Haha! I rule.

Ok, maybe this is a lame thing to be proud of but last night I did something I’ve only done once before. I beat a game. It has taken almost a year (I have taken lots and lots of breaks), but I finally beat The Legend of Zelda, the Wind Waker. The last game I beat was Super Mario Bros – pathetic I know. I’m not really into games, but Zelda has always been a favorite. I’ve played all but the 4th one (I hear I didn’t miss much) but this is the first one I’ve beaten. I know that other people finish these things all the time, but I am not one of these people. Some of you have witnessed my game playing firsthand, and to those who have seen it, I’m betting you are actually pretty impressed right now. Once, one of my friends (you know who you are) and myself had a conversation while I was playing Tony Hawk. It went like this:

Me: “Am I the worst you’ve ever seen?”
Unnamed Friend: “Uhhh… yeah.”
Me: “But there’s hope right? I mean, I can get better can’t I?”
Unnamed Friend: “No, you’re just not good at this.”

Thankfully, I have other skills to fall back on. But back to the point, I just want to let the world know that on April 23rd at about 1:30 am, I, Melanie Sharp, beat a game.

Oscilloscope

I admit up until very recently, I had never heard of an oscilloscope. Apparently this is an indispensable tool to many different professions, but I have only an automotive appreciation of them. Just in case you didn’t know, an oscilloscope draws a graph of electrical signals – in the world of cars, it measures the vibrations of an engine.
How fantastic. Even more fantastic is the fact that this little thing which I imagine looks like one of those tin-foiled boxes mad scientists always display in thier labs, didn’t fix my car. Why, if it had nothing to do with the fixing of my car, am I bringing it up? Quite simply because it’s a cool word and I was impressed when I found out that the wonderful people at Downtown Seattle Nissan Service Center had used one to try and diagnose my car’s problem. You notice that I have described the people who had my car very differently from my last entry. That is because my car is fixed. After 3 days, they finally figured out that the problem was with my Mass Air Flow Sensor. I’m very happy to have my car back in my possession, and even more happy to have my car running properly. I’m willing to accept that my initial impression of these folks was wrong. I still don’t think the guy who doesn’t know the difference between a Sentra and a Maxima is a very good image for their business. But he’s not a mechanic so I guess it’s ok. I’m also very impressed with the reciept they gave me. When I’ve taken my car to other places my reciept always looks like a mess of indecipherable codes. Codes that give me no inidcation of what actually went on with my car or what exactly I paid for. Not so with the reciept sitting in front of me now. This one has info – informative info even. I’ll transcribe a portion.

LABOR…………………………………………………………446.75
Customer states it has no power. Ck for restricted exhaust or possible trans.
Road tested and verified customers concern.
Hooked up to the scanner and ckd for codes. None.
Put the fuel pressure guage on it and was ok.
Drove with guage on to see if the pressure would go down. Was ok.
Put a vacuum guage on it and drove it to see if the vac would drop. Was ok.
Put the scanner on again and ckd the MAF sensor and got a good reading.
Called the Techline and they recommended a new MAF sensor anyway.
Took a used MAF off of a used car and tried it. Ran fine.
Ordered a new MAF and installed.
Test drove.
ALL OK NOW.

Isn’t that beautiful? Especially the last line. ALL OK NOW.
I wish that they had used the word “oscilloscope” instead of “scanner” in their detailed log, but I guess one can’t have everything.

I should have bought a Honda.

I, like most people, have a love/hate relationship with my car. My car symbolizes freedom to me. And it’s mine – all mine, 100% mine. Actually that’s a lie, it’s more like 27% mine and 63% Nissan Motor Acceptance Corporation. But still, they don’t get to drive it. I like to be in my car more than any other car. Unless I had a friend with a Porsche 168 Cabriolet (red with grey leather interior)…. but I digress. I really like my car – except when it’s sick. Which recently has been the rule rather than the exception. Whenever there’s something wrong with it I get very angry and agitated and I always think the same thing – I should have bought a Honda. Yes, instead of my Nissan Maixima, I should have purchased a nice, reliable Honda. I thought the same thing when I had my Volkswagen Jetta and found out that you have to involve an authorized dealer in simple little tasks such as replacing a battery because almost everything you do the car requires the resetting of a button. A button that can only be located and pressed by an expert in the art of German Kraftfahrzeuge. A button that costs $100 to press. I didn’t have the same thoughts about the car before the Jetta – because it was a Honda Civic. It was the best car I ever had. I never had to take it in for servcie – I don’t recall even taking it to get it’s oil changed. It ran perfectly and I loved it. But one day I saw a really nifty Jetta commercial and had to run right down to the dealer and buy a shiny new Jetta with bright blue dashboard lights. Before the Honda I had a Ford Probe with retractable headlights that were very good about retracting into the hood and not very good about retracting back out. Before that there was a Ford Tempo that I have mostly blocked from my memory and before that, another Honda. The first Honda I ever owned was a punishment car – punishment for missing a stop sign and running my Ford Escort (my first car) into an off-dury narcotics detective and totaling both cars. But that first Honda was great. It got over 50 miles to the gallon (I’m not joking) and despite it’s being shit brown in color, it was not at all a piece of shit. It didn’t look too pretty but it ran like a new car and never ever had to be serviced. I didn’t buy a Honda this last time because while I knew it would be a solid investment, Brian the Nissan saleman mentioned that Hondas aren’t very exciting. He was right and I never considered a Honda after that. So here I am sitting at home and as I look out the second floor window of our crappy apartment, I see no Maxima. My Maxima is in the shop, again. We thought it was a fuel filter problem. So this morning we found ourselves at the dealer ready to check my sick car in for service. This is where I start getting angry. First, the gentelman who checked us in was wearing a tie. I don’t want to talk about fuel injectors and lagging with a man in a tie. I tried to be hopeful, but all hope was lost when after going outside to copy some numbers off of my car he said, “Ok, so we have a Sentra.” Excuse me? A Sentra? I don’t have a Sentra, I have a Maxima. Clint later tried to convince me that since the man sees these cars all day long he can’t tell the difference. Bullshit. If anyone should be able to distinguish a Maxima from a Sentra it should be an employee of a Nissan dealership. After that I mentioned that my Service Engine Soon light had come on several times (even after I had it serviced in late 2003) and that I was under the impression that this was a light that came on at certain milleage marks and that maybe it just needed to be reset.
“No, there are no automatic lights on Nissans.”
I guess he thought he was selling me a new car, he then proceeded to explain, “Sometimes when you don’t get your gas cap screwed on all the way that light will come on.” Ok, so for a long time I was able to properly secure my gas cap and then all of the sudden I lost the ability to close a lid? That makes sense. After a bit more disucssion with a man who should never, ever be allowed to talk to someone with service questions he said, “Ok, we have your car in for fuel injector cleaning and I’ve noted that the Check Engine light has been coming on.”
Trying very hard not to shout, I looked him in the eye and said, “NO! The Service Engine Soon light has been coming on, not the Check Engine light.”

Here is what he said, and he was serious when he said it, “It’s all the same to us.”

I own a car that not screwing a gas cap tightly enough causes the Check Engine light to come on?

I should have bought a freaking Honda.

So here I sit, Clint called me a bit ago to inform me that he had talked to the service department. They cleaned my fuel injectors but the problem remains. According to Jim the service department guy, my injectors were very dirty. Sure they were. Now they think it’s an emissions problem. That sounds expensive to me. This is the point at which as my mother would say, “I have a radio on wheels”. Except that back a few months ago, my speakers started making funny noises and haven’t been the same since. I know next to nothing about speakers – but whatever is wrong with them makes listening to the Red Hot Chili Peppers almost impossible. Oh, and did I mention that the CD player scratches CD’s? I’m going to leave it at that… I think I’ll spend the rest of my day’s pricing another car…. maybe this time I really should buy a Honda.

Ninjas are sweet!

So I’m sitting here contemplating my first post and Clint tells me that I’m supposed to post links and then talk about them. I thought that’s what mailing lists were for, but I figured I’d wait to make my first post until I found an appropriate link. I think I found a good one for my first post – but let me explain how I came to find such an informative site.
I was reading my email and clicked on a post to a mailing list I’m on. Here’s an excerpt:

“I define the divine as the Celestial Choreographer. The organizing or dynamic forces moving as one fluid medium. Spirit or Chi. So magic is being in synch with that power. An ability to read the script. To look backstage. Accessing your spider senses. Hightened awareness.

You know who is really aware of their surroundings?
(Here it comes…)

Ninjas! They notice changes in climate, the sudden halt of chirping crickets, creaking boards…
Or I would if I were a ninja.”

I would comment on the above, but I don’t think it’s necessary…. But it did get me thinking. So I cruised over to google and entered Ninjas.
Here’s what I got

www.realultimatepower.net

This site is the difinitive source on all things Ninja. It tells us important things like:
Facts:

1. Ninjas are mammals.
2. Ninjas fight ALL the time.
3. The purpose of the ninja is to flip out and kill people.

Did you know all those things? I sure didn’t. But this is why this site is so great, you can get the answers to all those burning questions as well as read all about Seppuka, which is the “ancient art of killing yourself if you get super pissed and can’t find anybody else to kill.” And you can get step by step instructions for commiting it with a frisbee. Anyway, that’s enough for now. I will leave you with a final though though…… “I can’t stop thinking about ninjas.  These guys are cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet.”
Cheers!

Ninjas are sweet!

So I’m sitting here contemplating my first post and Clint tells me that I’m supposed to post links and then talk about them. I thought that’s what mailing lists were for, but I figured I’d wait to make my first post until I found an appropriate link. I think I found a good one for my first post – but let me explain how I came to find such an informative site.
I was reading my email and clicked on a post to a mailing list I’m on. Here’s an excerpt:

“I define the divine as the Celestial Choreographer. The organizing or dynamic forces moving as one fluid medium. Spirit or Chi. So magic is being in synch with that power. An ability to read the script. To look backstage. Accessing your spider senses. Hightened awareness.

You know who is really aware of their surroundings?
(Here it comes…)

Ninjas! They notice changes in climate, the sudden halt of chirping crickets, creaking boards…
Or I would if I were a ninja.”

I would comment on the above, but I don’t think it’s necessary…. But it did get me thinking. So I cruised over to google and entered “Ninjas”.
Here’s what I got

Did you know all those things? I sure didn’t. But this is why this site is so great, you can get the answers to all those burning questions as well as read all about Seppuka, which is the “ancient art of killing yourself if you get super pissed and can’t find anybody else to kill.” And you can get step by step instructions for commiting it with a frisbee. Anyway, that’s enough for now. I will leave you with a final though though…… “I can’t stop thinking about ninjas.  These guys are cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet.”
Cheers!