Itinerator To Refrigerator

Keep it clean, children may be present.

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Amskeptic
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Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by Amskeptic » Sun Dec 11, 2016 8:21 am

dashing to the snow, complaining all the way . . .

Yes, holiday lap to Cindy, to Amy, to parents in the frozen north.

This is Smoky Mountains at Georgia/North Carolina/Tennessee borders:

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I drove up from way below the dam on the Little Tennessee River photographed below. Several miles later, I happened across the being-repaired leaky Chilhowee Dam next to US 129. When there is a plume of grey silt and gravel down a brown river with the exposed edge of a grey concrete dam, you get the picture.

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US 129 North, a beautiful drive with a four-cam v8 and real heat:

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Next series of photographs are likely to look a whole lot more hideous than above, more like below . . . :geek:

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BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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tommu
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Re: Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by tommu » Sun Dec 11, 2016 2:50 pm

Do you need to make use of snow chains? I'm always curious how well they work. Rarely had snow long enough to need them in them UK.

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by Amskeptic » Mon Dec 12, 2016 5:53 am

tommu wrote:Do you need to make use of snow chains? I'm always curious how well they work. Rarely had snow long enough to need them in them UK.
I avoid chains at all cost. When it was 23* below 0*F in 1992 on a cross-country banzai in my Vanagon, one of the links failed and flogged the brake line on the trailing arm in the dark. I had put them on because it was mandated as a requirement to drive on the interstate. Took them off on the shoulder of I-80 and drove the next 1,300 miles without incident.

Today, my "trac" light turned on in the Lexus. Code says that the accumulator/pump is leaking. Accumulator allows the traction control system to apply brakes to prevent wheel spin. These Michelin Harmony tires are not winter tires by any stretch. Snow/ice/slush due when I hit Pennsylvania. Things might get interesting.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by Amskeptic » Fri Dec 16, 2016 7:27 am

Interstate 81 through Pennsylvania:

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I do appreciate good heat in a car, cruising at an easy 67-75 mph. We're getting 23-26mpg out of this V8:

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Passing through Wilkes Barre PA:

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Visited with Cindy and Ruth and Emmett in snow-blown upstate New York. Drank in the Christmas lights and cards and all the photographs on the walls. With great hope, I listened to the child with whom I used to play "waitress" tell me about the immorality of offshore accounts and her desire to attend Georgetown University or Columbia so she can get up to speed in her chosen area of interest, International Relations.

Then I drove through a serious snow squall back to the interstate. 2" per hour, the hushed slow ballet of cars inching forward through the dizzying snow flakes punctured by the occasional 4X4 blasting past (poor idiots don't realize that while they might have an advantage in the ability to get moving, we all are on an equal playing field when it comes to stopping).

9* this morning just seizes my muscles. Here is a snow squall coming on I-390 south into the Finger Lakes region:

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The browns of the Lexus work well with the winter palette of the surrounding landscape:

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But you can't sightsee too much, at a moment's notice, the road can turn suddenly winterwonderland:

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On my way to Woodstock. There WILL be politics.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

Jivermo
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Re: Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by Jivermo » Fri Dec 16, 2016 6:24 pm

Yeah. Politics are always in the picture. Could be the USSR in 1919, where my White Russian Grandfather fled to Peking, China, and his Soviet oriented brother, who was a machine gunner in the Red Army, was murdered in winter, and his body preserved in the icy grip of that land, only to be found in the spring thaw. Or my great, great, great grandmother, who was captured by Indians and French, two of her boys murdered in her presence, and held captive for 10 days before escaping to Fort Pitt. Or, my own mom, imprisoned by the Japanese in China, at 16, in her own house as her parents were hauled away to prison for a year, until an American friend got them all out, and off to Boston, two years before Pearl Harbor. Politics steers towards blood, that's what I see, and the fancy suits and high falutin' words of diplomats keep the bus on course for only so long.
Mr. Trump will set us on a new course, but you can always expect the worst. It may take awhile to get here, but it always seems to come around. Politics, and religion, have caused more spilling of blood than anything I can think of. You can talk about this stuff all you want, but it's just like when you were a kid playing with sticks out back; mom comes out and she says, "somebody's gonna get hurt", and you know, she's right. Somebody always gets hurt. That's the true nature of politics.

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerator To Refrigerator

Post by Amskeptic » Sun Dec 18, 2016 8:24 am

Jivermo wrote:Politics, and religion, have caused more spilling of blood than anything I can think of. You can talk about this stuff all you want, but it's just like when you were a kid playing with sticks out back; mom comes out and she says, "somebody's gonna get hurt", and you know, she's right. Somebody always gets hurt. That's the true nature of politics.
Let's say that our DNA is all about survival, like every other animal on Earth.

If you look at the toolboxes of survival, there are animals who win by brute strength, yes, but there are also animals who win by deceit, they change their colors, they mimic sticks or coral patterns. There are animals who look innocent enough, but they can inject powerful toxins that paralyze their predator/prey. There are animals who retreat, but they survive nonetheless. Some hide in huge numbers of fellow animals, like bee hives and penguin herds.

As conscious monkeys, we have all of the above strategies, plus nuclear bombs. We are all trying to survive. Some try by brute domination, some camouflage themselves "Make America Great Again", some just go to work and try not raise a stink.

As a conscious member of my species, I am devoted to a cooperative interplay of our individual contributions. I am personally dog-tired of the dominating brutes who suck the energy out of the rest of us.
We have created a system that is pretty damn good, but our own apathy has created a vacuum where the dominating brutes are flourishing every more brazenly. The system has been designed to limit their effects, but we are at a threshold where the design itself is at risk, see: North Carolina Legislature.

Let's figure out what we need to do and get it done.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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