I am now the Charlie Brown of hardware

Work Notes:
Last week my laptop was stolen. Today, the cpu fan in my DS10 Alphastation seized up, unbeknownst to me and when I came back from lunch, the machine was repeating a VMS version of the blue screen of death. Not to mention that the errors took out my network port. Anyways, Saul and Harold to the rescue, we swapped the machine out with my original devices, got the port reset and was up and running again in an hour. I work with some great guys.

Arcade Notes:
This whirlwind, is blowing the money right out of my wallet. I've had to order a ton of parts for it and while I was at it, got a bunch of spare parts to keep on hand, and semi- expensive parts for other machines. I blew it last night and and only got 1 and a half flipper rebuilds done. But I'm waiting for parts from 4 different suppliers to come in... sigh... Another thing acuired was a gravitar cabinet for my Quantum conversion. I'm officially out of room (again) by two spare cabs. I need a shed to put these in and work on them, but there's no room in the back yard at all

Training notes: NONE, I'm a slouch... am going to go play soccer tomorrow though. And this weekend I'm going to shoot for another long mountain bike ride.

Ahhh Day off

A day off from work. Got to spend the day with my kid since his school is closed for two weeks. It forced me to take the day off I wouldn't normally take, but I got a few errands done, like post office, bank, gas, work on the R.V. ho-hum...

Arcade Notes: Okay so the pin acquisition came through (my last for a very long time - heard that before?!!?). In the club now is a rare diamond plate Whirlwind. I probably paid about the right amount for it, but I still have to dump a bit of money to it to make it playable and decent looking. The cab is not so good, but the playfield is niccceee.... These pinballs are money pits and I'm just glad I'm not a perfectionist when it comes to restoring these things. I just like 100% mechanically and electronically working, and I can deal with rough art that's at least 70% intact. This Whirlwind meets the art criteria. I guess I'll have to wait for cabinet decals if they ever come out. Already spent a lot on the machine and will have to dump in at least another 200 to get this thing looking and working good. Fortunately, the sale of the Data East Hook covered this. here are some pics:

http://lousarcade.com/ww1.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/ww2.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/ww3.jpg

Beautiful Sunday

Training Notes:
What a crappy week of work last week. A Sunday like today makes it all worth while. did a 21 miler today albeit it was on pavement, but I was pulling my kid in the trailer, who by the way is getting heavier and harder to pull. oh well resistance may be futile, but it adds to my training. It was beautiful outside. I'm about to shave my head bald, because I'm sick of looking like a F.O.B. because my hair is long and unkept, because I'm too lazy and busy to deal with it. Plus I'm kinda digging that Ken Watanabe look in Last Samurai, so I'm growing my goat again and will shave my head after Christmas (for my wife's sake).

Arcade Notes:
Took a stab at Terminator 2. fixing an outhole problem which was just a loose screw sitting in the out hole, that was an easy fix... Placed the Major Havoc in it's permanent place and this is how the row stands: http://www.lousarcade.com/ATARI4.html
I've got a cabinet and pin acquisition I'm working on, don't know where I'll put the stuff, but I'll find someway to deal with it.

Variety is the spice of life

There is a reason a cliche' becomes a cliche'.

Training Notes:
Today I did about an hour of soccer at lunch. Damn, there is no halftime, no time outs, no between periods, just pure running, stop and go and chasing a bunch of fly weights around. Although I didn't play soccer growing up (just some playground and intramural), I was able to hold my own by keeping things simple - some of the same principles of basketball applied on defense. (keeping the movie "Victory" with Pele' and Stallone in mind) and relying on my natural athletic ability (har har har). I had blast and considered it as a type of interval training because there is a heck of a lot of sprinting involved. My thighs are wiped.

Arcade Notes:

Hehe, none really it's been nice that everything's mostly fixed and I've been putting some miles in on JokerZ and F-14. Understanding the rulesheet is essential to get high scores. I did put a WG6100 monitor together and have to install and test it in my spare space duel cab (only outstanding project). Tron art project has stalled as I would like to wait for the flourescing inside art AZ games is producing soon.

Work notes:
Laptop got stolen out of someone's car at lunch, Thieves SUCK .

Quick Post

Training notes:

It's been busy the last few weeks, not much time for training, plenty of time to gain weight. I did manage to get a few miles of running in since the SJT fiasco, but the poison oak is really killing my legs. The symptoms didn't show up until 4 days after the ride. This is even after I applied tecnu on my legs twice the night of the ride... luckily I had some steroid cream left over from my last poison oak incident and it seems to help the itching and swelling. Looks like organizers are starting to get their 2005 races down pat. I'm planning on about 9 races next year, with at least two 24 hour mtn bike races and AT LEAST on 24 hour adventure race. If I do those to minimum, I will be a happy guy. Although not training much, I feel pretty good about my fitness and weight.

Arcade notes:

JokerZ Pinball is 100% running after some painstaking flipper adjustment, 2 pop bumper rebuilds and an outhole kicker repair. Now that everything's working I was able to get a high-score on there. I'm a bit concerned about the F-14 insert lifiting, but I'll try and tap them back down and do it the poor man's way (more like lazy man's). Tron got a much needed CPO repair and the inside art has been stripped. This long running project is going to get done soon. It's been nice to be able to get to old art projects ever since everything's been electronically repaired, it's freed me up.