Current Status: -posted

Sunday, July 29, 2007

Removing a Bolt

We twisted, we sawed.
We hammered and clawed.
But try as we might,
And we put up a fight,
The bolt it just wouldn't come off!

Well its turned out to be another adventurous weekend with my good (and once in a while a pain) friend Justin. Yes sir! Nothing like a good sweat and a little grease to really get the blood racing.

Justin has been wanting a trailer for a while now to haul trash and things behind his truck (which I've appropriately dubbed the Justinmobile). Well a few days ago we saw an old rusty one here in King. I called the number and the the guy said he'd take $75 for the trailer. I told Justin I'd give him $30 for helping me on the Muncy trailer (in a previous blog entry). So a few more bucks from his mom, and Justin had himself a nice little trailer.

Now here's the problem. The ball on Justin's truck is only like two inches from his bumper. Every time we've tried to hook up a trailer, we have a very hard time with it because the lock on the coupler (the thing on the tongue of the trailer that connects to the truck) scrapes the bumper. It makes it very difficult to hook up a trailer. Also, Justin's trailer doesn't even have a coupler on it currently, so he's going to have to have one welded on there.

So today we took a trip to my Grandma's house to look for a solution in her basement. There's a myriad of trailer parts in her basement that belonged to Grandpa. Well we finally found something that would work. The plan was to simply take a part off of Justin's bumper and put on the new part we found. Sounds simple enough right? Yeah right. As you read in the poem above, it was anything but simple. Even now the part still remains on Justin's truck. I asked Justin to wait until a weekday so we could take it to somebody with the proper tools, but he insisted on continuing our efforts. So we ended up working on this little project until about 9pm or so. Yet the bolt remains. Slightly deformed, yet remaining. Happy Saturday.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Knight Rider Sightings




As you may know, I'm a HUGE Knight Rider fan. This was of course a TV show popular back in the 80's about a computerized, talking car named K.I.T.T. Well, something you may not know is that all over the world there are fans like me who have taken their fanaticism one step further. They've actually gone out and purchased a 1980s model Pontiac Trans Am and have converted it to look just like the original K.I.T.T. from Knight Rider.

Well I would of course love to buy my very own Knight Rider replica some day. In fact, this past weekend, I spotted a few potential Knight Riders-to-be which I've pictured here. And yes, one of them I even got to drive. It was for sale and I asked to give it a test drive. Awesome! Nothing like the sound of K.I.T.T.'s big V8 rumbling around you. Perhaps someday I'll be able to afford my own when I'm not looking at buying a house ;-)

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Outside Primer Done!

Well its been a fantastic Saturday to work on the trailer! The trailer has been sitting up at Justin's house for about a week or so. The rear portion of the trailer which we had sanded but not yet sprayed with primer had started to get quite rusty just from sitting in the morning dew and day-to-day humidity. So I decided that today I would work on finishing the outside.

Thanks to Grandma (Connie Muncy), today I got to work in a nice, cool basement! What a luxury! If you've ever worked on a trailer in the scorching sun, you would know what I'm talking about. It was just plain fun to work on today.

So the outside primering work is now done with the exception of the corners on the very back and of course the inside. I'm not sure yet exactly how I'm going to finish the inside. I've got my choices. One is Rhino liner. Sprayed professionally, this is about $400. It makes for a really nice protective coating, and you can even get colored Rhino liner to match the paint. But I don't have $400 to spend on this. The other option is to get a do-it-myself kit and roll on my own coating. Perhaps I can get a white coating and then mix in some color (the trailer will be 'Coca-Cola Yellow'). We'll see. Plenty to do until then! Until next time...

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Trailer Progress



Well this weekend we made some more progress on the old Muncy trailer. The weather in NC has been quite scorching lately, so we've had to work on the trailer a lot at night. Justin and I went by Walmart and bought some work lights (since my brother stole my other work lights), so that we could work at night. Sunday we started working at about 9pm after a hearty meal at the fabulous Dairi-o and worked until about 3:30 in the morning.

We made a lot of progress! In those few hours we were able to strip more of the paint off of the rear of the trailer, strip and prime the wheels, and spray rubberized undercoating on the bottom of the trailer.



The bottom was quite the trick. We actually had to tilt the trailer up by the tongue so that it was sitting on its tailgate. So far we've used up three cans of undercoating on the bottom, and I would probably like to do one more coat just to be sure. We've been through around 6 cans or so of primer on the trailer total, and we still need more.

I've actually done a Photoshop rendering on my computer of what the trailer will look like (hopefully) when we're finished. I would post it online, but I don't want to spoil the surprise just yet. Keep on watching my blog and photos page to see more!

Click here to see the rest of the trailer photos.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

My New T-shirt



Hey ya'll check out my cool new t-shirt! I had it custom-made with a logo I designed myself. Nah, it doesn't look that similar to the MySpace logo...does it? Nope, my logo has block-heads...hehe. Gonna wear it to express my controversial view on the ever expanding U.S. population. Oh, and yeah I own the domain name too. Not sure what I'm gonna do with it yet though.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

AT&T. We giveth and we taketh away.

Well folks it looks like cellular/wireless services are going to continue to charge you more and give you less for your money. As you may or may not know, I've been a customer of Cingular Wireless since they first started in 2001. Now of course, they are 'the new AT&T'. I now have what they call a 'grandfather plan.' I guess that means it's just old -- kind of like me. Anyway, this grandfather plan, as they call it, is really nice. It comes with 325 anytime minutes, 1000 night and weekend minutes that start at 8pm (not 9pm like most), free text messaging, and several other nice features. And it's only $29.99!

Well, a few months back I received a text message that tells me that I am no longer going to be getting free text messaging. So I call them. I even email the assistant to the president of Cingular. He calls me back. I'm outraged that they're going to take away a feature I've been getting for six years. Wouldn't you be? I mean, why cut it off after six years? How odd.

So I now pay $14.99 extra to add 1500 text messages and 5MB of data to my plan (for internet). Text messages which I was previously receiving for free. Obviously my bickering and complaining didn't do any good. So now I'm up to around $45 per month.

Well, I'll be derned if the story doesn't end there. Recently I called them because I was having trouble sending photos with text messages. Some go through, and some do not. Now 'the new AT&T' is telling me that I don't have the right plan for my phone, my Treo 650 (smartphone). Even though this is the plan that THEY recommended. They tell me that AT ANY TIME my internet, messaging and all features could cease to function (even though they're working just fine now), just because I'm on the wrong plan for my phone. So what's the right plan I ask?

Well here it gets kind of confusing. I've spoken to three different AT&T representatives and they all have slight variations in what they offer me. The first lady I spoke to said that my phone should keep on working just fine. The second lady said I need to upgrade to a $39.99 add-on that would include 1500 text messages and unlimited internet. The third person I spoke with said I would need to upgrade to a $69.99 add-on that would include only unlimited internet, but no text messaging. That's $100 a month to get less service than I'm getting now for $45! Next, the guy puts me on hold and says he has found some 'conflicting information.' Then he comes back and tells me the same thing the second lady told me. Good grief.

So basically from my understanding, the kind of deal you get with AT&T depends on what representative you speak to at the time you call. So if you want a nice new iPhone, feel free to call back a few times until you get a good deal. That or just avoid this silly company altogether.

So why don't I just switch companies, you ask? Well, I called Alltel today. My girlfriend highly recommends them. Turns out that in order to move my service to them, and get all of the features I currently have. I would have to pay about $69 for a new plan. Plus, I would have to re-purchase my nice Treo 650 cell phone, since cellular carriers can't seem to agree on a single compatible cellular technology. I'll stay on the lookout for a better plan. If you have any recommendations, feel free to leave a comment on this post, and I'll be more than happy to check with your carrier!

Related:
AT&T Wireless Users Sue Cingular, Say Service Sucks
CingularCucks.com
Enlightening Travel Report Number One: Cingular Sucks!

Taxes Are Voluntary

It may sound absurd to most of us but the amount of evidence out there is plentiful. I encourage you to research it for yourself! Think this is incorrect? Freedom Law School is offering up to $300,000 to the first person to prove them wrong. Go for it!
Freedom Law School :: Live Free Now!

Saturday, July 07, 2007

Cingular becomes AT&T. Eckerd becomes Rite Aid. World domination eminent.

What is the deal with all the merging and buying here lately? Why do these companies have to be so huge? Why don't we just go ahead and give up and make one gigantic store in the middle of Asia or somewhere that carries every item known to man? The boss of this fictitious company could be so wealthy that he would basically own the whole world. He would become our leader. We would bow to his every whim. Oh wait, this sounds a lot like the anti-Christ which is spoken of in the Bible! Enjoy the ride folks, its gonna get bumpy! Ohh yeah..

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

AT&T. Fewest Dropped Calls?


Make the Call: Do carriers do anything right? - Single Post View - CNET reviews: "... whose advertising campaign was built around the statistic 'Fewer crashes than any other carrier?' Come on! What other industry tries to expand its customer base by touting that it fails less than its competitors? If the best air carrier lost planes as often as the best phone carrier loses calls, the airline industry would not exist. That Steve Martin-John Candy movie would have been called 'Boats, Trains and Automobiles."

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Muncy Trailer Restoration


Well I've recently taken on a big project -- the restoration of my grandfather's old rental trailer. For many years my grandfather, Paul H. Muncy was the owner and founder of Muncy Trailer Rental located on Stratford Road in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Grandpa rented trailers to folks all over the Piedmont Triad area. As such, a lot of people from his generation remember his old Muncy rental trailers which displayed the Muncy name so prominently. And since they were rental trailers, I'm sure a lot of people outside this area may remember them as well.

After retirement, Paul Muncy stored on his property the trailer you see here as well as several other old Muncy trailers. After 20 years, this trailer was in the best shape of all of the remaining trailers. After my Grandpa's passing recently, this trailer has been handed down to me.

Because of the significance of the Muncy business and its ties with Grandpa, this trailer holds a bit of sentimental value to me. So I've taken it upon myself to restore this little trailer -- to make it better than new. I have plans beyond this which I'd like to keep everyone abreast of, so I'm finally using this blog. I'll also be posting my progress as I go.

I'm restoring the trailer with the help of my good buddy, Justin Cline. I couldn't do it without him. Enjoy the photos and video clips!!

Photos and videos of the restoration