Well it's been a hit and miss day for me today. I decided to work on my project car today. I did a little diagnostics last week and determined that the alternator wasn't generating enough electricity and that's why my battery has been dying. So today I called around and found a "rebuilt" alternator and one of the local parts stores. Apparently they don't carry new ones just "rebuilt" ones...go figure. So I installed it, and new drive belts while I was at it. I was so proud of myself. I'm not really automotively inclined but an alternator is pretty straight forward...right? Well I got it all hooked up and triple checked it to make sure that it was hooked up the same as the one I took out. When I was satisfied I reconnected the battery so I could give it a shot. Once I connected the battery I heard a POP from the engine compartment and smoke started pouring out so I disconnect the battery as fast as I can. Strange thing is that the smoke came pouring out of the other side of the engine than I was working.
So I called my brother-in-law over who IS mechanically inclined he came to the conclusion that the alternator was bad. Sure enough, I took it back to the store and they put it on their little tester and it is bad. Funny thing is that they claim that these are tested when they are rebuilt. Well they replace the alternator (I made them put the replacement one on the tester this time, (cuz I'm no dummy) but the pulley size is wrong so I got to make yet another visit to the parts store and help the clerk swap out the pulley. I finally got it installed, reconnected the battery and TA-DA no smoke. Hoping and praying I turned the key to test it out and....nothing. The damage was done. So it looks like I will be getting to pull the starter next and trying to get them to replace that so that I can be back where I was before today only hopefully with a charged battery.
We did setup out INFLATABLE MOVIE SCREEN tonight and put on a movie. It was originally sheduled (British version of "scheduled") for yesterday but it was sprinkling a bit so we called it off. We ended up watching the recently released version of "Alice in Wonderland" staring Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter. It should be noted that I only now realized that our last two outdoor movies have starred Johnny Depp. Should I be alarmed by this? For the record Wendi is the one that picked them out so perhaps I will need to family counsel to discuss the matter. At any rate, for those that have never heard of Alice in Wonderland here is a brief synopsis.
The movie is about a girl named Alice who invents a dress that changes sizes as you do. To test the limitations of her invention she travels to a magical land where the food makes you grow (imagine that) and shrink (yeah right) in size. We also learn that in this magical land caterpillars do not get lung cancer, that a Bandisnatch eye contains no nerves connecting it to the brain and that you can fix a watch by dunking it in tea. The movie ends when Alice, after eating and drinking everything else in sight, drinks some purple blood she finds. Apparently that is where wonderland draws the line and they kicked her out but not before she manages to kill the queens prize "Jabber-Baby-Wocky" with a sword that she stole.
All-in-all it was an entertaining movie but I don't know about letting kids watch it. Impressionable minds might think it cool to try drinking urine and blood and go around stealing swords from people's dog houses and killing the queens pets.
We didn't get as much of a turnout this time as we did last time. We did have my cousin (Jen) and her husband (Todd) over with their son (Tavin) for the movie. It was pretty entertaining to watch Todd jump up every time Tavin found a hammer. You really don't realize how many hammers you have lying around your flat (British for house) until a kid comes over that loves to smash electronics with hammers. I found myself thinking "I don't even remember buying that hammer" after like the 10th one. It's a good thing Todd was paying attention or I could have been out a projector too. It's a good think Tavin is so cute too.
No comments:
Post a Comment