Well, I sold the Durango almost a month ago and part of my “agreement” with the wife, was that 1) the new car had to have four doors 2) the new car had to have as many airbags as possible, and 3) i could only spend the money i saved and not dip into our savings. Well, two outa three ain’t bad :)I’ve been looking for a VW Jetta or Audi A4/A6, as well as a couple of other makes and models for the last month and a half. Maybe longer since I think I started looking around before the Durango was sold. I’ve always admired Sean’s GTI and Erik’s various dubbs. I was *this* close to picking up an 03 Jetta GLI in Louisville, because the price was right and I really like the GLI model. It had some issues tho – check engine light and some other stuff. I expanded my search on autos.yahoo.com past the 100 miles to 200 miles and found another GLI 117 miles away in Columbus. It wasn’t in the price range, but Emily was VERY gracious and let me break rule #3. She was happy I found a newer car, with full airbags all around, and it rates extremely high on the NHTSA (4’s and 5’s, with 5 being the highest). Also got “good” in the government testing, which is the highest.
I called the seller and it turned out a guy from Louisville was having a mechanic come up to check out the car that night, and was planning on driving up Tuesday (today) to buy it, if it checked out. I wasn’t about to pass up this deal so I placed a deposit on my Mastercard. So, Emily and I drove up to Columbus after work last night to C and L Performance Auto Sales . We met with Courtney, the owner. He told us he just got off the phone with the Louisville guy and that guy was NOT happy. That made me smile. While we were talking and starting paperwork, the guy from L-Ville called two more times!
Emily and I were extremely impressed with Courtney and C and L Performance Auto Sales. He had a lot of great performance oriented vehicles on his lot and was very open about all of them when I asked questions. We were in and out of there pretty quickly and painlessly. The gas tank was on “E”, and he apologized profusely and even gave us gas money out of his own pocket as we were leaving!
The ride home was about 130 miles and went very well. The heated leather seats are amazing (the GLI includes sport seats with extra bolstering in the sides and seat). The Monsoon stereo is very bassy and sounds great. The cabin is pretty quiet compared to my previous talons and even Emily’s Mazda 3. I have a huge roll of dynamat in my garage waiting to make it even better! The VR6 engine is awesome. I can’t believe how linear and strong it feels. The GLI also comes with a 6 speed manual transmission and is a blast to drive. Here are some pics from the AutoTrader ad. I’m waiting for some nicer weather to take some pics of my own:
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YouTube – Verstehen Sie Spass? – Unsichtbar / Invisible
Crazy video of a trick mirror that doesn’t show someone’s reflection. A hidden camera joke for a German TV show.
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Max & Erma’s triples loss in 3Q, considers sale – Business Courier of Cincinnati:
Saw this on an RSS feed and it simply doesn’t surprise me. Emily and I ate there a number of times since they opened in Crestview Hills and every time the service was lousy. I know I am sometimes picky with my service, but it is VERY rare that I won’t leave a at least a 15% tip (I normally leave 20% or more). We always had problems with their service, the kitchen, the food, etc. Its a shame to, because they have some nice, unique, and yummy menu items. Even Ashley blogged about this. We’ve called their corporate offices and sent them emails about the bad service we received. Nothing has really changed. Oh well, there are too many of those style restaraunts anyway.
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Yesterday, Emily and I went to Best Buy and bought a new gadget. Four our anniversary (Aug 9th, so just a little early), we bought a Nikon D40x Digital SLR camera. I have friends who have the D50, D80, D40 and D200 and love them. I went with Nikon instead of my favorite brand, Olympus, because the lense options and after market support for the Nikon seemed to be stronger. Guess I need to start brushing up on those skills I learned during my two photography courses back at Murray State! This is the camera:
Emily has started playing with it and taking photos of the cat, dog, and some other things. The image quality is flat out amazing. The detail it pics up in Macro, zoom, and normal range is pretty amazing.
Now what extras should I buy? I think we are going to get a lense hood/shade and a filter. I found an article on Digital -Photography-School.com that lists the 10 most popular lenses for Nikon DSLR cameras, so I can use that as a reference.
Click here to see some pictures we’ve taken so far.
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Google Moon – Lunar Landing Sites
Thought this was pretty interesting, and highly detailed. Check it out and make sure you zoom in *ALL* the way!
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IrfanView (link here!)
This is a very popular image editing software. Its great for people like me who take hundreds of photos and then need to resize them in a large batch to put on the web. Also has some other nifty features like converting, printing, slide shows, etc. Give it a whirl!
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Monty Pythons Spamalot ™ – Presented by AddictingGames
This is a fun Monty python flash game. You basically play either as a Stinky Frenchie or a Silly English Person (I only played as an English). If you play the English team, you have to catapult various barn animals at the approaching French, Black Knight and other characters in the movie. Fun stuff!
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CDBurnerXP Pro – free burning solution
I’m often asked what software I use for CD/DVD Burning. I’ve used Nero, CDRWin, and Roxio. They work well…but they cost money! CDBurnerXP is a great bit of software that will burn CD/DVD/ISO/MP3/etc very easily. I’ve used it on three different computers and reccomended it to people in the past.
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Free Firewall, Anti Virus, File Backup, etc. Solutions
Comodo is a company that sells SSL certificates and they are trying to get their name out as a “security provider” company. Their techs put together some nice looking software packages – and they are free for personal and business use! They have antivirus, firewall, antispam, backup, and more…all free! I believe I read their firewall software won an award from PC magazine as an editor’s choice or something. I have it installed and so far I really like it. I’m going to try out their antispam and antivirus software next. I hate what Symantec has done to their Norton line of products, so I don’t even have it installed anymore. Won’t even consider it. I’ll keep you posted on what I think about Comodo’s other products.
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