House, Car, and Health updates

This will be a short post.  Just an update on several things that have been on my mind.


The House
Work on the house is done and we've been made whole... more or less.  The foundation was replaced around the front third of the house.  The bad part of that is that they couldn't replicate the look of the cinder blocks we had before.  It kind of makes the front third now look like it's been added on to an older home.

My brother and I (mostly my brother) rebuilt the parking spots.  Instead of two spots angled out from the driveway, we made it into a single parallel spot.  That will make it easier to clear out in the winter.  The only thing left is to get some kind of covering on it.  Right now it just has the excess dirt and white gravel from the old spots, but that gravel is decades old and it's more or less just rock now.  We thought about putting down some more white gravel down as it does look nice, but I think we're going to go with the same type of semi asphalt chip that's on Nina's parking spot.  It's VERY easy to maintain and overtime will just get harder and harder.  With the weather the way it is now, however, it's a decision we'll make in the spring or next summer.  It's just to cold to get the asphalt.

We couldn't get a dumpster, so the garage is still mostly full.  We took a lot of the stuff back to the basement, but it will still be at least a long weekend project to clean out the garage and the rest of the basement, let alone the sheds.  Until it gets cleared out Mom's Escape just sits in the driveway.  It's not a real problem for her, but it does mean I have to thread my way in between the Escape and my brother's now parallel parked Grand Cherokee.  In a new Mustang that I'm not 100% comfortable in yet.  I've on more than one occasion had to just stop and pull forward to line myself up all over again.

Now the repairs started with the Insurance adjuster and the general contractor coming out to look at the house and make up an estimate.  That estimage included fixing the parking spot, which we did, replacing the red wood paneling in the basement, which we didn't have replaced, fixing the lights in the basement, which we didn't have done, and replacing the drop ceiling in the basement, which we just left bare.  It also included painting the two bedrooms because there were small cracks in the walls, but we didn't have them do that as it would have been a pain in the ass to move the rooms around to get access to the walls, and we didn't want the house filled with paint fumes.

We all kind of figured we'd get paid for doing the parking spot (the lumber alone cost us several hundred dollars!), and then maybe get reimbursed for the red wood paneling they took out of the basement as it was all still good and worth quite a bit of money.  We didn't' have the paneling re done as this is the back room in an unfinished basement.  There has never been any reason to have that room kind of half finished as it's just used as long term storage.  Now it's just white cinder-block walls with the floor joists from above as a ceiling.

When the contractor told the insurance company they were done, the insurance issued the check to us.  Mom had to then take it to the contractor and sign it over to them.  They'd then get it cashed and cut us a check for the remainder.  Again, we were figuring the remainder would cover the parking spot and enough to cover the deductible.  The contractor had my mom sit down and told her that she would be getting back $67.90.  My mom got a bit of her old school fire back (she's mellowed out a lot since dad passed away, but she used to be a true firebrand!) and told him that that was completely unacceptable.  She emphasized that we'd already put a couple hundred into the parking spot and hadn't even got a new asphalt covering for it, not to mention the paneling replacement that wasn't done... the contractor just chuckled and told mom that she didn't understand.  He put the check he was cutting her on the desk for her to see and it wasn't for $67.90.

It was for $6790.99.

Jesus holy hell!  He showed on his estimate what he was going to spend to put new paneling up, put a new ceiling in, paint the bedrooms, and put a new parking spot in.  All, and I mean ALL, of his estimated costs came back to us on those projects.  The total repair for the house, not including the remaining $6790.99 was over $40,000.

So now my brother, my mother, and I all need to decide what to do with the remaining money.  It's not like mega-millions lottery money or anything, but it's still almost $7000 that we've supposedly lost in value to the house that we can put back into it.  That could be redoing the living room (new carpet, new paint, new ceiling, new baseboards and new crown moldings).  That could be re carpeting and repainting the bedrooms.  That could be repaving the entire driveway.  That could be doing some of the bones of the house in plumbing or electrical work.  We're going to get our ideas together and talk about them later in the month.

The Mustang
So Nina is good.  I'll write up a review of her in a few months after I've had her a bit longer, but after over 6000 miles, I can say that I love her.  She's a joy to drive and oh dear goddess does he ever sing when she's floored.  And seriously.... going from a standstill to 60 miles per hour takes about 4 or 5 seconds!

I had some plans on how to improve her. 

• Tinting the windows
• Putting some racing stripes on her
• Some kind of better internal storage system

I figured these would all be reasonable and fairly easy.  I know the first two wouldn't be cheap, and I'll eventually also have to put some winter tires on her.  

Wanting some internal storage system is because there just isn't much space in Nina.  She has a sizable glove box, but that's always been a stretch to get to.  The center console storage is barely acceptable.  It isn't as wide, deep, or long as Isabella's was.  I don't keep a lot in there but so far my extra change, my few dollar bills, my extra breath mints, my wallet, my sun glasses, and my Walkman is enough to completely fill it.  And the location of the USB port for the Walkman makes it so that even more space is destroyed. 

There are some cubbys in the bottom of each door but they're cumbersome to reach and actually too deep to keep anything significant in.  I keep my little interior california duster inside the drivers door so I can give the dashboard a quick dusting at stop lights.  The passenger one is empty.  The only other storage cubby is a space in front of the gear shifter that has a USB port and a shallow shelf that was obviously designed to hold a phone.  So that's where my phone goes.  The big problem there is that it gets very HOT as it's right above the transmission.  Over the summer my phone would turn itself off after sitting in the hot car for a few hours.  Understand this is while the car was just sitting as I can't take my phone into work.  While driving around it stays plenty cool enough.  

Unfortunately... there doesn't seem to be any type of storage solution for a mustang.  I've had to pare back what I keep in the center console, accept that my phone will overheat in the summer, and know that my cigarettes and lighter will have to sit in one of the two cup holders.  Passenger's drink?  Screw 'em.  

I thought getting the windows tinted would be relatively easy but finding a reputable shop that does that work is actually quite difficult.  First, let me tell you want I want and what I can get.  Here in Michigan we can only tint the top few inches of the windshield and side front windows.  The rear three windows can be tinted quite dark.  What I want is to keep some of the heat out as well as get some privacy.  As is, you can see right in the back window and see anything that I have in the back seat clear as day.  

Now for heat reduction, according to what I've read, you want to get ceramic window tinting.  It's more costly but it can come in dark shades and will truly block a lot of heat where regular tinging blocks a bit of heat.  The nice thing is that ceramic coatings can also come in nearly transparent sheets, so it can go all over the front windshield and side windows.  

That's settled and it's what I want.  Now I just have to find a place to put it in.  Most of the places that talk about installing window tint are those punk run places that specialize in stereos, expensive rims, and cheap sunroofs.  I don't want to trust my Nina to one of them.  There is a place about 30 minutes from me, but they're only open Saturday mornings.  Like most places they're open Monday through Friday too, but I don't want to take time off work to get this done.  So to get there I'd have to get up early, drive up, talk to them and see if they can do what I want, set up an appointment for some future time with dropping it off on a Saturday morning and hopefully have someone that can pick it up a couple days later.  I MIGHT do that, but right now it's football season and my Saturday mornings are spent watching Game Day and then the games (yesterday I started in front of the TV at 0900 and stopped watching football at 0130 the next morning!  

The only other alternative that I see is Ziebart.  Yeah, the rust proof guys.  There's a local franchise in town but it's actually closed on Saturdays.  A couple weeks back I took a Tuesday off to catch up on a bunch of weekday stuff I wanted to get done (more on that later) and went in to ask them about window tinting.  The guy at the front desk had the tired attitude of an underpaid staff member who doesn't care about selling a damn thing.  I told him I was looking at tinting out the back windows of a Mustang plus maybe the front.  He looked at a sheet without asking me about what kind of tint (they sell like 4 different types in 7 different varieties!) and told me it would be $250.  I asked him if that was ceramic and he said, without pausing to think about it, that that would be $320.  

$320 isn't bad, so I waited for the other shoe to drop.  Nothing happened.  He just stared at me.  I eventually realized that this wasn't a sales consultation, it was an installer who's day I was interrupting.  I don't know if this is how they normally operate or if their sales guy was on a break, but this is just sad.  I mean, I don't want this stuff and would say no to it, but I came in expecting to have to fight off their hard sales push on under coating, rust proofing, and interior leather packages (which I know come to like $3000), not to mention their paint protection services which range from a good waxing to a full ceramic coating for $2000.  

$320

I finally asked him (knowing the previous price wouldn't include it) if he could also get a clear ceramic tint on the windshield and front windows to help block the heat.  I swear I think he didn't know that ceramic coating tint was good for heat reduction (it's the only thing that's better about it!).  He said that the best he could do was a 90% tint meaning that it would let 90% of the light through.  But he mentioned that it would also be "technically" illegal.  I rolled my eyes knowing that it was damned straight up illegal and that cops around here love writing tickets for it.  As I turned to leave he asked me if I'd like to set up an appointment.  I'm normally not rude, even to useless sales people, but he didn't even warrant me pausing or turning my head to tell him I was in fact NOT interested in an installation appointment.  

So... after football season I'll look into the one 30 miles away.  

That leaves racing stripes.  So far as I'm concerned there are three types of acceptable stripes without getting too flashy:

• The single fat stripe in the center of the car.  This is most often called a 'BOSS' stripe as it's the type of stripe that is used on the Boss Mustangs.  There is a variation of this with the large stripe and two thinner stripes, one on each side. 
• The two thinner stripes centered on the car.  This is most well associated with the Shelby mustangs.  They look good, but I don't want to try and show my car as something it's not.  
• The one fat stripe with a thinner one to one side.  This is a current factory option from Ford and it looks good especially since it's not symmetrical. 

This is the 'Boss' style stripe.  It looks good, but it's significant to mustang owners.  It's also just a little too symmetrical.  

This is the Shelby look.  I really do like it, but again, when you get a Shelby Mustang (a more powerful version of my car) this is a standard option.  Most people wouldn't even recognize the differences between the two cars, but to people who did know would immediately spot my car as an impostor.  I'm no poser, even if my intent wasn't to pose.  So sadly, this one is out and not an option. 

This is the rally type stripe that's available as a factory option.  And I have to say, I really like it.  It's non symmetry is just nice.  The white is a bit too much for me, but in black....

In black it's near perfect.  And I have to say that it must be fairly rare to have a Velocity Blue Mustang with the black factory stripes as I could only find a few smaller pictures.  The one above is from the configurator on the Ford website (with the 20" wheels Nina has!).  It's funny though as I haven't used the configurator since I got Nina and that just doesn't look like the Velocity Blue I see every day.  In fact, all of the cars I have here are Velocity Blue Mustangs.  I think the closest one is the Shelby Mustang.  So, to show how the nice subtle black looks, here is one of those smaller photos:

Yeah.  I think we have a winner here.  It's not in your face, but still unique.  It will stand out in a crowd, but not shout out it's presence.  That fits my idea of perfection.  

Now, before wanting to get Nina's new stripes I've never considered what it means to get stripes.  I had to learn about it and found out that it's just a vinyl sticker.  Even from the factory!  That took the price WAY down.  It's still not cheap, but I thought I'd have to take it in to get painted.  

But the more I looked at vinyl stripes, the more disheartened I grew.  As with several things I'd like to do with Nina, it's really just not an option.  Let me explain.  I like to keep my car clean.  I mean, she's beautiful especially with a fresh coat of wax.  But while I like her clean, I'm not willing to spend 30 minutes to an hour cleaning her by hand.  I'm really REALLY not willing to spend several hours every few months putting a new coat of wax on her.  For one thing, this is a daily driven car.   While Nina is certainly a sports car and could be turned into a show car, for much of her life she's the same thing as my Focus or two Fusions were.... transportation from point A to point B.  

I've had Nina for three and a half months and I already have over 6000 miles on her.  When I'm at work I go out to smoke for my lunch break which means driving off of state property.  Thankfully there's an abandoned parking lot across from a factory where many of the factory's workers and state workers alike will park and smoke.  Un-thankfully it was last a paved lot in the 70s.  There is still some concrete sections left but most of this is a dirt lot.  So every day I'm at work I drive into a dusty or muddy lot to smoke.  That's in addition to the 90+ miles I put on her every commuting day.   

Nina gets dirty quick.  

To get my cars clean I've always used the car wash near my house.  It's one of those drive in, get pulled by a conveyor belt, have the soap and water and was fall or be sprayed on the car, and have a long series of spinning brushes clean off all the dirt and shine the car up to a sparkling finish.  It has a series of hot dryers and has vacume cleaners in their spacious lot so that you can clean the interior or towel dry your car.  I always go out and at least towel dry the windows as I absolutely HATE seeing those water spots.  Yeah yeah, those spots are certainly all over the car but it's hard to see them after even 40 miles of driving (that would be one way to work!).  If they're on the window though, I have to stare at them until she gets cleaned again, so I take that little bit of extra effort.  I like it.  With my older cars I'd get them washed once every month or so.  With Fiona, Ginger, and Isabella, I'd get them washed every other week.  But with Nina, I think she deserves to be washed even more often as she just SHINES when she's clean.  

Now at $18 a wash (that includes the hot carnauba wax) getting her clean would be outrageous.  BUT they offer a wash club.  For $40 a month I can get her washed whenever I want.  I could wash her every single day and it would still only cost me $40.  So let me tell you, Nina gets washed at LEAST once a week.  If it rains and she gets particularly dirty Nina can get two showers a week.  I know that the risk is those brushes slowly damaging the paint.  But honestly unless I put in that 30 minute to hour long wash, there is NO safe alternative.  Certainly nothing as convenient as this business (the whole wash process if there's no one in front of me and including me drying the glass takes all of 10 minutes!).  So yea, every year or so I'll have to have her detailed and have the clearcoat fixed.

There are options to keep the clearcoat in better condition like good wax (well over an hour to apply properly) paint protection films (costly and takes a day to install professionally), and ceramic coatings (very costly and takes several days to install professionally), but none of these can withstand the mechanical brush based washings.  If I were going to park her or only drive her on the weekends, then any of these would be a good option... but Nina is a commuter car and she knows it.  

Why talk about all that when I'm discussing vinyl stripes?  Well guess what else doesn't hold up well to machine washing?  That's right, the damned stripes can get ripped off.  The leaves me with having the stripes painted on.  My brother tells me they can do that without having to paint the full car by sanding down the current clear coat, painting the stripes on top of the factory paint, then clear coating it all and feathering the sanding down so it's smooth to the touch.  But I'd want to take it to a very reputable paint shop and not the local Maaco.  Looking around it seems like $2000 might be a good estimate.  

That's obviously expensive... but I plan to have Nina for a while and I think it might be worth it.  We'll see in spring.  

My Health

My health is... well, it's all right.  No major complaints.  At my last doctor's appointment I was put on some more diabetic medication and it seems to be doing a better job with my fasting blood glucose.  We'll see how well it's doing once I get the A1C and I think that's in December. 

I had some dental work done and... ow.  I had two crowns done at the same time.  As I'm sure most of you know getting a crown is a multi step process and requires two visits.  First they take a mold of your tooth (in my case, teeth), then they drill out the outer enamel, then they get a mold of the remaining core, then they make a temporary crown and put it on with temporary glue.  That's visit one.  Visit two is when the real crown is done and all they do is pull off the temp crown, clean around the core, and permanently glue the crown in.   These are my third and fourth crowns and so far, only the first crown went exactly like that.  

On this procedure, after coring out the two teeth he noted that I had a cavity (carrie?) on the tooth behind the ones he just shaved off and if I wanted he could do it now while it was better exposed and get a filling in.  I agreed, but damn it, that meant I was sitting in that chair with my jaw jacked open wide for well over an hour.  By the time I was done my gums were swollen, my teeth ached even through the numbing agent, and the joint of my jaw felt painful.  That part is normal.  What isn't normal is for that pain and discomfort lasting two and a half weeks.  By the end I was downing 800 mg of ibuprofen and 1000 mg of acetaminophen about every 6 hours.  Just to manage the pain.  

The dentist said, when I complained about it, that there was a very small crack in the core of one of the teeth he exposed.  He guessed that with the temporary glue, which allows for some movement, the temp crown was torquing the core and making it hurt.  And that could happen when I eat, when I speak, when I move my jaw in any way, and of course when I lie on it.  So that made sense.  Instead of getting aggressive with it, we both agreed to try putting the permanent crowns on and see if that would keep it from getting torqued.  If the pain went away normally, then problem solved.  If it didn't then I'd likely have to have a root canal.  

It's been just under a week and while the pain is certainly better, it still requires an unhealthy amount of over the counter medications to keep the pain at bay.  Plus the tooth is FAR to cold sensitive.  So I think a root canal is in my future.  I'm going to give it until after my vacation to make any decisions, but it's not looking good.  

My Work

Work is work and work is stressful.  There's really nothing special right now, its just the way of the job.  I can normally mitigate that stress with vacations and such, but I haven't had a big vacation in too long.  I won't go into much detail here, but I'm planning a trip and have a full post regarding that coming up.  

And that's it.  See you later!