Well, I got fucked over by my band peeps today- or, specifically, our fill-in bassist who never bothered to get back to us whether he could rehearse or not. So I spent the day at my house rather than out job hunting. That being said, our landlady was over and I've been working on the upstairs, cleaning, ripping up carpet, spackling, painting etc.

At least the acoustics are nice.

I am frustrated a bit to say the least. But at least shit's getting done.

Ah, so she was able to oust the previous occupants, anyhoo?

They left voluntarily, when they said they would (after stalling for a bit). Surprisingly. I have to say the place was pretty narsty, and there's a fair bit of work that needs to be done.

That being said, the spaces themselves are very cool. And our landlady, being A) nice and B) from California is totally cool with having a bunch of artists re-do the house. My main studio space may be red when I'm done with it. My bathroom is already purple. Jen and Ana may have blue rooms when they're done with them, etc. There's some neat, quirky stuff- especially on the third floor where the ladies' rooms are and we're gonna have a fun time re-doing the place to be really spiffy. If we spontaneously combusted shortly after finishing it up, our landlady will have added several hundred dollars a month worth of value to the place with whomever gets it next. Second floor will be my quasi-Victorian thing; third is obvious artist's lofts, and they're nice spaces to begin with. There's exposed brick, skylights, quirky-shaped things, walk-in closets, etc. I get to put all my useful recently acquired house-working-on skills to use.

Especially because my bedroom doesn't have a damn door on it, so here I go putting on doors again and for the time being once we move up there living in what I was going to make into an oversized walk-in closet.

Just saw Every Time I Die play El Corazon. Was fucking excellent.

Goddamnit, what with the sort of bouncy dancy thing that I do at shows, my calves are toast.

It's not actually that bad. Much better than the shit hole that was HCAF

Turns out my dad may be getting given an MG MGF and I'll be insured to drive it Proper hairdressers car but it'll be fun to have a stupid little automagical transmission car to drive around with the roof down on our one day of summer.

Perhaps rock the division 2 footballer look?

Might have to buy a car here soon. Ye olde abandoned Subaru wagon has become: no longer reliable, which i honestly thought would never happen, thinking for sure, that the body would fall off before the motor stopped working properly. Its mileage and rust situations are such that i more or less expect it to require more than a couple thousand bucks to fix it, and even then it would not be inspectable due to certain of the rust situations involved. It has a million miles on it, a fucking automatic transmission(BAN THEM NOW.) and i am just not going to put that money in that car. I should really not have been driving it these last few years anyhow. The inspection sticker currently affixed to it expired in errr... 2006?

I have access to the MINI most of the time, but when folks visit, i need alternate transport. I kind of hate the MINI anyhow. That car should NEVER have been produced with the little 100hp engine attached to an auto trans.

Now of course, comes the problem, and the main reason that i have been avoiding this process for so many years now.

Thinking about cars gets me into trouble. There are just too many ways i might go about the thing. It will most likely be something German, and probably something from the mid-to-late 80s and/or possibly up into into the very early 00s. A beat up VW? A sketchy(awesome) audi 4000 that someone swapped a later turbo motor into and then crashed into a ditch with, making it ugly, but seemingly still fully functional? A ubiquitous but fun BMW 3 series of which there seem to be a ton, but which generally seem to have wayyyy too many miles on them for the asking prices? Or perhaps some kind of (not german but still oddly inline with my current mindset) fucked up turbo Volvo station wagon?

Realizing that decent but generally undesirable (and therefore unnaturally inexpensive) Porsches are available just barely beyond the top end of what i am looking to spend is certainly not helpful.

I am not really in a big rush, but part of me feels that the sooner i get something the better, in case it needs something done to it unexpectedly(which tends to be the way of new/old cars), so that i might have a small amount of warm weather available to make such a thing happen in the driveway.

I didn't really want to get back into the mode of carthings. But if i need to get something to get to work, i don't think i can really avoid it.

I know i can't afford the potential speeding tickets that one might expect to come my way should i actually wind up again driving a car that i actually enjoy driving.

Hey. I like automatic. I am by no means a good, or serious driver. I just need to get around.

I remember finding a nice black one for cheap once years ago. I'm sure it was all sorts of knackered and I just stuck with my plain-Jane Nissan anyhow. If I have to drive at any point in the near future (which may be the case) it will likely be one of me 'rent's cars, which are plain but nicely appointed recent model four-door whatnots you would expect a well off couple pushing 70 to have.

And my ass is perfectly fine with automatic transmission- I've never actually driven anything else. Not that my driving is a good idea to begin with.

All this talk of cars is reminding that unbeknownst to y'all, instead of the ol' Dango this is what I have been driving for the past 6 months or so:



It is coincidentally, a manual transmission.

Having only ever driven a manual I find the idea of an autobox weird. Generally speaking, in the UK (and probably the rest of Europe) people would look at you funny for driving an auto.

IMNSHO, the only cars that should be offered in automatics, are the big superpowerful executive type cars, BMW 7/8 series, Audi A8/S8, etc. And they are all better as manual trans anyhow.

Automatic transmissions are for delivery vans, in my view.

Now, it is worth noting that i only mean this, from the perspective of me driving the thing myself. I know lots of folks who prefer the auto- types. Mainly i want to have them disallowed so that there would be more cars that i personally find useful, out there in the used market.



Those hondas are actually pretty blast/fun. The problem on this coast, is that the youngpunk/assholes seem to have gotten their paws on every single one and made a host of questionable modification/"improvements" to them, usually including but not limited to: destroying the suspensions(cut springs, blown shocks, questionable camber/toe and destroyed tires from massive misalignments caused by all of the preceding), the exhausts(usually something bad, lots of different ways they can be bad though), the intakes(see too much more than none: pvc piping, faux plasti-chrome, ill-fitting crap), the interiors( a LOT of vents and trim painted to almostmatch the body color, usually with what looks like nail polish, or cheap artists acrylics), and then especially, the wiring(for the subs yo, and then for those obnoxious blue not-actually-HID headlights).

That, and they are kind pricy in a relative sense, around here, especially considering all of the aforementioned bits of the 'tuning package' offered.

I don't personally really get along with japanese cars too well anyhow, aside from the older subarus, whose general overstoutness i appreciate. That and their properly working defrosters that don't just rely on blasting the AC to clear the windows.

My Dad always drives autos now, just due to laziness I think as he's fine with a manual as well. I've never driven one apart from his car once, just doesn't seem right. When I get hold of the MG MGF which is auto it'll be interesting though

I only have cars that fit gear now. Terrible reason to drive sumpin' too big. I use a Toyota Highlander for my daily driving and gigs with PA. For the gigs without PA and long trips like Boston where a bunch of us go together I take my chicks van. Can get 5 of use easily enough and 2 guitar rigs + keys or 3 of us + drum kit + my rig. Does the job.

Yeah, we call thems rice racers, or just ricers.

It is pretty hard to find unmodified Hondas/Acuras here as well, especially if it's a Civic hatch or an Integra. People like to dick with CRXs around here too. Luckily, I am only the cars third owner (it's an '89) and the second owner was the head mechanic at the biggest Honda dealership in the area. Car runs waaaaayyy smooth and quiet. People expect it to sound like a lawnmower, but it goddamn does not. Car is completely stock besides a killswitch.

As an aside: I hate the fuck out of modern car culture. It is all, "MAN IDGAF IF ITS NOT SLAMMED ON CAMBERED FITTED RIMS BLAHBLAHBLAH". I so live in the worst area for this. Young people here have: Too much money, too much time and no desire to do anything truly cool with either of these resources.

Don't get me wrong, i like lowered cars. But like, lowered for a reason other than looks.

This is IMO, about as low as any car that isn't going to be taken to a track on a trailer, should ever be:



As for the ricer thing, i have never quite dug the term, as it is really just as popular with hispanics and smaller chevy and ford sedans as well. I prefer to just refer to it as douchebag asshole car-ruining.

I too like the aesthetic of reasonably lowered cars, but here people slam their shit till it is inconvenient to drive on less than ideal roads. That in the picture is pretty low, but it is pretty typical to see people daily drivers an inch lower than that. These people are not benefitting from the aerodynamic aspects of the lowering. They just don't want to not fit in.

And they are also fond of this godawful sort of extreme camber:



I gotta admit though, I am a fond of this car:

Cars with camber like that look fucking ridiculous. Plus, they must grip like shit due to having hardly any tyre contact?