Month end wrap up

Yeah I know, it's not officially the end of February yet but I couldn't come up with a snappy title to this post and I didn't want to leave it blank like I've been doing lately.

Anyway, February is almost over. It's taken the cold weather with it apparently and just dumping snow on us now. I would guess we've received about 25 cm in total over the last week or so. I don't mind though as I'll take some snow and a slower drive to work over the extreme cold... or would I? It's a bit of catch 22. Either it's cold and clear or warmer and snowing. Canadian weather at it's finest I do believe.

On the Automotive front there are credible rumors that GM is looking to purchase Chrysler (including Dodge and Jeep) from Daimler. Given the dollar amount needed to seperate the companies (rough estimate of $70 billion which includes legacy costs associated with UAW workers) I figured it was just that - a rumor. Now however the talk is that Daimler will get a share of GM in lieu of the exchange of cash. Great, another company Daimler can try to suck dry. I believe Dave at Allpar.com says it best:

"Any merger would be fraught with problems as Mercedes relies heavily on Chrysler for its revenue. There’s the consulting fees, the royalties, Chrysler Financial, and the engineering work done in Auburn Hills (presumably at no cost) for Mercedes. Daimler would collapse without Chrysler, regardless of what the Germans and analysts like to say, because it survives by sucking cash out of its American industries, and Freightliner is drying up fast. Mercedes’ thirst for ill-gotten dollars could be quenched pretty quickly, though, with another “merger,” and a deal could include some provision for a cash flow to Stuttgart via royalties for a certain number of years, as well as the use of DAIMLERchrysler Financial for a certain number of years, to allow the Daimler parasite time to find another host. "

On another topic I gave Live for Speed another go online yesterday and was pleased to finish 8th out of 23 racers in a 6 lap race. The first lap was spent avoiding other collisions and even getting spun out by an overzealous fellow racer. I could make a report to a race steward but I figured that it didn't actually cost me anything in the end and I only have 40 miles logged online. I'll take some of the rough stuff to start just so I can handle the learning curve of racing online. I almost squeaked out a 7th place but didn't have the right gearing on the car for the track I was on. The track had a very long banked turn and my car topped out at 150km/h. The guy who took 7th place from me on the last lap could get up to about 160km/h, which in racing - even over a short distance - is hard to make up. Even harder when he can take turns as fast as you as well.

I guess I should show the car I've been racing. Live for Speed has no real production cars (there is a BMW Sauber F1 car and a two other one off cars) but the cars are based on real world counterparts. I'll give you a guess at what the UF1000 is based on. Hint - Mini ;-)

It's quite fun to drive and handles very well. My online forays have been to the STCC servers (Sim Touring Car Cup) where you earn licenses for racing. Racing clean, fast and finishing on the podium helps you obtain advanced licenses a bit quicker. They start at copper and go up to titanium. I've raced on the "New and Bronze" server and have to work my way up to the Silver and Gold server through clean racing. Poor and/or aggressive driving is no tolerated and if you do not follow the rules you can get suspensions or even banned.

Here's my little graphic I can use on forums and whatnot:

Now that I've bored you all to tears I figure I'll sign off ;-)

So the first dance lesson was more fun than I thought it would be. Our instructor said we move very well together and that we are fun to teach (so far anyway ;-). We just have to work on me leading ALL the time and Marla being willing to follow. I believe it's going to be a good thing for us and I felt really connected with Marla once we got our steps down.

The cold snap has finally broken. It's been warmer for the past few days and it's nice. We did get a few centimetres of snow last night but it's quickly turning to slush and just making cars dirty. It's nice to be able to go out without having to bundle up and look like the Michelin Man. Another month or so and the snow should be gone... or most of it anyway.

I got around to playing Live for Speed online a few nights back. It's quite cool being able to race against people from all over the world. My only problem is I was SO SLOW compared to the other people on the server. Afterwards I realized that it was most likely because my car had a regular street suspension setup and wasn't tuned for racing. Given I was only 3 seconds or so slower per lap than those with a good setup, I don't believe I did too badly my first time out. I did have a spectacular single vehicle crash at one point though. Poor old car wouldn't move much after that. Managed to limp back to the pits for repairs;-)

The basement is still coming along. The fireplace is finished now (with the exception of stone of course) and we've built the bulkheads needed for the main part of the basment. I drywalled it last night and it looks ok. Just have to put on the round corners and then some finishing mud to finish it. Then we'll be putting up the primer and then paint.

The Job, The Dance, The Life

It's still frickin' cold here. There's no getting used to -30 and below. The weatherman is calling for -4 come Friday, but we were told a month ago that this cold would only last a few days as well. Can't trust 'em ;-)

At my job I've been placed back in "lease activation" to "clean things up." Apparently the process had slowed down our funding department and was causing issues. So far I've streamlined the checklist we have (from two pages down to one) and have been given leeway as to what we actually need to do when reviewing files. The whole point of lease activation was to protect against fraud, but for some reason it had turned into something much larger than that and was growing out of control. I'm fairly sure everything is ok now. I'll be here for a few more weeks and then will train a new employee in credit to take over. It's not a difficult job but you do need to be able to pick up on subtle hints to prevent fraud.

Marla and I signed up for dance lessons, which will start this coming Saturday. I'm not sure how I feel about that and honestly I do feel a little uncomfortable about it. More due to the fact that I don't feel I have enough coordination for it. We'll given it a go though and I'm sure I'll grow to like it. We'll be focusing on Latin dances and do some Ballroom stuff after. I'll keep you posted on our experiences ;-)

Bugatti veyron Top Speed test

One of the guys from the British Automotive show, Top Gear, takes the world's fastest production car for a top speed test at Volkswagen's test track in Germany.

407 km/h. Yes, 407. That's 253 mph in a road legal car.

Check out the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8cqgInEPcY

Not much to report as of late. The Colts won the Superbowl rather decisively... after the initial touchdown return by the Bears on the opening kickoff. The weather here is cold... very cold. Winnipeg came close to setting a record a few days ago. It was -42 without the windchill and with it was -54 or something absurd like that.

I've still been messing around with my video games. It's split now between Guitar Hero and a PC game called Live for Speed. Last nights guitar hero session was particularly intense with songs such as Institutionalized by Suicidal Tendancies, Hanger 18 by Megadeth and Free Bird by Lynard Skynard. Free Bird is rather crazy near the end and is very long compared to other songs on Guitar Hero.

Live for Speed is a highly realistic racing game. While it doesn't feature real life cars or tracks, the actual physics of the game more than make up for it (many of the cars do look like real life cars, but are different enough to not need licensing). Compared to other racing/driving games I've played, this one feels most like driving a real car. It was quite disappointing when I tried playing Gran Turismo 4 after a spell of Live For Speed.

Marla is back on Friday after her month long trip away to Florida and New York. It's going to be quite nice to have her back and I'm sure she'll be very happy to be back at home =)

Wanted to wish my friend, Scott, good luck while he's in Afghanistan. He left last Sunday for his 6 month tour. I'm looking forward to updates on his own blog (http://scottyswords.blogspot.com) and wish him all the best representing Canada.