The heat this weekend was 'creeping heat'. You walked outside, think to yourself 'Gee, this is not so bad' then take about three steps before you shirt suddenly becomes a big soggy rag on your back. I went through three shirts this weekend just puttering around my yard and mowing my lawn and doing other such outside activities.
I was oddly pleased with myself to find that I can use marine-oil additive in my weedwacker. Weed whackers, as everyone knows (except maybe Ether Bunny) take a mixture of 2 stroke oil and gas. I had run out of gas, however I still had half a gas can filled with blue gas from when I was playing with an outboard engine. The gas was blue because I had put in a marine-oil additive. I do not know if it is actually blue because of the various petrol-molecules that the oil-additive is made of, or if the manufacturer actually dyes it blue so that when you see blue gas you think blue=water=boat. Regardless I had sold the engine on ebay a while back and was stuck with a can of blue gas. Not knowing what to do with it, and too environmentally conscious to go and pour it in the gutter, I had left it sitting in the garage. This weekend when I pulled out the weed whacker and saw it empty of gas, I thought, why not. It's oil mixed with gas, how different could it be?
So I filled up the weed whacker and gave it a pull, and much to my delight it roared to life. I was half expecting it to belch out a huge cloud of blue smoke that would drift around the neighborhood and make the trees shrivel and bird to drop lifeless out of the sky, but nothing other than the normal fumes came out. If anything it seemed to be running more smoothly than it ever has before. So, blue gas = good.
My car has been striving to annoy me lately. I walked out on Friday and beheld a flat tire. I was pretty annoyed with this because the tire was still fairly good. For me a tire is 'fairly good' if you can look at it head on and not see your reflection. So I pulled the tire off and saw a fat rusty nail sticking in it. I ended up taking it to flea world where some huge mullet-bearing Mexican dude put a plug in it for me for 10 dollars. So, that's not too bad. Cheaper than a new tire.
Sunday I made an effort to clean the stench form my car. I mixed up a bucket of hot water and lysol and a few drops of oxy-clean dish detergent. I then dumped this mixture on to the floor of my car and set to work with a scrub brush. Once the Lysol-puddle had turned black I then sucked it all up with my wet-vac. I then sprayed down the interior with aerosol Lysol and foaming carpet fresh. I let it sit over night and I came out to my new somewhat-fresh smelling car. Actually, the smell is still not perfect. It sort of reminds me how when you wash a dirty dog, after the bath you can still smell a little bit of dirty-dog but mostly you just smell the shampoo you used. That is the closest way I can describe it. Regardless, the smell has vastly improved.
Saturday night Alan and I wandered around Sanford. We walked into the west end and was shocked by the sheer amount of heat boiling out of that place. Apparently the guy's a/c had busted, and it had sat all day in the sweltering heat. It was simply too hot to sit in there, so Alan and I perched in some chairs out front. You could actually feel the heat inside the bar blowing out the doors. I ordered a yard of beer and was annoyed to find it warm. It was not the guy's falt, his AC was busted. But still. After that I had a couple of cold bottled ones, but I usually hate getting bottled beer at bars. What's the point? I can drink bottled beer at home.
http://www.carling.com/media/ec_walkagainst.jpg
While we were sitting outside a bat dive-bombed us. It fluttered away and perched itself in the door overhang of MOON SUB.
Afterwards we wandered over to LFHP where I got a basket of tater tots. Actually, Alan and I each wanted out own basket, but for whatever reason a second basket could not be produced, so Alan and I had to share. It was not so bad; it was a big basket of tots. As a product of the public school system, I love tater tots. Plus the owner gave us a bunch of army men and rubber toads to play with while we are the tots. While I was there I tried a bottle of 'Cisco green apple' drink, which turned out to be incredibly foul. It was like a girl-drink invented for girl-bums. It was also surprisingly strong. I have no down that a couple of those would have left me weaving through the streets of Sanford.
While I was there the owner asked me if I wanted a fun acting position. They are trying to set up some sort of pub-crawling parade, exactly what I have no clue. However I would get to be the 'Mayor of sanford' who, as she put it, was 'something of a pompous ass'. Bearing a big brass-capped cane I would march around and act like a pompous ass, something I think I would be rather good at. I have no idea what is up with that whole thing, but it sounds like fun.
Over the weekend I watched 'My super ex-girlfriend' which turned out to be surprisingly good. What made it good was not the lame story line or anything; rather it was Uma Thurman's excellent acting of a crazy chick. I think my favorite scene in the movie was when the guy showed up with a bunch of roses to say he was sorry for breaking up with her (he was not, he was trying to lure her into a trap) and she grabbed his face by his chin and 'searched his eyes' to see if he was telling the truth. She had just such an excellent crazy-girl look on her face when she did this that I chuckled. That scene alone made the movie enjoyable. Other than that, it was unremarkable.
How come nearly every Uma Thurman movie seems to have to show her big ugly feet?
2026 Update
Setting the dial for September 4th, 2007, where Ed is feeding blue boat gas to his weedwhacker.
Ah, 2007. A time when a man could keep a can of mystery blue gas in the garage for months, sell an outboard on eBay, and then bravely feed that questionable fuel to a weedwhacker on a whim. Now? The weedwhacker would probably have a lithium battery and a Bluetooth app that demands a firmware update before it will spin. The gas can would be a government-mandated spill-proof nozzle that still drips on your shoes. The flea market tire plug—that glorious ten-dollar fix—has largely been replaced by a tire shop that tries to sell you a sensor-based pressure monitoring package and a subscription to roadside assistance. And the bar? You'd have a phone in your hand, trying to find a craft brewery with exposed ductwork and a ludicrous small-batch lager, while the warm yard of beer is now an 'artisanal ale flight' served at a precisely controlled temperature. Even the bat dive-bombing you would be documented in 4K and posted before the tots arrive. I miss the simplicity of blue gas and a dirty car.
“2007 Ed, why did one successful weedwhacker pull convince you that blue gas = good, and did you ever consider just pouring that marine mix into your car when it started acting up?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2007 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, because one successful pull is basically all the proof I ever need for anything. I'm a simple man: if the weed whacker roars and doesn't melt into a puddle of blue goo, that's a win. I figured oil is oil, gas is gas, and the marineland voodoo couldn't hurt. My standards for mechanical success are pretty low, kind of like my standards for tires. And no, I never put it in the car. The car is a grumpy beast that already hates me, and I figured dumping boat fuel in it would just give it another reason to leave me stranded at Flea World. Plus, I was too busy scrubbing dirty-dog smell out of the carpet and drinking warm yard beer. Blue gas stays in the weed whacker. Take that, foul germs.
