"Ah yes, the 2.8 v6. The fuel economy of the 4.3 with all the power of the 2.5 iron duke."

"I suppose on the bright side, they leak so much oil that the block will never get a chance to rust." Yes, I have always loved the GM 3.8Litre V6. The Regal. Luxury to spare, slow as a snail. The Skylark. So bad I ripped it out and replaced it with a 4 cylindar. And the Jeep, my Wonderful Wagoneer. Danny kicked my butt going up Parley's Summit. I was in the Jeep, towing nothing, he was in his Mazda B2000, towing a trailer. Passed me like I was standing still, and getting twice the gas mileage. Yup. I love the GM 3.8 V6.

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So I was up at 5:00 this morning. I let myself get volunteered for another one of these Saturday college field trips. This time to UVU, Utah Valley University, formerly known as Utah Valley Community College. Other than being at school, standing in the dark waiting for the bus at 6:00am, it was a fun day. Saw some robots, played with physics stuff, learned about fingerprints (did you know that the Egyptians were aware of their use over 3,000 years ago? Neither did I until today.) Anyway, it's 6:30, there are tops 20 people in a bus built for 60 and it's dark outside. I said that it felt like the beginning of a really bad horror movie. We got into a big discussion about who was going to go first. Teachers, #1. Bigger kids second, get them while you're fresh. And last would be Adam, small, wiry and fast. The conversation faded out somewhere around 7200 south. About 15 minutes later we come up over the point of the mountain into a wall of fog. The radio crackles to silence. Tyrel comments that his cell phone lost reception. We all get real quiet and all of a sudden Sam blurts out "Oh my God, I'm dead, they always go for the black guy first" and ducks under the seat. Now I know this isn't very Politically Correct, and I do apologize to anyone who takes offense. But coming from Sam himself, and because of it's spontaneity, I couldn't help but laugh. It's like Guy on Galaxy Quest. "Of course I'm gonna die, I don't even have a last name!".

Why wasn't I there?

Seems a couple of nights ago the Tesoro on Highland Drive was robbed. I found out when I went to dinner with one of the counselors and a friend of hers that used to come into the Chevron all the time. This friend of hers was driving down the road between Pei Wei and Granite Furniture when she saw a guy running and being followed by two guys, one in one of those fluorescent crossing guard vests. So she gets down to Fairmont Park and turns around and asks the guy bringing up the rear what's going on. He tells her they're chasing a guy that just robbed the Tesoro and she figures "I'm a mom in a minivan, let's go get the guy". She invites the guy to hop in and they flip down the road heading towards Smith's looking for the burglar, who happens to be in a bright red parka. They see him behind a tree and she stops, down the street a bit and the guy gets out of the minivan and goes to confront the burglar. Nobody knows if he ever had a gun, but the burglar tells him to back off or he'll shoot, and of course he backs off. The burglar takes off, he hops back in the minivan and tells her what happened. So she starts following the burglar, at a reasonable distance, and since she stayed back at the confrontation he isn't aware of her minivan. While she's driving they cal 9-1-1, and bring them up to speed, and even let them know when they see the burglar toss the red parka in the dumpster. They end up about two blocks behind him on Hollywood Avewhen the cops show up right as the burglar turns north on Lincoln Ave. She has already described the burglar to the cops, so she just points up Lincoln and they go get him. Earlier today they called her and asked if she actually saw him take off the parka and if he was ever out of her sight. She admits that he did get out of her sigh but that she did see hime toss the parka in the dumpster. She gave them her account and was a little worried that it wouldn't stand up in court, and they told her that it was ok because they had reviewed the tapes at the Tesoro and there was no doubt they got the right guy. And all for $30.

Focusyn with Bart in Psychology.

Yesterday we finished watching "A Beautiful Mind" in psychology class and had enough time to start the presentations the students did before the break. I had them get into groups and pick their favorite disorder, collect info on it and put together a 15 minute presentation. Ski, Ivan and Laurel (names have been rearranged to protect the innocent) volunteered to go first and by coincidence their favorite disorder was Paranoid Schizophrenia. I was surprised that most of the students were actually paying attention to the movie, because they kept referring back to things that happened in it. The other thing I discovered was how great "The Simpsons" is for the discussion of schizophrenia. They brought up the episode where Bart's parents put him on the ADHD drug, and he goes wacko with the tin foil and garbage can lid, trying to prevent professional baseball from reading his mind. Beautiful paranoid schizophrenic behaviors, and we also got to discuss the difference between real schizophrenia and the same behaviors caused by drug use and/or withdrawal. One of the most satisfying half hours of my teaching career. Now, if only some of them remember "3rd Rock from the Sun" for when we discuss Narcissism. Hmmm, maybe we'll have to watch a few episodes........

Quayle lost to Murphy Brown, so why not?

Predictions 101

Have you ever thought "man, that guy is headed for an accident" while driving down the freeway? Yeah, me too. I'm going a good 70+ MPH along I-215 headed home, and right where it turns north at the 6200 So exit the road suddenly got all snow packed. I slow down to 55 or so, figuring that it's going to be getting worse as we head up the hill. On the way up this grey car goes screaming past me like I'm standing still. Immediately I thought "what a moron, he's gonna cause an accident". Lo and behold, I get to the top, right before the 45/39th south exit, and there he is, facing the wrong way among a few other cars, parts of his car dangling and thrown about. Now, I really don't know for sure that he caused the accident. But I know for sure that going 70+ on top of packed, albeit patchy, snow certainly did not help.

By the time I got off the freeway at Foothill, turned around and got on Wasatch Blvd where I could get my pictures, the cops were already there directing, or trying to direct traffic. It never ceases to amaze me when people decide they don't need to follow traffic directions and try to head where the cop is specifically telling them not to go. I could hear the cop screaming at this guy from where I was taking the other pictures, loud enough that it caught my attention in time to get this picture of the cop yelling at the driver.

Couple of dumbasses I tell ya.

When I was done there I ended up at my old school, Churchill, and caught this sequence of a kid snowboarding down the hill there. I don't know if you can see it well, but somebody built a ramp out of snow and he was getting some good air off it. (And no comments from you, Gibb!)