I looked at the inside of the wheel and noticed there wasnt a rod that went through at all…just a hook that grabbed the inside of the rim. SWEET!!! or so I thouhgt. I reach around and grap that big circular pad and pulled it back a bit, and it felt like it could just slip right off…no go, almost, but no matter how hard I pulled the shit it wouldnt budge!

BUT…i had an idea. I needed a buddy to help.

I could pull the pad away just far enough to get OEM lug wrench in there and unbolt the rim from the hub!!!! TAH DAH!!!!!!

threw the spare on and said PEACE BEEATCH!

I didnt take it off…I took my tire off I left the boot like i found it, almost pee’d on it but held myself back.

i’ve been sick since saturday, so half of my 4-day weekend was shot to hell and i ended up making it a 5-day since i was still too ill yesterday to come in. taka’s been taking good care of me and i made it into work today but i still feel all congested and groggy. it makes me appreciate how good i feel when i’m not sick, ’cause i can’t stand the slow motion feeling when i have a head cold like this. anyway, since i always get sick during the holidays, better that i catch my cold now before everything starts up.

now that all the wedding madness is behind us, eric and i spent the entire day working on the boat. we’ve kinda neglected it lately, and haven’t been doing the necessary maintenance. so today we changed the oil (a pain in the ass, because you need to pump it out… there’s no drain plug), changed the spark plugs, added a second battery and a multi-switch, and best of all, we installed flush-mounted pole holders in the gunnels. tomorrow we’re gonna take her out off the coast of PV and start doing some serious fishing. until now, we’ve stayed within the safety of the federal breakwater, but we figure it’s time we go big or go home.

the actor that plays james bond might change, but the watch he wears doesn’t ;)

taka got a membership to the bally’s near our place (she got a pretty good deal too, $500 for 3 years which is less than $14/mo) so i’ve been working out with her on tuesdays, thursdays and sundays. she mainly works cardio and does light machines, and since i’m still working out mondays (the new chest/tri day), wednesdays (back/biceps) and fridays (the new shoulder/leg day) with costin at 24, i’ve started focusing my workouts with her on developing some strength and muscle in my core area. i haven’t had clearly defined abs since high school, and that was only because i was malnourished. since i’ve started working out, i’ve seen some growth in all upper body muscles except the abs, plus these weight gaining cycles inevitably add fat to make any growth in the abs harder to notice anyway. so on tuesdays and thursdays i do multiple ab workouts, lower back exercises and side lifts. i think strengthening this part of my body will also help support and enhance other workouts that require the core for stabilization. on sundays now, i’m doing biceps before a back workout since on wednesdays, my biceps are usually blown from my back workout by the time i start. i’m starting to focus on traps on my sunday workouts. i wanna have no neck like this dude:

today i feel all loopy. this morning i felt a bit of a cold coming on, so after my calorie shake and banana breakfast, i had an airborne drink to hopefully help dodge it or at least expedite it. by the time i got to work, i was just feeling tired so i had a coke to help pick me up, but my nose started running so i took a benadryl, but that made me sleepy, so i had a redbull. then i had a big lunch and being that full made me sleepy, so i had a rockstar. all day i feel like i’m just combating one thing with the other and always overcompensating.

it reminded me of that episode of the simpsons, where homer gets a lobster that he named ‘pinchy’ and he puts it in his fresh water fish tank… when marge reminds him that lobsters need salt water, he balances out the mixture of salt and fresh water so that both are only half dead. that’s me.

muscle man dave and his sidekick lyle hosted a sushi class/party at lyle’s place this weekend, and yung, the sushi chef from tuna town in huntington beach was our sensei. he showed us how to prepare cut rolls, hand-rolls, nigiri and some of his personal specialities.

the iron-pumping chef dave preparing the vinegar rice with the wife who is randomly weilding a knife:

taka preparing a philly roll:

we made more sushi than we could eat. thank god i’m on another gaining cycle :)

ebi nigiri:

spicy tuna hand rolls:

seared tuna with a red pepper crust and albacore:
yum:

this is one of yung’s specialties that he’s dubbed “monkey brains” it’s salmon, crab, avacado and cucumber wrapped in halibut:

you bake it for about 5 minutes and voila:

good eats.

the radiator on my integra has had a slow leak for the last week or so. i wasn’t really sure if it was a hose that was leaking or if it was just a cooling pipe that could be soldered shut, but last weekend when i was removing my front lip, i realized that it was leaking at the crimping which is for the most part irrepairable. so on wednesday i ordered a radiator and it arrived today. the install went smoothly… i wonder how much longer this thing is gonna run?

the old radiator. notice the airbox and everything else in the engine bay is going back to stock…

the new radiator with the old fans and new lower hose:

the new radiator all ready to go.

long live the 1995 acura integra:

the whole install took about 3 hours, but that included a couple of trips to autozone, an oil change and a car wash.
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i finally figured out 18 out of the 20. i’m sure the second to the the last one is a james bond movie with that guy ‘jaws’ in it, but i have no idea what the name of it is. i also couldn’t figure out the one with the russian boat. dumb fun if you’re bored.

www.stationarymovies.com

yep, so after only 2 days with her resident alien card, we’re a dual income family and she’s now an “export assistant” for an export company in torrance and is going to start working the normal 9-5 (or 8-5, where does anyone only work from 9-5 these days?) it happened a lot quicker than i imagined, but she got into a network of japanese recruitment agencies that were constantly calling and setting up interviews.

we’re going to be carpooling for now since her office is only about 5 miles from mine, but it looks like we’re probably going to move up north a bit so we don’t both have to deal with that ridiculous drive every morning.