Stinson Beach 40th Birthday Bash

So the week of my 40th birthday came and went and I somehow survived. We rallied the troops for a week of amazing weather, lots of booze, great food, late night Poker, early morning Poker, surfing, kayaking, hiking, Smores, hot tubbing, motorcycling, tide pooling, lounging around and general tomfoolery (how's that word for you cupcake!).

Thank you to everyone who showed up and made it happen. It means so much to me in my twilight years to have my friends near by to keep me drunk and happy. But seriously, I deeply believe that the most important thing we have in life is each other and I loved every minute with you guys and couldn't gotten a better present.

Mat's photos

Ben's photos

Vanessa's photos

Layover

Feeling a little melancholy about my 40th birthday coming up next week. It's not nearly as hard as turning 30 was but still it makes me wonder where all the time has gone and what I want to do with the time I have left. It seems to pass so quickly and that if I don't make a plan that next month, next year, I'll still be saying the same thing. Here is what I've got so far on my to do list (in no particular order):

see the Northern Lights
watch the Space Shuttle launch
learn to Scuba dive
learn to fly plane
sail around SF Bay or to Mexico
go to the Isle of Man TT
learn to Moonwalk
build a sensory deprivation tank
camp on Angel Island
fly a kite with Grace and Amelia
learn to play the harmonica
go to a shooting range
help in a cattle drive
learn how to make one good meal / one good formal dance

that’s what I’ve got right now. There are all reasonable, attainable goals. Anyone want in on helping me with any of these?

Dolores Park Movie Night

Yo peeps, in my hood we have Thursday night movies in the park. Check it out. The weather has been so great in SF this summer (normally drizzling and cold) that there was a mob at the recent "Dial M for Murder" in 3D. B and I got some burritos and 40oz and kicked it.


Look for this setup to be in my backyard soon as I am ordering it to put on my back wall and have my own damn movie night!

I'm famous and infamous

Nothing like getting blind drunk, barely being able to stumble home and then having someone blog about it http://youareastone.blogspot.com/2007/06/irony-wine.html

Thanks B

Cat Toy

What a decadent life I live. I was brushing my teeth the other day, fighting off the cats that LOVE to drink out of the bathroom faucet and thought, "There has got to be a better way!" I Googled "cat + water bowl + automatic" and came up with this:


Yes, a cat water fountain. The Drinkwell Platinum specifically. The site says that cats would rather drink from running water and also not have their whiskers touch while drinking. Brave (dusty) Henderson checked it out to make sure it was safe but they took to it right away. Check it out at http://www.vetventures.com/platinum.asp

Weekend Warriors

So what did I do this weekend? I was busy under Chris' Datsun (yes a diesel Datsun pickup) helping him pull out the transmission. I hadn't done this in a few years and it is still a royal pain but I love it. We were both varying shades of greasy black from our toes to head. After lots of cursing and head scratching the thing came apart and now the flywheel is off to the machine shop and next weekend we'll be throwing the whole mess back together.


After this project we'll be turning it into, of course, a bio-diesel truck. It is San Francisco after all. I was aching in places I that haven't ached in a LONG time. I was feeling the old man until the next day when Chris came limping into work looking just as bad as me. I've still got it.

Mat's FAQ Page about Mat

So as many of you have asked similar questions about what I do in my spare time, type of food I eat, brand of floor wax I use, etc... that I decided to start a short FAQ page to help answer questions in a more thorough and expedient way. Read on.

Questioning Admirer: You say that you love to take things apart to see how they work. What does that mean?

QA, I'm so glad that you asked that as I have a great example of what I mean queued up with photos! The rain has let up here in SF recently and I decided to take advantage of the nice weather and cut the over grown lawn. The problem is that my mower refused to start. Well, I've never worked on a mower before but I'm sure it must be simple. New plugs, gas and an air filter later with the same result. Slight backfire and random putting. A Google search points to 3 possible culprits: 1) fouled carb 2) bent key pin 3) stuck valves

OK, this is what I was talking about. Time to roll up my sleeves and see what I can break. Let's pull apart the engine, ye-haw!! Carb seemed OK. Nothing obviously gummed up. Put that back together. Took the pulley off the top and realized that option 2 had a real chance of getting ugly. Back up. Think about this for a second. Skip to option 3 as it has a lesser chance of destroying the mower and if I don't find anything, go back to 2. Pulled the head off and saw the large intake valve open, spin the engine and it doesn't close. That's it, stuck intake valve! Some taps with the persuader... I mean hammer, lots of WD40, scraping carbon off and spinning the engine. Button it all back up and things are peachy. Check out the photos of the operation below. Fascinating

So come to think of it, this answers two questions. The taking things apart question (see above) and what do I do in my spare time = not very much