dlloyd.net – The World of Darren (and Dawn)

The weather the last few days has been FANTASTIC for Portland. Fairly cool, but very sunny and clear. It was the perfect weather for the season opening event at PIR yesterday. I actually forgot my wallet and as a result took no laps at all. I was volunteering with Oregon PCA and spent the day doing tech inspections (good way to meet nice–and not-as-nice–people with sweet cars) and helping get people going on ridealong laps in and out of their cars. Was pretty awesome, all things considered. Now that Eric has the new tow rig, I have a feeling things will be starting with preparing Red for the race season this year!

I feel like every time I mention Pilots basketball around here they have a bit of a stumble…after doing so well they lost to LMU last night (a team we beat by 40 in Portland). So, unless St. Mary’s falls apart, we have to win our games (including the game against currently 4th San Francisco this week) to lock in third place. And, assuming we do lock in 3rd, we’ll know that after our first game (5th vs. 8th) that St. Mary’s is next. Ah, the wacky WCC.

Haven’t been following too much Olympics coverage – maybe a little bit here and there. I’m annoyed at NBC – I’m in the same freaking timezone as Vancouver, yet they still tape delay stuff. So, if your coverage doesn’t start until 8, at that point I’m busy doing other things.

And finally, could the media stop making a big deal out of Danica Patrick running NASCAR? Dale Earnhardt Jr. I think said it best (I’ll paraphrase, as I can’t find a transcript): “She’s a race car driver and she’s very competitive, there’s no reason she wouldn’t be good.” But, her own separate item in ESPN’s score ticker at the bottom of the screen? Come on, that’s reserved for “Tiger has 7 8 9 mistresses” or Kobe Bryant rape charges. Danica’s good–a damn sight better than a bunch of the other drivers out there–but the fact that she has boobs has turned this into a circus.  Having said that, I’m probably looking at sleeping on the couch here at Danica Patrick fan central. 

Yep, I’m on the Saints bandwagon. I’ve had a soft spot for New Orleans for some time, and not just because of Katrina. I needed a team to root for, with the 49ers and Raiders circling the drain the last few years. I’m not much of a Seahawks fan, clearly. So, when the Super Bowl came ’round and pitted the gritty Saints against the Colts (who are becoming like the Cowboys, Patriots, Yankees, and Dodgers to me, teams to hate on principle), I was firmly in the camp of the “Who dat” nation. (For those not in the know, the full statement is “Who dat? Who dat? Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints? Who dat? Who dat”) Thankfully, everyone here for our Super Bowl party was also in the Saints camp!

It’s nice to have something to force you to clean up the house! We keep the house fairly tidy, but often have stacks of papers or something on the kitchen table, or on the floor, that sort of thing. No big deal when it’s just the two of us, but when we have 7 people over to watch the game and they’re all bringing food, that starts to complicate things a bit! As a result, some deep cleaning happened in the run-up to the Super Bowl. I guess that’s a good thing, especially with me working from home more often. I’ve done quite a bit to get the office (even more) organized and clean.  Now if only I could get my garage door opener up and working!

Speaking of the office…I think the desktop is finally happy. I was able to RMA all 8GB of memory to Kingston and get replacement sticks. I tested the replacement memory for about 48 hours with Memtest and Prime95 without any errors. Obviously, since it took about 6 months for the problem to manifest itself initially, we’ll see.

Racing season has finally arrived, hooray! The 24 Hours of Daytona happened at the end of January, and Nascar kicks off its season at Daytona this weekend. Danica Patrick will be running a partial Nationwide season in addition to running IndyCar full time. The whole “OMG, girl driving Nascar” thing is non-news to me. She knows how to drive and as far as I can tell has made it on talent, not money.  We’re about a month away from F1 starting back up, and about two months from Eric getting back out on track.  I figure that also means lots of work on the red car, to boot.

Pilot basketball is winding down, as well.  UP, Gonzaga, and St. Mary’s are all in the hunt for 1st and 2nd in conference, which is pretty damn awesome (especially in light of the fact that in the past, UP’s looking at 6th or worse).  Dawn and I are going to Vegas for the tournament this year because a seat in the rhythm section was offered to me.  I think the tourney needs a little more cowbell!  We’ve been asked by USF to play for them as well, so that’s pretty awesome – twice the music, twice the fun.  Plus, well, it’s Vegas. 

In other music news, Dawn and I were lucky to be involved with a UP CD project with music by Maureen Briare and recorded by her husband Tim.  It’s actually pretty awesome; I was able to contribute voice and instrumental tracks to the effort.  “Ring Out Your Joy!” is available in the UP Bookstore.

This hasn’t been the best month thus far. Our California trip was fantastic, but I’m not sure if our home is exacting its revenge, or what! January never is all that great at work – it’s our busiest month of the year. Last week was full of 60+ calls at 60+ minutes. That’s normal! The good news is that the customers all know, and even expect it.

Thankfully this week has been a little better from the work front. That’s about the extent of the grace afforded to us.

I’ve had some bad luck with my computer, which sure makes it tough to work from home! I think at this point I’m fighting bad memory of some sort – two reformats since I returned from California…and I’m not sure if I’ve got it sorted yet, but I’ll be borrowing some memory from Eric to try and sort things out. I love technology…until it breaks me.

The straw that broke the camel’s back this week? Haiti. Two UP grads from the class of 2009 have been volunteering in Haiti for the last several months. Rachel Prusinski, the 2009 valedictorian made it out with some broken bones. Molly Hightower, on the other hand, didn’t make it out. Dawn and I didn’t know Molly all that well, but we did know who she was.

It’s a scary thought, someone our age out there like that. Our thoughts are with the Hightowers and their friends.

This is a new one for me…it really doesn’t feel like 11 days until Christmas! Either time’s moved real quickly since Thanksgiving or I just wasn’t paying attention. Event being peripherally attached to UP hasn’t really made it noticeable–sure, there were Christmas concerts to play in (Sleigh Ride, even), and this week is finals week, but I’m not setting my calendar by the academic year anymore. It’s depressing, a la Charlie Brown…something just doesn’t feel right this year.  Even with the tree up, the lights on the house, and everything else…something’s missing.

I guess we’ll have to make the most of it with the family this year!

Man oh man, what a weekend. I’m still decompressing from the first ever a)24-hour event in PIR history and b)the first ever ChumpCar World Series race. Some of you know about this event, some of you don’t. A bunch of us local 944 types put together a beat-to-hell ‘83 944 to run in a 24-hour endurance race for $500 cars. The only way it worked was that 5 of the 7 drivers/crew own or work on a street or track 944. We had the knowledge and parts, and that kept the thing on track.

The volume of crap (tools, shelter, chairs, food, spare parts, everything) took up tons of space, but most of it all showed up Friday so we could get set up, run the car and drivers through technical inspection, and get ready for the event. We had everything we needed to fix any problem except a blown engine, blown clutch, or blown gearbox (by the way, those are the 3 big issues on 944s!).

Green flag flew at 12:30 Saturday afternoon. Two of our drivers race 944s in ICSCC/SCCA events, one of them has actually driven in the 12 Hours of the Cascades. He drove the first stint and after two hours, we were up to 4th overall. His stint had the majority of the rain that we saw all weekend, and it was still a pretty wet track when our next driver went out. He was still getting used to the car, re-acclimating himself to the track, and doing it all in the wet. Several spins in a short period of time found us being black flagged, where the folks in the penalty box rotated our (directional) rear tires from left to right. That doesn’t work so well in the wet, so we swapped them back and went back out. Things were looking great until about 4:30, when the fuel pump seized on us, requiring a tow. It took us about 2 hours to replace the pump–our spare pump was leaking. Thankfully, the race had a two hour break built in, which allowed us to get one of our driver’s cars in the pits, pull that fuel pump, and go back out on track! We only lost an hour of race time. Everything continued to run swimmingly (well, we had some real annoying in-car radio issues that took me until about 1AM to track down), so I headed to bed around 2 (or 1AM, since the race took place over daylight savings!) I woke up around 4AM and found out I’d missed some fun!

It started to get quite foggy after I went to bed, so people were having issues navigating the track and being able to see what was happening. Now, those who know PIR know that there’s normally only one chicane, the Festivals. ChumpCar, in an effort to slow the field a bit, added a chicane to the back “straight”–plastic barriers filled with water. A few cars had hit them in the 9 hours or so, so the chicane was getting smaller and smaller as the event went on. One of our drivers came through the area quickly and saw three cars going very slowly through the chicane. Instead of hitting them, he went to the right and demolished the rest of the chicane with the passenger side of the car. They guys had to cut the front valence off the car, but kept going. Imagine my surprise waking up at 4AM and seeing front end parts on the ground in the pits! The race was red flagged at about 4:30 due to really bad fog, so we stopped until 8AM (they extended the race almost 2 hours to try and get us the made up time, hats off to the ChumpCar officials). Before restarting, we were informed that we’d be seeing a black flag for our shenanigans on the back straight and would have to serve a penalty. Previous teams had served almost 2 hours in impound, so we figured that’s what awaited us. At 9:45 we ended up with a 1.25 hour impound, during which the “wrecking crew” (first and second semester automotive techs at Portland Community College) deflated all four tires, removed the plug wires, removed the rear wheels, and hid our rear lugnuts in the car. We “found” all the lugnuts, replaced the plug wires, re-inflated and remounted the tires, all in under 15 minutes. The wrecking crew was amazed, but their crew chief told them he wasn’t surprised at all–we knew the car, what we were doing, and were smart enough to bring spare lugnuts! We also asked around in the pits if our “public service” of removing the chicane was appreciated…we collected enough money to pay for most of the barriers.

And so, at 10:30, back out on track we went. Everything went perfectly–no real car problems–until 50 minutes left, when we suddenly lost all shifting. 25 minutes later, we’d fixed the shift linkage and gone back out, finishing the race. All told, we completed 447 laps (about 880 miles) in 24 hours, finishing 21st out of 38 cars. I’ll freely admit I expected major mechanical problems, but it just didn’t happen! We even collected a trophy for our donation to Portland Community College (our “fee” for destroying the barriers), to much cheering and applause.

All things considered, this was an AMAZING event. Thanks so much to John and the ChumpCar staff for putting together a great event. To the other competitors, hats off to you for a very clean, very enjoyable race. Words can’t quite express the thanks to the CORNER WORKERS, without which we can’t race at all. And, finally, to my drivers…Eric, James, Chris, Cliff, Greg, and Don…you guys rock. All the driving, all the working, great job. I had a blast and didn’t sit in the driver’s seat at all!

We’ll be back!

And, as always, PHOTOS are posted.  Video is on YouTube, too: Finish; Return to Pits

I spent all day (literally) at the race track for the 34th running of the 12 Hours of the Cascades. It’s the annual 12 hour endurance race here in Portland, and boy was it a wet one! Last year I was only able to come out for a few hours in the middle, this time I was there start-finish in the pits of the Matrix Integrated 944s owned by Hal Hilton. Photos are coming, but I stayed in the pits this time, so it’s lots of guys jumping over walls with tires and whatnot. The car ran fairly well, it seemed. Torrential downpour made things interesting in the late morning, including a bit of an off-road excursion towards the end of the first driver’s stint. Let’s just say a new fiberglass bumper is needed. That lost about 6 laps, a few aero bits, and what I believe was first in class at the time. The rain came and went, claiming a Nissan Z (whole right side smashed by wall), E30 BMW, and a Sports Racer (think a Le Mans Prototype, but smaller). His crash was right on the front straight, where he like hydroplaned and drifted the tail right into the pit wall. Other cars were in and out of the pits, including the 968 turbo (2.5L 8-valve 944 turbo engine in 968 chassis) right next to us. Eric and I went to Eric’s place and got them the computer piece they needed to get out and finish.

As for the 944s, things looked great until 8:20 (just over 1:30 to go), when the bolts holding the passenger driveshaft to the transmission sheared off. That was game over.

Watching cars lap PIR at speed in the dark is amazing…ESPECIALLY standing along the outer pit wall during the last laps and having people drive by 5 feet away at 100+ mph with everyone cheering and clapping. It really is something else.

Like I said, photos soon. Photos are posted here.

The Latin motto of the Holy Cross (translated, “The cross, our only hope”) permeates a lot of the recent happenings this month.  This past Tuesday was the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, so I was able to join Mo and the Chapel Choir for my favorite mass of the year.  The Chapel Choir is recording a CD this year as well to commemorate the completion of  the new bell tower at UP.  It’s a stunning visual and aural sight, that’s for sure.  I took a few photos of the tower last night, but am working on a plethora of photos as part of the Chapel Choir CD project.

Dr. Porsche has smiled upon the 944 racing efforts.  Eric’s new shiny exhaust arrived in time for last weekend’s race, and it did not blow up!  Very sweet system from Greg Fordahl up in Seattle.  As usual, there are a few things that need to be done before the next race in October.  Hopefully that includes a test of the radio system we’ll use both in Eric’s car and the ChumpCar campaign.  Chumpy is at the cage shop getting its roll cage built right now.

The sporting world is looking up, too.  UP soccer continues to dominate, the Irish defeated Michigan State this weekend, and the Niners and the Raiders won!  I like that!  All we need are the Sharks to embrace Lord Stanley’s cup…  F1 is getting more and more interesting, with the second ever night race from Singapore this coming weekend.  This season looked like a runaway season for Brawn and likely still is, but may come down to the final race to determine whether Jenson Button or Rubens Barrichello will take the driver’s championship.

Never been pulled over before today. On my way to Matrix Integrated here in town to have the S2 aligned. Stopped at the first stop sign after leaving my house, facing a cop car on other side of intersection. I go, he goes. In my mirrors I see him turn around. I say to myself, “Well, I hope he just got a radio call,” as his lights go on. I pull over…and he’s behind me.

Pulled over for “no front plate” (which 1. isn’t legal in Oregon, it’s a secondary offense that must be tacked onto another, like speeding, running red light, etc., and 2. if you want to split hairs, I DO in fact have a front plate. It’s just European, with my OR tag number).

Friendly enough officer let me know what was up, that Oregon requires it, etc. Wrote me a warning and let me know that it’s no big deal, but some cop with a bad day might turn it into one so I should put a plate on as soon as I can.

Man, 5 minutes later…

Lots of good things happening. Eric is racing this weekend after locally locating some exhaust that will bolt onto the car. Looking forward to a carnage-free weekend.

It might be preseason, but FOOTBALL is back.  HOORAY!

The Voodoo Doughnut truck came to Sage today, so there were some unusual doughnuts about today. That was fun, and a great way to celebrate a promotion. That’s right, I have moved up to Senior analyst effective today. It’s been a few months in the making, and I’m pleased at the speed with which it came through.

How am I celebrating? With one of my last two bottles of La Rochelle.

Spent the weekend at the track this weekend. Okay, spent part of the weekend at the track. Seven 944s came, 4 were left by Sunday. One car was out thanks to a rod bearing starting to go. What really sucks is that the SAME guy had the SAME problem at the Rose Cup back in June. This was in a different motor! Another car (a car that lost it’s wheel–literally–during the Rose Cup) had a transmission problem that caused a spin. The spin itself wasn’t damaging, but the forces on the car caused the rear hatch to open. It opened more than 90 degrees and shattered on the roof of the car. Glass was everywhere; in the car, on the track, etc. A quick trip to Darren’s parts cache and a new hatch was installed (after much vacuuming). The transmission problem, however, was weird. We put the car up on jackstands in the back, then started the car. Put the clutch in, then put car in first gear…the driver’s side wheel immediately starts spinning. Give it some gas, and the passenger wheel would think about maybe wanting to spin. Very unusual.

In the sprint race Saturday afternoon, Eric suddenly got VERY loud–the exhaust pipe had sheared off at the front of the muffler. While it was probably fixable last night so we could race today, he decided it wasn’t worth it. Hopefully we will be getting things sorted out so he can race this coming weekend. I’m getting photos posted from the weekend of all the carnage and racing action.  They’re located in the PIR 2009 gallery, which I’ve linked here for lazy people like me.

I have switched from Windows 7 RC1 to Windows 7 RTM.  It’s pretty snazzy.  Not much different between the RC and RTM releases, but this one won’t time out on me at some point.  Hooray for working on the bleeding edge of technology!  The only issue I’ve noticed so far is that I’m unable to log into the photo gallery here on the site in Firefox in Windows 7.  I can log in via IE on any computer, and can log in from Firefox from the mini.  Very odd.  Could be a residual side-effect from the server migration.  We’ll see.