wow, woke up to 35F.. hot! it's good to see ice and snow melting...wish this was official Spring. still have like 2months to go for that.


i was thinking about washing my '12 yesterday, but im glad i didnt. streets are wet from the melting snow (as expected) and the salt mixed in with the water on the ground makes it even worse. car is like a brown muck now. yuk


already noticing a lot of pot holes on the streets emerging. will need to mark the craters in my head. think i will keep the 16" on the car until like May or so. my summer wheels are 17's.

 

I know... it was good most of the snow melt.


Same here with the potholes, they're beginning to pop up everywhere.

 

over the weekend went shopping for some cloths with the wife. the parking lot for the big mall was pretty packed as always, but the reason was not from excessive number of shoppers, but the plowed snow blocking a lot of parking space.


luckily for us, my '12 was short enough to park at a shallow parking spot where no suv/mini van would've fit. my trunk did not poke out into the aisle or anything. another thumbs up for having a small car i guess.

 

yah, this warmer weather gets me real excited, but by end of this week, we're probably going to be back into single digits by night time.


im just hoping they dont start breaking the concrete sidewalk right in front of my house this Spring. there's not a big crack or anything, but last year the village marked it to be replaced. they take FOREVER to finish the work after they break the old sidewalk and remove it. my neighbors down the street was left with a gaping hole in the middle of their driveway where the sidewalk was for like a month.

 

well, i do have cinder blocks and smaller solid blocks ready if they do remove the sidewalk. not gonna let the village ruin my weekends not being able to pull out my cars.

 

Oh, I know about sidewalk/street problems... Years ago, they had to replace the main electrical connection in my house... they paved half the spot, and left the rest... finally they came back like 6 months later and finished it. The newer part is already cracking & peeling/chaffing.


Two years ago the utility company replaced the main gas line on the whole street (actually the whole town), they repaved the street eventually, but left those metal spikes in the asphalt right in my driveway... had to dig/grind them out. A year later the city repaved the whole street (too high) now everytime it rains every one's driveway becomes a lake (luckily mines only a puddle)...


You know the saying... if you want something done right you gotta do it yourself.

 

^^ wow, that sucks.

yah, ever since the economy took a dive in 2008, the village has been cutting corners on repairs. i hope they just cut the corner completely and skip fixing my sidewalk for another couple of years.

 

yah, we dont care about toyota's here. lol

 

my insurance premimum went up... for no reason.


no accidents, no citations, nada. wtf is going on here? dumbarse drivers getting into accidents causing the general premium for this car to go up? the hell.

 

the aries floor mat is working nicely. the entire bottom of the mat is white from salt, but none of the car's carpeting is white. AND, the black hard felt carpet cover i made next to the gas pedal is holding up nicely (no sliding around) and it's white also. im going to toss that piece in Spring. well worth the $$, i thinks.

 

got my smartphone cradle. will install hopefully tomorrow. i didnt want to get the powered one this time as it's the one that clips to the center vent area. i dont want a charge cable hanging over my doubledin touchscreen stereo all the time.

it has holes to accomodate a microusb charger as needed though, which i thought was a cool feature.
if things work out, great. if not, will install it on my 09 and get a cradle for my wife's smartphone.

 

dang, i keep forgetting to take a pict of the cradle it's too dark to take a pict in the evenings (sun goes down before i get off work), and too busy in the mornings. oh well. maybe on the weekend.


was -2F this am, car started without any issue. both my 12 and 09.

 

both my 09 and 12 look like a pile of muck right now with caked on road salt. it okay, that's wat beaters are for. hope to wash them when it gets a tad warmer im currently sitting at 3F, going down to -7F or something tonight. they are both very reliable which is why i have them.

the new cradle's working out real nicely. will try to take a snap over the weekend.

 

crap more snow and wind on the way today and tomorrow... and COLD temps coming in i heard. so glad my '12 has been rock solid through this winter season again.

 

a good day to stay inside and play with my new gadget.

 

check this out. brand spankin' new. found it along with 4-5 other hatches in my drawer.

completely forgot i had these.

This is a GD:

 

 

ok, so at -6F windchill like -20F, the 09 started up no problem on its 6yr old unmaintained battery..lol

... brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!

 

my fits have not been washed since end of DEC. they are gross...


but the sun is coming out sooner and setting later so im sensing a little bit of hope that spring is around the corner...

 

Me too haven't washed mine since then too... gotta really clean it out soon...


But don't be too hopeful, saw a Weather Channel report saying Spring will arrive later for people in the mid-West, NE, and mid-Atlantic regions... pretty much most of the US due to some weather pattern.