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I also have a Zune (120GB version). Definitely a great purchase, sounds better than the iPod classic I had to buy for work (which I immediately put RockBox on). Do wish it supported OGG or FLAC properly though.

Get yourself an expandable player and a 128GB microSDXC card and call it good.

Many of the older Sansa players choke once the number of tracks gets up into the thousands. This imposes a practical upper limit in the 16GB-32GB range.

Oh, you hadn't gotten Heavy Soul Sessions yet either? Could've sworn you had that one already. Yeah, it seems to be mostly heavier versions of earlier material.

So you picked up the last 3 DKs in this batch?

Lost a colleague today/late last night. She'd helped our organization through disasters from Katrina to the 2011 wildfires in Texas. She was a seriously awesome woman and an absolute rock.

edit: stroke at her desk and never woke up.

I don't want to claim closer friendship than we had--but it was a shock and we'll miss her.

So the 16th annual Drunk Monk Challenge is history. The past week has been very hectic getting everything ready for this. Things went pretty smoothly this year, with only a couple of glitches on competition day. For a competition of this size that's almost unheard of.

And now I'm caught back up on this thread.

So my dad took me to this place in November, and this happened:



And then some bottling happened three weeks later. (Damn, I haven't been posting on here for a while.)

Mmm, hefeweizen. (Enjoying one right now.)

Edit: Also, holy crap, I've been signed up here over a decade?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpRNjESk1v0

sorta kinda nsfw. It's a music video. I'm kinda like "wtf did I just watch?"

Captain Ned wrote:

Having to get up at 6AM on a Saturday morning & shave just to be thrown to the wolves is not pleasant. I will say that the meeting went a whole lot better than I feared.

http://www.rutlandherald.com/apps/pbcs. ... /703169905

When 1/3 of your total transaction flow isn't in the books, I'm in no position to say anything about the books. Oh, and the picture is Dad.

Looks like the article is behind a paywall.

Had a nightmare with my car yesterday. It had started misfiring at partial throttle and a check with an OBD-II scanner didn't show any faults or pending faults, but the live data showed the O2 sensor was a bit lazy so I replaced that on Wednesday.

Thursday I still had the misfire and it now showed cylinder 4 misfire on the OBD-II scanner. I left it parked Friday and went and got some parts. It's an 05 Subaru 2.5 RS and the plugs are down long tubes that go through the valve cover. I knew the seals on the tube for cylinder 3 was leaking so I got a complete valve cover gasket set and a set of plugs. I get the right hand side (1&3) done fine, both had been leaking a bit, but the plugs looked fine. The left hand side (2&4) was anther matter. Both were leaking and plug 2 was fine, but the first bit of bad news was when I unscrewed plug 4 and pulled out the socket. The socket came out with only the terminal from the plug and its stalk down the insulator. I used another socket that gripped on the insulator rather than the terminal and got the plug out of the tube to find the ground electrode had been melted away. I can't believe the thing only misfired sometimes, I'm seriously impressed by the power of the ignitor.

I thought this was bad enough but it was only just getting started, I try to put a new plug in number 4 but the thread is stripped. I always lubricate the threads and use a torque wrench with the reduced torque figure for lubricated threads so it must have been all the other damage that meant the threads were just done in. I got a helicoil set and did the grease on the tap with multiple cleanings trick to avoid having to pull the head so hopefully that's OK and didn't have any chips go through to the cylinder. I've got the helicoil in, new plugs, new wires and a new gasket set. I'm just waiting for the sealant on the helicoil to set before giving it a gently test this afternoon. Hopefully it's good otherwise it's going to have to go to a mechanic for at least the head off and maybe even a look at the piston.

Moral of the story is to keep an eye on those spark plug tubes regularly and replace the seals as soon as they show any leaks at all, and not wait a few months for the temperature to warm up when it is nicer to work on the car. I must have had enough oil leak to cause the lead to short in the tube, making it misfire occasionally but also heating and potentially setting fire to the oil enough to damage the plug and the plug threads when I removed it.

I had no idea it was that bad from the driving symptoms. Every other car I've had has been far more sensitive to the ignition system not being perfect. With the plug in that state I would expect it to barely if ever actually fire, but the idle was smooth and I only got the misfire after spending more than 5 minutes on the highway. Fingers crossed on my fix working...

Sounds like the ignition computer did a fantastic job of compensating for the problem, until it couldn't any more. Surprising you didn't get a trouble light sooner.

On the NA the plugs are not too bad, RHS is just air intake hose off (two clips and 1 worm drive clip). LHS is pull the battery and washer fluid bottle (2 bolts on each plus electrical connections). I could see the turbo being way worse. I think on the NA that #2 is actually the longest run on the header, but yes, that side of the engine is way longer than the RHS.

Well, that might have been a record for shortest lifespan for a bumper. SWMBO just got her bumper replaced a week or two ago, and today she decided to do another field test on it. Maybe I should tell her that the goal is to NOT get in an accident? OTOH, neither one was her fault so I suppose I can't blame her too much.

I know a guy who drove his brand new car out of the dealer's lot and got T-boned at the first junction. He was fine but the car was a write-off, so he walked back down the street and said "I'll have another one of those, please"

Cleaned my monitor today. Is this really my monitor? It SO CLEAR!

An awesome lifehack for your Tuesday evening: If you ever want to feel popular and loved, just give away old furniture on Craigslist.