Anybody Have a Car or Truck To Get Rid Of?

My car was having overheating issues when I was driving out to Sunriver yesterday, which was odd considering it was 15°F outside. It would overheat, the heater would kick on cold air, and then it was like a switch flipped and it would go cool again and then heat up again and then cool again. The engine was cool to the touch, so I don’t know what was going on. I took it into the Subaru Guru, who I’ve had look at my car several times and I know they know what they’re doing. The diagnoses? A blown head gasket, which is, needless to say, a really expensive repair at $950 (because they basically have to dismantle the entire engine to get at it).

The car has 204,000 miles on it, and I’m not about to spend $1000 on a repair for it when it could (and should) put that towards a new car. And since we already have one car payment, I’m hoping to get a second that’s dirt cheap.

Anybody have one for sale? I don’t need anything powerful (would even prefer a wussy little car) as I drive daily to Sunriver and back from Bend and gas milage is key. If you have a small little truck, that’d be great as I’m constantly needing to haul stuff around and have to borrow trucks from people.

I’m open to options outside of Central Oregon, if the deal’s right.

Comment here or e-mail me at utterlyboring [at] gmail [dot] com.

January 7, 2008

Geek Links

Just a few geek links that need to be bookmarked for my future reference.

  • The Trouble With PDFs. Interesting article, though I’d have to say that a few of the biggest reasons that folks (me included) still use PDF is that it’s very easy to maintain page and print layout with a PDF, very easy to embed fonts with a PDF, easy to secure copying with a PDF, easy to embed high-res imagry in a PDF, among other things that are just not as easy to do in an HTML editor or on a Web page. Just because it can be done in HTML doesn’t always mean it should, especially if I’m emailing something to someone who I know doesn’t have a newer browser but I wan the layout and print out to be maintained. I can create a fully functional PDF in just about any program with CutePDF, but if I use the program’s built-in functions to export to HTML, the output leaves quite a bit to be desired.
  • Are you an expert user trying to get around in Vista? Vista4Experts turns off the annoying crap that is built in for computer novices.
  • Selecting text vertically in MS Word. Boy am I stupidly glad to have seen this, as I was just needing this the other day and was sick of pasting back and forth between a text editor that can do this and MS Word.
  • Integrating Gmail and Google Calendar with the Enhance Gmail Greasemonkey script. Now if this would just get added into the Better Gmail Firefox extension, I wouldn’t have to install Greasemonkey to do it.
  • If you need a great way to better your typing skills, try this great little Flash game — I was up to about averaging 65 words per minute (got 85 on one) before I had to get back to work. Though I just tried it again and only averaged 50 words per minute.

January 6, 2008

Fun Flash Timekiller

This will kill off quite a bit of your day. The goal is level 16, but I could only make it to 15. How about you?

January 6, 2008

There Has To Be Freeware To Accomplish This

So I mentioned that we got a new digital camera for Christmas. We had a Canon for years, and got a much newer Nikon as a gift. We finally got around to installing the software for the camera, and while it’s fine and dandy and all, there’s one thing that it can’t do (as far as I know) that the Canon CameraWindow software can: create folders upon transfer based on the EXIF date of the image. All our digital photos are nicely sorted in our “My Pictures” folder, sorted by appropriately named folders by date, using the format “YYYY_MM_DD”. It’s not rocket science, but for some reason, every bit of transfer software — the stuff built into Windows and the stuff that comes with this and our daughters Polaroid camera to Picasa and other apps — and not one of them can create folders based on shooting date.

I found one commercial app that will take a folder of images and create folders based on EXIF dates, but I can’t find myself spending $20 on something that I could do for free with my Canon transfer software. The trial version works on up to 75 images at a time, which is fine if we transfer the images frequently, but I still get annoyed about the two-step process.

Does anybody know of a freeware app that will create folders like this or will transfer from my camera the images and create folders? Or am I just missing something really obvious in Nikon’s twinky PictureProject software?

January 4, 2008

The Love Mattress

I mentioned a while back an xkcd comic for a great mattress for couples. Looks like somebody’s gone and created the concept for something similar:

This version doesn’t have the Rock ’em Sock ’em Robots like the xkcd version does, which I believe is a requirement for this thing to go to market.

Link via BB.

January 3, 2008

Real Life Tetris

Playing Tetris with humans would be far more entertaining than the video game:

January 3, 2008

Wouldn’t Be My Weapon Of Choice

If I was going to rob a market, I’d arm myself with something a bit more powerful than a Sharpie.

January 3, 2008

Attention Business Travelers

Starting yesterday, spare lithium batteries are banned from checked airline luggage. However, it’s not the end of the world.

January 2, 2008

If We Could Only Be So Lucky

Microsoft is planning on discontinuing Internet Explorer.

Update on 1/16: Welcome BBSpot Mailbag readers! Feel free to check out the front page of the site for more time-wasters.

January 2, 2008

Ladies, Listen Up

Here are 50 things us men really wish you knew. A few of my favorites:

8. No question need ever be asked through a closed bathroom door if I’m inside. I love you less with each syllable you utter.

[…]

29. When you call us at work “just to chat,” we’re not really listening; we’re checking our e-mail.

[…]

41. Do not expect to have a conversation via text message (Jake Note: Or IM) unless you use the words “naked” and “waiting.”

[…]

43. Anytime you cook for us, we’re happy.

January 1, 2008