prodrive

The driving school looked like the Top Gear production office, but most of the time we were outside anyway.

SkidCar - Toyota Camry lifts in each corner to reduce tire contact patch either in front or in the rear so it will skid/spin at 15 mph.

no rocket no heat

I just finished my car control course. It starts in a classroom and the instructor talks about understeer and oversteer and what you should do. Everyone then goes outside and breaks into groups for the skidcars, which are Camrys mounted on a steel frame with pneumatics at each corner. I was with a UO student who had once spun his car and has several speeding tickets, so his family "encouraged" him to come to this, and a high school kid who had an accident involving a mailbox and some trees and ended up needed two brain surgeries. So I apparently get points for being proactive.

The instructor first set up the car so it would understeer at 15 mph and we all had some practice doing figure 8's with that to see how steering less can get you to steer more. Then the car was set up for oversteer. I was the first in the series to go and I spun the car several times before I could get it to go around a corner at all. We did some figure 8's like that, then widened up the driving area to add some different corners, and then took the widened course in the opposite direction. By the end of the day we were all doing pretty good. The instructor even asked me if I was sandbagging at one point, but that just made me start spinning again. Overall I think it was a worthwhile experience.

Now I'm going to go play Midnight Club Los Angeles and do the opposite of everything I've learned today.

there's so many things that i cannot explain

On the advice of family members I've started reading "A Random Walk Down Wall Street." It is supposed to be a guide for investing, but so far it is mostly concerned with how people are stupid and irrational. Once I finish this book it might be interesting to go back to "Critical Mass" and go through what it says about patterns (or lack thereof) in the stock market.

Another week of work. But car control class on Saturday!

fell asleep on tuesday woke up monday afternoon

Sadly I'm not done ranting about alarm clocks. I found a model that looked like it was almost done properly so I decided to get it. You care to guess what store it was at? Best Buy? Target? Nope. Toys 'R Us. I could see going there if I wanted a pirate alarm clock, but why are they the only ones who sell decent normal ones as well?

So I get this thing home and plug it in. It says it has Indiglo. But of course it hasn't been done properly. Instead of lighting up when you hit the button, like in a proper alarm clock, it does an always-on and the button just sets the brightness. Fortunately one of the settings is off. But now if I want to check the time during the night, I have to hit the button four times instead of one. Outstanding work.

I then went to set the time. Pretty standard stuff. Except that it asks for the year as well. I don't need to know what year it is! I just need to know when to get my ass out of bed!!

Fortunately the new alarm clock doesn't seem to have any other stupid functions built in - no temperature or atomics - so I may be able to get some use out of it yet. For the record this is like the fourth time I've tried to replace my old one.

(I can just imagine an Apple alarm clock. Requires AT&T service and WiFi connection, charges you for a $10 firmware update to tell hours in addition to minutes, daily alarm downloads from iTunes store are DRM-enabled.)

While we're on the subject of badly designed things, it turns out that under New Facebook the posted items app won't actually let you post items. It's just for sorting things already posted. Way to put functions where nobody will find them, New Facebook.

The one bright spot in my badly designed day was that more Genesis Coupe news has come to light. It has gone on sale in SK, where the first review sounded pretty good, and a very well put together ad appeared on YouTube. Which is what I was trying to post.

october moon and rusty skies

I am trying to buy a new alarm clock, as my current one is in a bad way and I slept through it on Friday. The difficulty is that I absolutely require Indiglo, and that is exactly what you can't find. I saw all of two Indiglo clocks in stores, one with a ridiculous four-minute snooze and one billed as 'All-Night' Indiglo that never turns off. Which completely defeats the purpose. It's not much better online, where Amazon's results for 'Indiglo alarm clock' are three travel clocks, an iPod dock and a Tom Clancy book. Google chips in with an Indiglo thermometer.

It's also hard to find one that is just an alarm clock. I've ranted before about "atomic clocks." And telling the temperature just clutters up the display for the purpose of telling me what I already knew, that it's warmer in bed than out.

the stone gods did not make a sound

I randomly pulled up Top Gear's Africa special. Apart from the scenery I am amazed at how they were able to keep their heaps of junk moving every time they broke down. I know the presenters probably had car people with them but someone there was able to get them working again, and I admire that. It's also interesting how the cars evolve over time to adapt to whatever challenge they are taking on...at least two of them do.

I've been playing with the iPod touch for a few days, and unfortunately it doesn't work at work. There isn't a suitable WiFi network. Which I suppose makes sense, but it's no fun. So it's a funny thing. A cell phone, for example, is a cell phone 99% of the time because you can get a signal pretty much anywhere in the area. But with the iPod I am dependent on whatever WiFi signal I can get so half the time it's an amazing WiFi gadget and half the time it's just an over-designed iPod.

pirate watch: day 8

The thing with the Somalian pirates hijacking the Ukrainian ship full of tanks has been in the paper every day for a week, and a group of us have started following it at lunch. Lunchs haven't really had a story arc until now.

Today's news:

"Somali pirates on a hijacked cargo ship holding battle tanks and hostages said Thursday that they were ready to battle any commando-style rescue attempt."

where you'll be i'll know

Boss squared wants to change my role at work. I like my role at work.

We also have some pilot builds of a new pacemaker at work and we can't get rid of the damned things. We have tried four times to ship them and failed. There is nothing wrong with the parts - it's all paperwork.

I am still playing Spore but I have pretty much played the crap out of it. I have been rereading some books but I only have relatively few books with me so I'm kind of sick of them. Prodrive is weeks away and there are no good Firebirds online.

it was over before it started

Had another near miss on a Firebird - found an '87 Firebird Formula on CL that had the right color, wheels, transmission, engine...unfortunately when I called to see the car later that day it was in the process of being sold.

Finished rereading the Caves of Steel quartet - don't know what to read next. Maybe Catch-22 again.

I took the day off of work tomorrow, but I don't know what to do. At least I won't be at work.

you tell me i can't slow down

Diesel power has emerged as the dominating fuel in Le Mans series endurance racing, with Audi and Peugeot competing neck-and-neck for top honors. But that's about to change, if the Automobile Club de l'Ouest
(ACO) has anything to say about it. ACO, the body that organizes the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the LMS championships in Europe and North America, has announced new rules aimed at reducing the performance of the diesel racers to level the playing field with the gasoline-fueled competitors.

The new regulations would include air restrictors reduced in diameter by 10% and a decrease in allowable turbo boost on the oil-burners. The move is also aimed at impeding laps times in the name of safety, with a 3 minute 30 second La Sarthe lap time as the target, where the Peugeot 908s lapped the circuit in the low 3:08s this year.

Additional rule-book amendments include the banning of tire warmers, a reduction in the permissible size of rear wings and the allowance of only one wheel gun for each pit crew, all in an effort to reduce costs and raise lap times.

This is another reason I don't care for racing. You would think they objective would be to get around the track as fast as possible, but it's actually just to put on a good show. The only reason the C6.R and DBR9 battles at Le Mans were close was because the Corvette had to carry ballast.

Also, how can they argue these latest changes are for safety if they are banning tire warmers and reducing wing sizes? That's like saying my car is safer if you cut the brakes lines.

You could argue that by making the cars all the same you focus everything on the driver. But people-only sports don't put up with this. If one runner is faster than all the others they don't make him wear lead weights and a parachute. If someone is different that's just how they are.

I think racing cars should either be allowed to be as specialized as possible or left completely stock.