Black Squirrel

I'd never seen a black squirrel before moving to Omaha a few years ago. I've since developed a -perhaps unhealthy- obsession with them since. As some of you may or may not know, if I had to be a rodent, I would choose to be a squirrel. And preferably a black one. They are rather rare here as I have only seen one in my neighborhood, across the street. One in Memorial Park, and one in West Omaha. I'm sure there are more, but these are the three individuals that I can account for. I spent about 40 minutes stalking the one in the park on Saturday.

This grey/red squirrel was chasing our black friend first. Then he turned the tables.I'm not sure how many trees that I followed him through, but I was amazed at the ground he could cover without touching the ground.

More HDZ

One of the nice things about living somewhere that isn't Centerville is that there are things to do. We have an annual pass to the zoo, so whenever Corwin is bored we like to stop by. Many people who visit the zoo try to see the whole thing in one go, but I don't like this. It can really wear you out, like going to a museum. By the end of the day, you're tired and not really enjoying yourself, but by damn you paid full admission and you're going to see everything. But because I visit the zoo two or three times a month I stroll along taking my time watching the exhibits that I really enjoy, getting passed by most everyone.

When we got the to the Desert Dome today, we saw our friend Andrew in the Sun Room. I don't remember his exact title, but he is the number 2 man in charge of reptiles in the Desert Dome. He invited us in and showed a couple of interesting things, before he had to go investigate some tree that fell over somewhere. He showed us a three day old gecko that was rather cute. And Corwin got introduced to a Black Something Something Snake. Andrew described it as a poor man's Indigo Snake. Corwin wasn't afraid at all and wanted to touch her, but even though she wasn't poisonous it would have hurt had she bit him. But she was a rather nice and calm snake.

Columbus Day

Italians think they're so damn important that they have to have their own holiday. I'm looking at you Tony. Can't they make up some cool holiday like the Irish and St. Patty's day where everyone gets drunk on green beer? Noooo, they've got to celebrate some guy who discovered America about 500 years after the vikings. And several thousand years after the Native Americans. But anyway, with thier holiday comes the closing of the government. And Corwin's daycare is in a government building. So even though I'm supposed to work, he can't go to daycare on Columbus Day. So I took Corwin to the zoo Monday afternoon.

Corwin had fun playing on the brass lion pride at the Henry Doorly Zoo's main entrance. He ran through the Desert Dome and wanted to play in all of the puddles and water falls that exist through out the complex. I got to watch the jack rabbits, which I rather enjoy. The older ones always have these torn up ears from numerous battles. Who knew that bunnies could be such warriors? We then went to the aquarium and played around the penguin tanks. We went through the tunnel aquarium next and Corwin became infatuated with these two girls that were maybe 6 or 7. He does this all the time, he'll see a cute little girl much too old for him, and stare at her or follow her around hoping to be friends. He is a terrible flirt. He should be more respectable like his father.

Return from C-town

I've always meant to take a picture of these funny dinosaurs at some place called Benny Davis Farm between Centerville and Corydon. I finally got around to it today. I'll have to do it again sometimes because I'm not happy with the quality of the image taken with my old point-and-shoot digital camera. And for those who care, my gas milage has increased from around 11 mpg to 17 with the new four speed transmission.

Yellow Hat

In many ways I'm a fairly simple guy. I'm really white trash with a decent income. I drive a 35 year old muscle car. I lament the fact that I don't own a house so that I might own a tree that I could hang an engine from to work on. I've owned ten cars in my life, and none has been an import. If you look in my fridge right now, you'll find Sam Adams but that doesn't mean that I don't enjoy the occasional Miller High Life or Busch Light. And little things often please me. I'm not very complex in some ways and that's OK. I know me and I like me.

Case in point, my new Hurst shifter finally arrived from Jegs.com today. It has been back ordered for a couple of weeks, but I wasn't in a hurry about it because I thought I had to have to whole transmission rebuilt. A shifter for it wasn't very important at the time. So I open the Jegs box and inside is my ratchet shifter but also a bright yellow Jegs hat that I didn't order. I suppose they included it just to say sorry for taking so long to get this to you. It pleased me in an illogical and stupid way. I put the hat on and show it to Anke, all excited that I had gotten a free hat. She says, "You look like someone from Iowa." And she's right, I put on this hat and I feel like I'm strait outta Mystic*! It makes me wish I still had my old black '77 Camaro that was held together with bondo, but was stupid fast. I could then put on my yellow hat and cruise the square listening to AC/DC in style.

Of course Corwin steals the hat right off of my head, and he just looks impossibly cute.




*Mystic is a small run down town about 8.5 minutes from Centerville.

Sometimes procrastination doesn't pay off

If you've been reading this you know that I put a new transmission in the Cutlass a month or so ago. Well the bloody thing was making a funny noise and not shifting right. The whole car was also extremely sluggish- like I'd lost 20 or 30 horse power. I was afraid that the transmission that I bought was bad. On top of that, the company that I bought the damn thing from is in bankruptcy at the moment. I was lucky to even get a transmission, some folks didn't. It was one of the last ones I believe.

But I was afraid to take the car to a transmission shop, because I didn't want to hear the bad news that the whole thing is junk and it'll cost you at least $1000 to rebuild the boat anchor in your drive train. I was talking to Dad about that this weekend and he suggested that I have Doug Widick of Widick Diesel rebuild it for me. Doug's shop is the only place that Dad will allow to touch his semi. Doug uses Dad's Western Star as a test truck of sorts and does all kinds of fun and wacky stuff to make it get better fuel mileage. He is currently getting around 7.5 mpg and pushing 550+ horsepower. That 7.5 mpg is a very impressive feat for a semi.

Anyway I didn't want to bring the car to Doug without really knowing the transmission was toast. So I took the Cutlass to a transmission shop (Transmissions Incorporated at 49th and Dodge, Omaha) that is only about 4 blocks from where I live. They sign out front that says free transmission diagnosis. So I thought that I'd have them check it out first. They then called about noon to say that the funny noise was the transmission dipstick was vibrating against something and the throttle pressure needed adjusted along with a cable stop thingy. Kirk at the shop said they could do all this for $51.43. This pleased me greatly- along with Anke who was very understanding and wasn't even going to yell at me if I had to get the transmission rebuilt.

I picked the car up after work and suddenly the Cutlass and I were friends again. I couldn't hear the transmission and it was much peppier. It seems that before getting fixed the car wasn't ever staying in first gear, so I was always taking off in second, which will make your car seem slower than it actually is.

So the moral of the story is I should have faced the music and taken it to the guys down the street weeks ago. I'd have been much happier if I had.