with managers over databases that maybe 15 people care about and all the usual corporate crap to spend two weeks putting together something tangible has been very rewarding.

I dont even know if they’re still using the stuff I spent ages trying to fix in the last place but in the past two weeks I’ve helped build 100 lights that have gone all over the world. i wont claim it was the most challenging of work, but there are theatres in America, France and England using lights that I built and will be for some time.