Tag Archives: can’t let go

Spent time walking in the freezing rain yesterday

I went out and deposited some checks, and tried to check out a plasma center. But I got off at the wrong stop and spent about an hour wandering around and never did find it. As I was looking on the wrong street a cold front moved in and I spent the last part of my day walking in a freezing mist. Also I had beans in the slow cooker at home waiting for me to season and add the hunk of leftover ham and start the rice cooker. Even though I was wearing a hoody under my Air Force Surplus winter flying jacket I forgot to wear gloves and the wind was really bad. I didn’t think to check the “feels like” temperature, but between the 31°F dry bulb, the misting rain, and the 20 MPH steady wind it had to have been pretty brutal. And somewhere along the way I managed to lose $15 out of my wallet.

The good thing about yesterday was I made beans and rice, and had enough to make me feel full. I used a pack of Taco Seasoning Mix instead of my usual garlic powder and cayenne pepper to “do something different”, and it came out pretty good. Far from Cajun, fahrvergnügen, far from the madding crowd, but still good. Sorta Mexican-ish I guess, about as spicy as Mrs. the Poet can stand. But anyway, 2 cups of mixed beans, 6 cups of hot water going in the pot, and about 7 hours of slow simmering with about 45 minutes to cook a dry cup of brown rice in the rice cooker and one of Mrs. the Poet’s salads, we have dinner.

My brain shutting down for sleep still plays design variations on the Sprint-T. The theme it as been playing with lately has been wrapping the roll cage portion as close as possible to the body while still allowing space to slide the painted body inside the completed chassis without scratching the paint on either one, while keeping the torsional rigidity up and the total weight down. You know, as you do. Anyway, the plan is to put a kink in the brace from the top of the rear hoop to the bottom of the front hoop to tuck the front hoop closer to the firewall where it tucks in. That would require another brace from the frame rail to the kink point and from the bottom of the rear hoop to the kink point, and from the pickup point for the rear swing arm/radius rod to the point where the vertical brace from the kink point meets the frame, so everything is totally triangulated. Also playing are variations on the powertrain with the Pentastar V6. The 330 pound engine combined with a 100 pound Powerglide combine for lower weight than a SBC long block assembly, by just a few pounds. The 8 speed transmission usually supplied with the Pentastar weighs 198 pounds, which means the total is still lower than a complete ready-to-run SBC with iron heads, and no transmission. Deep down I still want to build the car, and probably always will. But the gulf between want and have is just too broad and too deep for me to cross.