Everything I looked at was something I've already talked about, at length, and don't feel like adding anything to. That thing about Rahm Emanuel quitting his cushy White House job to take over for Richard Daley? Psh. Don't care.
I find it highly unlikely he'll lose the election. This is the Chicago Democrat Machine we're talking about, here. So we'll get rid of Daley and get...Daley 2.0. Yeah. Someone wake me up when there's news.
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The garbage truck normally comes around early in the morning. Today it didn't get here until after noon. WTF.
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So now it's October.
...
Yeah.
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Definitely have to do the grocery shopping today. I just finished my last bottle of Pepsi. All I've got left in reserve is one bottle each of Mountan Dew and Diet Mountain Dew.
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At some point I really have to make it over to K-mart to pick up Iron Man II, too. Pity there isn't a Wal-Mart nearby (yet). I'd go there instead if there were. Got to support them, after all, to offset all the stupid communist little girl "magazine majors" who think Wal-Mart is "evil".
Come to think of it, there's some prime real estate right next to Kohl's on the east side of town where a Wal-Mart would fit splendidly....
And a Wendy's out front. Perfect. Hop to it, guys!
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It's Friday; Smallville is on tonight. I'm probably just going to set up the DVD recorder and go shopping around then. F it. It's much nicer to shop when almost everyone else is at home, you know?
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Last night I played some WoW for the first time in several days. Slaughther did a couple randoms and got lvl 63, and after buying expert riding (hooray for flight!) had almost zero money left. I need about 48 gold for the flying mount. *sigh* So it's going to mean more grinding; and I'm probably going to start farming herbs with a view to selling them at the AH. I need money!
But I wasn't up for that last night; instead I worked on power-leveling Inscription again. Got it to 215 before running out of materials, money, and energy to play; that's not bad, though. It meant heading back to Stranglethorn Vale, though, so I could farm goldthistle and khadgar's whisker. I just need to keep harvesting every herb node I see and start selling herbs at the AH, and I should be able to garner enough money and materials to buy my flying mount (which will make farming herbs even easier) and level my skills.
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Gas finally went down again. This time I was able to wait for it, so I didn't have to fill the Jeep on $3 per gallon gas. I got it at $2.86. Whee!
...an average of about 16.6 MPG--which is better than the 12 I got last time--but that's still below the typical average of 18. WTF. At least 16.6 isn't egregiously low like 12 MPG is.
TPS? Or something else? Are they selling E15 as E10? A higher concentration of ethanol in the fuel would explain the drop in fuel economy (and it would be false advertising and probably other crimes since the stickers on the pumps say "up to 10% ethanol") but there's no way I can possibly find that out.
The first thing I can do is to eliminate mechanical causes. I haven't got 12,000 on the spark plugs, so it can't be that. (Can it?) No wires or distributor to go wonky. The air filter's the same vintage as the plugs, but the last time I looked at it the thing was so clean it looked virtually new.
Check the serpentine belt tension, I suppose, and replace that filter regardless of how it looks; dump in a can of SeaFoam and check for a dragging brake--but cripes, I doubt any of that is an issue, really. WTF.
Of course, it could also just be that the particular pump I used filled the tank more full than the last pump did, too. One extra gallon would account for the missing 2 MPG; if the last tankful was filled half a gallon lower than the nominal "full", and this one was half a gallon higher, that would do it.
It is probable that I have ventured into "you're thinking about it too damn much" territory now. I'm just going to do the maintenance checks I mentioned and otherwise table the issue until the next fillup; we'll see what it is then. (And hopefully I'll remember to use the same pump....)
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Today I saw a no-no: a 4x4 truck being towed with its rear wheels on the ground. Even if the transfer case is in neutral, it's better to haul a 4x4 on a flatbed.
How did I know it was a 4x4? The front wheels were spinning. Even in neutral, the rotation of gears in the transfer case can impart enough energy via the oil's viscosity to move drivetrain parts.
Put a car up on jack stands and start the engine. In neutral, the wheels will turn just a little bit because of this phenomenon. It's not normally an issue because the mass of the car overwhelms the tiny rotational force applied; but with the wheels unloaded they can turn much more freely.
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Man, even when I have nothing to talk about, I can blather on.