A Japanese wife and a Japanese car

Toyota-Prius-C

Owner of many cars

As an owner of many cars over the years, at this point I have to be up to about 30 cars owned and driven but I stopped counting around 20 something, I have been in just about every car there is. Ok, well not EVERY car. I haven’t yet owned a Ferrari or Mercedes or any of the top end super cars of the world of cars. My experience comes from owning a lot of garbage cars which is from a time when I was just starting out driving at 16 with a part time job and little money. My first car ever was a 1979 Mustang that was actually given to me by my mom’s boyfriend at the time. I think he took pity on me to help me out, thank you again. As great of a time it was with that Mustang, it didn’t last very long. I wound up driving it so hard by racing around so much that the drive shaft broke off and ripped out the rear end of the car. From then on for many years to come, I would go through cars like dirty underwear.

For quite some time actually I was finding great deals on very, very cheap cars but with that came the price of them not lasting very long. Without getting into every possible car experience, there are a few that stick in my mind that I laugh about now. One such car experience was a 1982 Oldsmobile Omega. I needed a car fast and found it in the classifieds section of the newspaper. Yes, people used to post used cars in the newspaper at one time. I am sure they probably still do but with Craigslist and other online for sale services, well yeah. What’s a newspaper? Anyway I bought the car and literally 3 days later is broke. I was driving down the road and the car started to shift into gears weirdly. Smoke poured out from the engine bay and there was a stream of oil behind me on the road. What happened was that someone replaced the radiator at some point and must have broken the steel lines leading from the transmission to the radiator. Instead of replacing the entire steel line they only replaced part of it and used rubber hosing on the rest. The hosing is not a problem if you properly put a flange on the end of the steel line so the hose doesn’t pop off under pressure with the hose clamp. I fixed the hose properly but by that point the first gear was burnt up. I wound up trashing the car not to much after that since it was more expensive to fix than it was worth.

more

Going home to family and friends

home-sign

It’s been quite a long time

It had been 11 years since I was home the last time in Eastern Pennsylvania. I had moved out to LA in late 2004 for a year and a half and had since moved up the the Bay Area. The reason for going home to family and friends was first and foremost to be at my sisters wedding. It of course was also the perfect time to take my wife with me as she had yet to meet everyone in the family, as well as see Pennsylvania and where I grew up as a boy. We didn’t have a whole lot of time in PA as we were also planning on seeing NYC for a few days. So we made a plan got on a plane and went. The flight was uneventful with the exception of a lighting show off the starboard side of the plane when we got into the vicinity of the New York area. I had never seen a lighting storm from a plane before, it was quite spectacular.

The wedding was great. Perfect summer PA weather with just the right amount of humidity and sun. Held at a small bed and breakfast it was an intimate experience with family and friends. I’ve not seen my sister smile like that in years, it was a wonderful moment for her and her new husband. My aunt and uncle were there along with my niece and nephews. My brother also rose to the occasion which was pretty exceptional. I hadn’t seen any of them for 11 long years. My mother and niece were however out in Cali 5 years ago. It’s kind of weird now thinking about it as the trip was just last week, and so long in between before that. I promised, as my siblings had, we wouldn’t wait so long next time. My wife was a bit out of place there being the only asian on tap but they all made her feel like one of the family. I come from a super small town with little diversity.

more

Surfing in Bolinas California

board-001

Surfing is Addictive

I love to surf. Can’t be any simpler than that. I found surfing a number of years ago while on vacation in Oahu, Hawaii. I had been in Hawaii a couple times already but this was my first visit to Oahu and with that, a visit there isn’t complete until you head to the North Shore. It was January at the time and the winter storms from the north in the Pacific Ocean were slamming the northern part of the island and it was going off, as surfers like to say. I remember stopping the car on the side of the road and running across the street to see what everyone else was stopped for and looking at. There it was in all it’s glory, the power of the ocean and the people trying to tame it. It was an amazing site. It was one of those moments which don’t come often in life that when you see something, you know you have to do it. I immediately felt it was something I just had to experience for myself.

Fast forward to today I am still surfing and will continue to until I die or am debilitated to the point where I can’t move anymore. It’s that powerful of a driving force in me to want to continue. There’s something about that direct connection with nature that I have yet to find anywhere else personally. I got my wife to try surfing with me once, but she didn’t like it as she felt too claustrophobic in the wetsuit. Which is understandable if you don’t like tight fitting items on your body. Surfing in Northern California you need to wear a wetsuit all year as the temperature, depending on where you go, is from the low 50’s to the mid 60’s if your lucky. The summer months here are typically colder than other times during the year due to the fog that rolls in just about daily. It isn’t until late in the summer that you get a few consistent days of solid warmer air temperatures. Southern California has warmer water temperatures but also suffers from the summer fog months. It’s also a very dangerous sport. My wife doesn’t like the fact that you can get held under the water by even the smallest of waves, and if you panic, well you just can’t allow yourself to panic.

more