David Boone

Saturday Mission Pics

Unorganized dump of a bunch of pics I took at Mission on the 24th.

http://iboone.net/pics/2004-07-24/

Short Story

A while back (years and years) I lost my license for no reason other than "too many tickets." Now, that's not such an interesting story to tell, and I felt I needed a far better alibi, and the following spewed forth...

I didn't realize that people believed it until, at the track a good time later, I was asked if I my lawyer got me out trouble. It's not really true.. not really.

Some asked about my license since I mentioned that I had lost it.

Well.. here's the story.

Down at the local street races... watching the races, etc etc. Rice boi's doing their burnouts, mustangs flaunting their 5 litres of displacement.. etc etc. The usual that occurs all over the continent in varying shapes and forms.

Anyways... guy comes up to me wants to race. Ask what he drives, a '99 Mustang GT, what he's got done to it, pulleys, chip, exhaust, "supercharger in the garage," bla bla bla. So we wait a few races, line up... see headlights, pull over, wait... finally get lined up and ready to go. He does the burnouts that the domestics seem to be so fond of, merrily scrubbing off rubber like there's no tomorrow, making sure all the racing ho's hear the roar of his 4.6 litres of furry. I wait there patiently in my beat up '90 AWD, willing to let him have his moment of fame, content in the knowledge that it'd soon be over when the little four banger gets a change to stretch it's legs in a patented howl of turbo induced horsepower.

Finally the road is suitably covered in molten rubber, and the girlies suitably impressed, and he pulls forward to the line... I stretch my fingers and wipe my sweaty hands off on my pants. I mentally prepare myself for the domestic slaying that I am about to unleash, when the mustang owner pops the hood. "WTF now???" I ask myself in amused confusion. A quick dash, a twiddle with something under the hood, and he's finally really ready to race. What exactly called his attention under the hood I'll never know.

Finally, we both get to rev our engines as we wait for the arms to fall. A second stretches into a seeming infinity as I delicately keep the engine RPM's right where they like to be. The arms fall, the clutch comes out, the gas pedal hits the floor in a cacophony of squealing tires and protesting drive train. The oft-witnessed AWD launch ensues, and the mustang falls a length or two behind while his rear tires scrabble for traction on the abused pavement.

As any history prof will tell you, history repeats itself. Now wasn't the time for that rule to be broken, and as I pulled the gear shifter back, praying for that sweet "clunk" that indicates a successful shift and the beginning of the 30-60mph dash, I gritted my teeth, half expecting what came next. Sure enough, my transmission abused me the way only a transmission can, howling in agony and no doubt spraying metallic chunks through the guts of my torque multiplying device. History just kept right on repeating itself, as I pushed, prodded and beat the syncro's into submission. For reasons unknown to man, the need to actually look at the shifter had allowed me to go a bit off road, and I looked up as I heard gravel spit up from under my tires.

The shifter decided to pop into gear just as I had looked up, and my legs instinctively did their job, popping the clutch and pegging the throttle as I steered back onto the road. As what usually happens when one finds themselves on the gravel unintentionally, I overcorrected and swerved back onto the road, just as the mustang flashed past, no doubt grinning ear to ear as he muttered something about piece-of-shit-rice-burning-imports.

Now this just wasn't right, V8 or not, that stupid Horse car thingy shouldn't be ahead of me. Unwilling to admit defeat, I screamed after him, as the dual exhaust seemed to laugh in my face. Now this road is actually pretty narrow, being but a horse path which is a lousy excuse for a "road." You have enough room for 2 cars, 12 inches between 'em, and a few beer guzzling eediots on the side. I tucked in behind the Mustang as my beat up 16g forced 20psi of air down the motors throat. My 2 litres of displacement did their job, and did it mighty well once again, delivering their thousands of joules of energy through the complaining drivetrain and to the road.

By this time, I had gone through another harrowing shift, managing to stuff the transaxle into third gear with little more than the crunch of syncros which had long given up any hope of a long life. The crankshaft was spinning at a blurry 7000 RPM, hanging onto its pistons for dear life as they changed direction two hundred and thirty times per second. My vision had blurred around the edges, and all that had my attention was the Mustang, as it slowly got nearer and nearer and began to fall to the side. I trusted my central nervous system's reflexes to take care of driving, using the information passed to it by my eyes and ears to guide the 3500 odd pounds of hurtling metal around that moving obstruction on the road.

So intent was I on this mustang, that my peripheral vision told me little other than the fact that the dotted line had long ago ceased to be dotted, and I failed to notice the two cars sitting on the side road ready to turn into the space which was destined to contain our cars in the very near future. No doubt the other drivers eyes were turned to his mirrors, where that "oh but he has a turbo" car was quickly gaining on him. An alarm bell was ringing now however, as part of my cerebrum (or was it the cerebellum that does this stuff??) took note of the problematic physics that were about to take place if everything continued on its present course and speed. The alarm bell grew louder as the RPMs continued to gain in fourth gear, (I can't recall doing it, but I had shifted into fourth by this time.)

Finally, my cerebrum/cerebellum panicked and grabbed my eyeball to stear it in the right direction. This was percieved by me as a twitch in my eye, but it was enough to notice the tons of steel moving into our path. This was communicated to the rest of my nervous system, but, as nervous systems are prone to do, it over reacted with a much to swift and way to "unsmooth" application of brakes. The tires, which had just been employed to provide as much friction as possible in the one direction, cursed loudly as they were forced to undo what they had been doing for the last 15 odd seconds. The brain, as usual, was intimidated by this swift response of the spine, and locked up.

Eyes wide open and pointed dead ahead, hands locked on the wheel, brake to the floor, I began to slide. In what seemed to stretch into several minutes, I noticed, tho my eyes were pointed the same way, that I was looking at the trees on the side of the road rush past at an unbelievable pace. For some reason, the image of an electrical utility box with its huge "High Power, WARNING" stickers imprinted itself into my short term memory, and soaked into the long term, as I still can picture it perfectly now. This served, however, to grab my brain and shake it up a bit, freeing it from the evil clutches of panic. The brain was working now, however, its best efforts were not enough, and no where in its data banks could it find the proper response to "Sliding sideways on pavement, tires locked up, 100+mph." The situation was passed off to the logic compartment (somewhere in the left hemisphere no doubt) where it was processed faster than a Cray calculating a move against a chess master.

The result? "Do nothing, ur screwed, best bet, stay on the brakes." With all four locked up, chances are you stay moving straight, which was as much as one could hope for in this situation. The curve in the road was a short few hundred feet ahead. Normally navigated at ridiculous speeds, but usually survivable, the story was different in this situation. The puddle of macaroni that guides me about life had by now been stirred into a frenzy, with every synapse firing frantically in a rush to analyze the situation. Things came clear, and every rock on the road seemed to come into focus as things slowed down like a slow-motion rerun. I saw the mustang thru the side view, where it had continued to go @ WOT, probably laughing at the silly import that fell so far behind so quick.

The brake lights had lit up by now, but it continued to go straight. Straight to where one car had pulled out onto the road in the manner common to the older folk, wide into the center of the road, accelerating as slowly as possible, and taking all the time in the world to pull back into their own lane. He didn't have a chance. I came to a shuddering hault about 20 feet from the entangled remains of mustang and what appeared to be a tempo.

However, what held my attention was the car I saw straight ahead. It was a Caprice. White. Had those cool holiday lights on top y'know. I sat there for what must have been at least 10 seconds. Just staring. He was staring back. I'm not quite sure who was shocked more. Like meeting up with a bear in the woods, I moved slowly, not wanting to scare it. My right hand was glued to the steering wheel, and it took the signal of 5000 strong synapses before it responded to my pleas to let go. I slowly reached down to the shifter, and fumbled with it. I moved like a toddler, and it took me a few tries before I managed to get it into first.

Amazingly, my left foot had the clutch in and the engine was running, idling as well as any DSM could rightfully be expected to idle. In a move that still amazes me now when I think of it, I revved to 6k, dumped the clutch and launched clean past the simmering bacon. The launch was harsh however, and the ride didn't get better. I finally knew just what it was like to drive a flintstones car. The fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view mirror danced like a monkey on hot coals.

I was committed now however. I kept on it, and saw the cop in the mirror, doing a quick 180 to take pursuit. Now I'm sure you're hoping for a great chase story, and if this was a movie, I'd be sure to put it in. Luckily however, (or unluckily, depending on your perspective,) no great movie mogul from Hollywood is paying me for this script, and I can stick to the truth, and nothing but the truth, with but a few literary embellishments.

A few corners, my car was still thumping along strong, but the handling sucked, as square tires are worse than Kumho 712's with gay tread patterns. The addition of the other cop tipped the balance, and I was forced to take some roads that led in all the wrong directions. Coming around this one bend, the cop figured I had had enough, and rear ended me rather violently. Off the road I go, and I look up to find myself looking down the wrong end of a rather vicious looking firearm (no wonder they're illegal in Canada, it's scary being on the wrong end of 'em.)

I had always wanted to check out the inside of a cop car, and lo-and-behold, the kind Protectors of Society and All That Is Good and Right offered me a peak. I got to ride all the way to the station, and they even towed my car! Great guys, those piglets. The rest of the day and the next day was pretty boring, but don't worry, me and my lawyer will figure it out. My lawyer-man even figures I might get a set of new (round) tires out of the deal due to some technicality. Thanks for listening.

Why redhat sucks?

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=119185

The comments on that bug are good for a laugh if nothing else. "It's not a bug, yes it is, no it's not, moron, not a bug, closed, reopened, moron, not a bug!" :P

Though it seems pretty clear to me that anytime the RPM database is corrupted that would be a bug.

Get your dog pheromones here

People are friggin' weird: ComfortZone� with D.A.P.�. The D.A.P. stands for... wait for this.. Dog Appeasing Pheromone. Do I really want to be constantly smelling lactating animal pheromones????

Engadget Entry

Transformers

Lotsa cool flash out there, here's another one.

Canon XL2 camcorder announced

Canon just announced the new XL2 Mini-DV camera, a follow-up to the XL1.

New features include 24fps mode and true 16:9 widescreen filming. Accepts all the XL1 and XL1S lenses, and there's also a new 20X zoom lens.

I want one. Check out the Press Release for more info.

Counterstrike Fun

If you've played CS (Counterstrike) you'll love this: www.pwned.nl

Bad language, not work/child safe, etc etc

Bike Stunts at Boundary Bay

You won't see this kind of riding everyday. Stunt School happens every Wednesday at Boundary Bay Airport in Delta.

Extreme Riderz

(Slimy) Pagerank Tricks

While poking around the stats for www.eaglecars.com I saw something interesting. It showed a *lot* of hits coming from some rather, shall we say, questionable, sites. Click here to see the stats.

Checking logs further showed 3500 identical requests (for the stats page) from the same IP with the referer set to these sites.

I guess the idea is that this gets them a link on my stats page, which gives them good google juice. Shady bastards. Time to tell google to not index the /stats/ stuff with some robots.txt magic.