Work story!!!

So! A good (and exciting!!!) story, and one that will maybe give you some idea of what it is I do... Some of the time. So, Jerker and I went to our old factory warehouse to take some measurements of a spreader that was shipped back to us for refurbishing. It's been in service in Germany for like 7 years, and it's all beat to hell and dirty as shit. So there is three main parts to a normal spreader. The center section and then the two twin-beam arms on both sides of that. The arms telescope out from the center and are held together by an end gable on the outside to shape like a giant rectangular U. Anyway this spreader is separated into it's three parts, and we are going to take measurments to see how close to tolerance the TBUs (arm thingys) are (answer: not very... now). The port had done some of their own repairs to it while they had it and we have to figure out if the out of tolerance...ness is from them or us or what, and why there was uneven wear in certain spots and not in others, etc. Stuff like that. Anyway, the TBUs are about 25 or 30 ft long and weigh about 5,000lbs each. The one we are messing with is about 4 feet off the ground on these giant metal stands. In order to check the tolerances we have to get the thing squared up as even as possible and as flat as possible, which means lifting it off it's stands and putting metal plates under it. Obviously we have two giant winches on the ceiling to lift it with. We adjust the end without the end gable (read: lighter end) with no problems, but it still isn't quite square so we have to adjust the end WITH the end gable (read: heavy as shit). One of the regular workshop guys is like "Yeah just slide the straps down to the other end and lift." And proceeds to do it, then tear ass with the winches to jack up the heavy as hell end like 6 inches in about 2 seconds, then slam it back down. "See?" and walks away. I'm like "I think we should support the other end, I mean, if it slips..." Jerker "It'll probly be fine." Here's the thing about inertia: It's very difficult to comprehend, even when you know how much something weighs and can see how big it is. If the winch isn't DIRECTLY over the center of the TBU then no matter how slow you lift it a tiny force to the left or right will send 5000lbs hurtling in that direction. Imagine having one of those huge Ford Super Duty trucks hanging in the air and swinging in the breeze. If you try and stop it from swinging, even though it looks like it's going slow, it will KNOCK YOUR SHIT DOWN. Anyway, Jerker very slowly winches up the heavy end. It starts to go a little to the right and then SHIT! It pulls the light end (like 2,000lbs) RIGHT OFF OF THE STANDS. The other two real workshop guys came running over cause it must have sounded like it fell through the earth and hit China or something. I can't really remember how loud it was cause I was too scared when it happened to notice. Luckily there was a wooden pallet in a very lucky spot that shattered and absorbed most of the impact thus no damage was done. When it fell though, I had my hand on a 1/2" thick steel plate, the corner of which ran straight up the length of my hand at about 50mph when the heavy end slid off. SOMEHOW it didn't slice it right open, well, in half really. I have no idea how. We both got REALLY lucky to not have more than only a scratch on me. I learned my lesson: Don't just SUGGEST them, ALWAYS INSIST on the safety precautions and if for some crazy reason you are refused, sit the shit out.

Yaw-mo-be-there

Haha I tricked you. I split this into two posts so you would read them both. DUMMY! NOW READ!

I'm very glad Obama won. Did he go back on his signed agreement, opt into public financing, and buy his presidency? You bet. Do I like that? Not one bit. Can he turn everything into rainbows and unicorns. Doubt it. Is the US headed toward "socialism"? Well if whatever he does sucks you better believe it'll be undone faster than you can say "Hussein" by the Republican horde that swarms Washington next election cycle. So everyone lamenting the fact we elected a "Marxist" can suck my sickle and two hammers. The election is over, remember? You can leave your fear tactics and scary word list on the desk, they finally failed you and they are of no use now. Next election you better bring something more to the table or it'll be four more years of your money going straight into the pockets of free-loaders and high school dropouts. The fact that the entire world is totally pumped that he won means a lot to me. And it'll be freaking awesome being proud instead of mortified when people from other countries start talking to me about our president. Which doesn't come up THAT often but still.

Oh which reminds me, I made this post mainly to talk about something that happened today, but I'll tell this short one too. There's this dude at work, who's probably like 65, kind of strange looking and almost always gives me a hard time about not being fluent in Swedish yet. Tuesday we went to the Port of Stockholm to test a new spreader design we've been working on for a few months. On the car ride there everyone was talking about the election, of course, and they were asking me about it. Anders (boss) asks: "Do you think Obama will get elected?" Me: "Yeah, I'm pretty sure." Old dude: "SO HOW LONG TILL YOU THINK HE GETS SHOT?" Everyone else just kind of chuckles, embarrassed, and I'm like "Well, there are a lot of crazy people with guns out there, but the security is good, they know it'll be more dangerous for him, blah blah, I really hope that doesn't happen, blah blah..." The issue fades and we get on with the (pretty awesome) day. Anyway, Wednesday, it's official, he's elected, and at the coffee break I can tell this dude is absolutely CHOMPING at the bit to say something to me so I do everything possible to avoid him. Sure enough right afterward he comes in all pretending to talk to my buddy Bosse for like two seconds and then comes right up to me and: "So how long till he gets shot?" AGAIN. I give the same answer as the day before, undeterred he presses on: "WHAT DO YOU THINK THE KU KLUX KLAN THINKS ABOUT HIM BEING ELECTED?" I'm like dumbfounded now. "Um there's not much of the Ku Klux Klan left..." "WHAT DO YOU THINK ALL THE BLACK PEOPLE WILL DO WHEN HE GETS SHOT?" Me: blank stare. "I BET THEY WON'T LIKE IT, DO YOU THINK THEY WILL RIOT?" Me: mouth agape. "I BET THEY WILL RIOT!" I slowly turned back to my computer to ignore him and he walked away.
Moral of the story: There are assholes in every country who take great pleasure in rubbing you the wrong way for no reason other than they like being a dickhole, I guess. On a nicer note... At the Stockholm Port, I went up in both of the gantry cranes they had. I don't like heights at all, and the walkways on these things are probably at least 200ft in the air. The walkways are basically metal grates that you can see right through straight down to the ground, there's nothing else underneath you, no supports for the grates or anything. It really looks like theres basically nothing holding you up. I was pretty happy I didn't freak out. It was fun being inside the cockpit thingy with the driver though, in the front the floor is glass so you can see straight down, which didn't bother me since I was enclosed. When they drive those things hard it's impossible to stand upright, it knocks you right over, it was like an amusement park ride. Really cool.

HOORAH

I'm updating!

I will be back in KS from like Nov. 25th until Dec. 4. Give me a holla and we'll drink beer.

We went to a nation last night (like a bar/club for students, Uppsala is a university town after all) and I drank enough to dance, so it was a good night. They played Thriller, and my favorite Swedish song by Håkan Hellström, it's sooooo awesome. Like jangly guitars and all upbeat. People scream the lyrics, everybody's all sweaty and happy. Nations are fun. At the pre-party I could juuuuust understand what people were talking about in Swedish, some of the time. It's weird because I've been concentrating so hard on understanding people and now that I actually barely can, sometimes it's when I'm not concentrating so hard that I understand the most. Weird how it works.

Yesterday I was walking around downtown and in the main square area there was like tons of people holding banners and handing out literature from all different groups including one with a red banner with a hammer and sickle on it and something about the "proletariat" written on it, and a dude on a loudspeaker harrassing everybody, and I think people were walking by and snickering at him. No idea what was going on there. My favorite part though was that amidst all the political activists and survery takers and solicitors and Serious Business was a dude in a giant tiger suit walking around handing out balloons to all the kiddies promoting the fast food chain Max. I wanted to give him a hug but I was too shy : (

It's not really cold here yet, in fact the weather is really similar to KS so far, at least surprisingly so for me. It's just darker a lot more than back home, and getting darker every day. I hear repeatedly all the time from basically everyone about how much warmer the winters are and how much less snow they get than when everyone was young. The older the person the bigger the difference It's kinda scary I guess. I'm definitely not on the doomsday predictions and mass extinctions tip, but damn, it really hits home up here.

Watching season 3 of Dexter and it is just as good as the first two seasons, if not better. I'm really pleased about that, hopefully it continues on this path for a few more seasons.

Mainly playing Castlevania SOTN for PS1 on PS3 (downloaded it off the playstation store). The game is classic, I really really like it. I really really like the PS3 too. Glad that I bought it. I'm also looking forward to buying Rock Band 2 when I'm home (it won't be out over here for several months I think) and I'm probly gonna get Little Big Planet too. Really dumb they had to pull it out of stores to take a song off the soundtrack because it contained lyrics from the koran, but whatev. Guess we gotta be P.C. At least it wasn't like the "Little Mommy Real Loving Baby Cuddle and Coo" doll:
www.kjrh.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=5c383aca-c3d2-4b3d-b4a5-5a8108ba4971

I got a bike now so I've been riding that to the houses of the guys who give me a ride to work, and that's been workin out ok, but it kinda sucks being sweaty on the car ride there. Also bought the cheapest electric guitar that the music store here had, just to mess around with, I was dying to play something even though I'm pretty terrible and can only play "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" right now. I've been working on some slayer, but doggone it if their songs aren't a little tough. I can play some of it about 10 times slower, and thus not nearly as cool. Oh, and I can kinda play some of "Gimme Danger" but it sounds funky. I forgot to buy a tuner (don't really need one anyway, I just tune by ear off websites set up for that purpose, I mean, I'm no David St. Hubbins so it works for me) so maybe thats why it sounds funky, the B string may be a little off... but more likely the tab I was going off of is wrong. Anyway... Frida needs to use the laptop so I'll sign off for now.

ta-ta

RIDICULOUS

Here's your update you vultures:

-Frida was in the hospital with meningitis. That sucked. She is 100% recovered now though. It wasn't the bacteria type that can kill you in a few days, so that was a plus. It was a regular ass rhinovirus that decided "Wouldn't it be sssssupersssssweet if instead of infecting her sssssinussssesssss we infected the membrane between her brain and ssssskull? C'mon! Let'ssss do it to it dewdssss!" She was sick for a good two weeks, half of which was in the hospital supersick. And yes, rhinoviruses all have lisps.

-Went to Rome for 4 days. No way to describe it, you just gotta see it with your own eyes. Favorite parts were: Sistine Chapel - Pictures don't do it justice, you just gotta see it in person, St. Peter's Basilica - it is impossible to have any concept of the size, even when you are in it your brain cannot process how big it is, awesome, Colosseum - again with the size, I thought it was gonna be much smaller. I can't figure out how they built these things. If I tried to make a wall of bricks more than 4 ft high it would tip over forthwith. How their shit is still standing... Well, I guess that's the draw isn't it now? Rome overall was pretty nice. Good weather, not polluted, relatively small area, well dressed people. I'm sorry but I thought people there were in general more attractive than people here in SE. But you know me, I like tall dark and handsome *BLUSH* Plus Swedes dress weird. I'm used to it now I guess, but Italians just dress nice. Oh, also went to this monastery where they have like thousands of monk bones and skulls all decorating the inside, all over the walls and ceilings, including kid skeletons. Really macabre, kinda sick, yet super awesome.

-Got the new 46" HDTV and have been playing tons PS3 in my small amount of spare time (and not updating the blog, obv). Mainly GT5 Prologue and GTA4. Can't freaking wait for Rock Band 2 tho. Will def. pick it up when I'm home for Thanksgiving.

-Started Swedish classes. Interesting folk in the class, all different countries. The french girl has the thickest accent ever. I try not to laugh. Two Americans besides me. Haven't talked to them, mainly to this Greek guy, Spyros, an Australian girl, this kinda odd Italian guy, and the teacher. Everyone is about my age, including the teacher.

-One of the guys I ride to work with bought his car off a gypsy. I told him we think of gypsies in the US the same way we think about fairies and dragons. Some kind of mythical beast. But he bought his car off one. Classic. Gypsy isn't the P.C. term by the way. In case you ever meet one. Kind of like eskimo.

-Harris was eating a hamburger sandwich on break the other day. Not too strange you think? Well, that's what they call horsemeat here. Our hamburger here is "hamburgare" in Swedish. Anyway, the meat is kind of dark and when I saw it I figured that's what it was so I had to call him out on it. I'll get around to trying it one of these days. It sounds pretty tasty actually, it's smoked, for flavor! What I may never try is the rotten herring "surströmming". I probably couldn't get past the overpowering rotting fish smell to actually put it in my mouth.

-Still hate Jason Mraz. Had that fucking song stuck in my head the whole time in Rome. It very nearly ruined the trip. They play it every morning on the radio when we drive to work. I HATE IT SO MUCH



My October resolution is to update more.

Later fools.

YOOOOOO.
I'm so lazy about posting on here. Since last time:
-Brett's friends from Oklahoma were here. One was a bartender. I guess he was a schmoozemaster cause he chatted up everyone that worked there and somehow we ended up getting about $200 worth of alcohol for free at this nice restaurant downtown. Apparently that never happens, but it did this time. It was quite the Tuesday night.
-That weekend was cityfest in Gävle. Good times, good times. They have this food called langos which is kinda like a unbaked pizza on a piece of fried bread. No red sauce but like sour cream and cheese and onions or other stuff depending which on you get. They are freaking awesome and I think they only have them that one weekend for cityfest. The previous weekend we had a kräft (crawfish) party and I got drunker than everyone else and then threw a fit when we were supposed to leave cause I wanted to party more. Everyone laughed at me. Then cityfest weekend I'm like the least drunk and everyone else wants to stay out and party and all I can think about is going home to sleep. Really gotta synch up with everyone else. Oh, but at the kräft party Gustav and Anna had just come back from Greece, and they kept pouring everyone shots of this Greek moonshine that they carried back in this like beat up plastic water bottle, like the kind bottled water comes in and then you throw out. It looked truly frightening, my first question was "Have you actually had this yet?" and my second question was "How is your vision right now?" I guess they sell the stuff at grocery stores, you have to bring your own container and then fill it out of this big jug they have er something. It was pretty good though, it didn't taste nearly as strong as I think it was. And I didn't go blind.
-This past week virtually nothing happened. Won a little money at online poker cause I've been home like everynight. And this weekend we stayed in Stockholm and just walked around on Kungsholmen yesterday, which is a pretty nice area actually, not trendy like Söder and not fancy like the fancy parts of town, but still nice. Although actually I think it is pretty trendy like Söder. But whatev. Besides seeing these giant mounds of poo in two different doorways that were obviously not from dogs, and were probably from the same person, and were truly disgusting, we found this tight store called "Grandpa" where they sold random shit. Kinda like urban outfitters a little but with less clothes. My favorite finds were this GIANT book of photos called "Swedish Fetish". It was just a bunch of people in leather, whips and chains, ball gags, tatoos, corsettes, gimp costumes, cool "Swedish" shit like that. I really wanted to buy it for our coffee table. It would be great. Although I don't think my sense of humor translates well to, you know, people. People would think I was a total perv. And they'd be right. The other find was this memory game, you know the one where the cards are face down and you turn them over two at a time, but this one had pictures of boobs. Like one boob on each card, not a complete pair. Again, hilarious. Again, sense of humor probably doesn't translate. Again, perv.

"I don't know how you guys do things in Europe..."
"New Zealand."
"Ch'yeah, probly!"

I have a new list of movies I want to see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_nasties#The_DPP_list

I hate Adrien Grenier.

The weather here has been mostly rainy and cloudy the past few weeks with a few exceptions. The temperature is like averaging 65 F, need to take jackets or you get cold out in the wind.

On TV earlier they had this really weird show called "sport opera" I guess, that's what's painted behind the commentators anyway. First they had a guy in face paint singing. Then the commentators talked about it, then they played an instant replay of what he had just sung. Then they had these dancers come on and do this really weird air-humping motion with giant smiles on their faces for like 2 minutes straight to some classic opera, then the music stopped and they danced around for like 5 minutes with no music at all. I actually liked the second part, then I wondered why the hell I hadn't changed the channel yet.

I have like 4 canker sores that refuse to go away and everytime I eat or drink juice they burn like all the volcanoes on earth are in my mouth. Damn!

So that's the update. Enjoy.

Urge to kill fading... fading... fading... OR Racecar PIX MeGaPoST!!!!!!

The rage is all gone. I'm looking forward to seeing the Batman movie at home on blu-ray someday, despite what I said yesterday. I'm sure I'll like it a little better next time now that I know it ain't king shit of fuck mountain. Axl Rose remains and always shall be king shit of fuck mountain. So disregard yesterdays rant except for that part.
Moving on...
You may recall (but most likely not) that I have been trying to go to this race team's shop here in Gävle to check out some of the new cars they have acquired since I was there last summer. In the last year their team has branched out from the guy I know and his brother plus one mechanic into like 4 more mechanics/techs plus a team captain, Stanley Dickens, a Swedish racecar driver AND the great-great-grandson of THE Charles Dickens. So they have expanded a lot I'd say. Anyway, I took Thursday and Friday off work which finally allowed our schedules to match up enough for me to make a quick visit to the shop on Thursday night. It was tiiiiiight. Not sure where to really start, I guess I'll kind of caption the pictures:

I don't think they had this one last time. Porsche Carrera Cup car. You buy these as you see above directly from Porsche for a race series specifically for these cars. They build these at the Porsche factory on the same assembly line as regular street Porsches I believe. These babies are all stripped out and have some bespoke carbon fiber work on the wheel arches and aero bits. Also has a standard roll cage. The engine is race tuned too, natch. Non-turbo. I believe Claes said they got this one from some team that was racing it in some FIA series, but I could be wrong about that. Also raced in the 24 hours of Le Mans a couple times.


My favorite part of this car, since it shares a lot with street cars, it actually uses a regular ass key, which you can see up there complete w/ Porsche keychain in the standard Porsche left-of-the-steering-wheel style orientation. I think this was a '96 model year car. Real pretty, Claes says it sounds amazing too. Unfortunately he didn't start any of them up this time : /


A view of the shop from the front door. It's in this inconspicuous warehouse out by the ocean. In the background on the lift is the 2006 GT3 RSR they were racing in their series the past few years. It's a real looker too, they started it up last time I was there. It sounds mean as hell. Porsche also, obv, from the shape.
The underside of it. Some pretty header work there. Anti-roll bar. The blog won't let me upload these in their original resolution so it's gonna be blurry, sorry.
The Porsche Lola. They had just bought this last time I was there. It wasn't looking NEARLY this good then. They fixed it all up like brand new. Here she was back in her glory days: http://www.championracing.net/2006/History/Porsche_Lola.htm
I recommend taking a peep if you like what you see in the pic. They bought it off some guy in England who bought it from the team I think. Oh, Lola is a specialty racecar manufacturer, http://www.lolacars.com/
which is why it's in the name along with Porsche. Lola made the car and it was powered by Porsche I believe. Claes said he had planned to take this thing out and see what she could do but when they were finished refurbishing it it was just too pretty to play with.
It is spectacular looking. All carbon fiber, a real racecar.

And here's the beast itself. I believe it's chassis 015R, previously raced by Graham Nash Motorsport. I'm not sure how I know that, I think Claes mentioned something in an email and I googled it. Saleen S7R. I don't think they have hardly touched this since they got it. No idea what the plans for it are. I was a little too star-struck to ask all the questions I wanted to about all the cars. And I was only there for about 45 minutes.


Cockpit. Thing had some sick gull-wing door action going on.


Engine bay, and rear. Brand new exhaust, whoever they bought this from was planning on racing it in some Nordic series, which had noise requirements. Really slick car. It was much bigger than I had expected. The street S7's look much smaller in pictures. The front is small, but the ass-end is mammoth.
On to the car they are currently campaigning:

Can ya make out what it says on the carbon intake plenum? Yes indeedy, it is an honest to god REAL Pratt & Miller C5R. Serial #011, the last example before the jump to the C6Rs that I had the privilege of watching race as a guest of Pratt & Miller at the 2007 Grand Prix of Houston. Meaning we were in the pits 2 feet from the cars. I think I've told this story on here before. Anyway, it was freaking sweet... But back to this car...
If you can see in the first pic of the engine bay, the big orange tubes that lead into tiny silver aluminum intake restrictors? Yah the orange tube is supposed to be the amount of air going into the engine, and the weeny assed restrictor is what they have to run in addition to like 200 lbs of ballast or so for them to stay competitive. I think he said they are down to about 580 HP or so. The Oreca Vipers they race against have like 800 HP and are lighter. So in summary, the C5R has to be much less powerful AND heavier in order to stay competitive. Because it is that freaking awesome in "stock" form. I know it barely makes sense, it seems like this thing should be getting spanked by cars that are lighter and more powerful, I mean that's just physics, but it is so well designed, put together, and cutting edge compared to the other cars in the series it has to be seriously handicapped. Another thing about this car that blew my mind. Claes says parts are much cheaper than for any of the Porsches they have owned. That also makes no sense, There's millions of Porsches out there and like, well, 12 of these. And yet Pratt & Miller supplies parts for "reasonable" amounts of money. Unfreakingbelievable. It was super-duper awesome to see this thing. Claes loves it. I can see why.
Well, as I wrote in a previous post, I had mentioned in an email to Claes that I would love to volunteer around the shop or at races or something. Didn't think much would come of it, and he never acknowledged it in any emails, but when I was about to leave we started chatting a little, and long story short he said he would give me a call sometime to help out at a race or something. They weren't sure when they next one was because apparently the races have been called on-off repeatedly, but probably in September. So, more pics and exciting megaposts to come!

THE NIGHT IS DARKEST BEFORE THE BLAH BLAH

So I saw The Dark Knight just now. As I told Frida, I must immediately post to my blog because if my post isn't fueled by rage then it won't be worth posting and I can already feel the rage waning. Heath Ledger. Give me a fucking break. You did a good job playing the joker in a fucking batman movie. Whaddya want, a fucking medal? OH SNAP! You died from taking too many drugs before reaching the age of 30. Whaddya want, a fucking medal? OH SNAP! Everyone's sayin' YOU JUST MIGHT GET A MEDAL! Albeit in the form of a little golden man named Oscar. Props to you for dying! I guess the cockstains in Holier-than-thouwood all gathered together at a big Film Actors Guild meeting and thought "Hmm, drugs are glamourous, obv, but how can we make them MORE glamourous??? I KNOW GIVE SOME ONE WHO OD'D AN OSCAR FOR PLAYING THE JOKER IN A BATMAN MOVIE! I mean, he died right? That MUST make his performance REALLY worth something!"
Talk about overrated, seriously. I'm so pissed right now. Mainly because I was misled into believing this movie was gonna be really awesome and worth seeing, and Heath Ledger is like some kind of acting god for pulling off playing a crazy clown badguy. Pshaw! And I don't mean a contraction of my name. When will they start giving actors awards for NOT doing drugs and depriving the world of real honest to god GOOD entertainment. Or even people who do drugs but don't turn in to fucking wah wah crybaby morons. "Oh I have so much money, oh people love me, boohoo boohoo the pressure is so tough! I need pills to go to sleep at night" Why don't you buy some prostitutes to wear you out before beddy-by time. Fucking money well spent if you look at the alternatives. Here, take Axl Rose, here's what he's got to say:

"I have a different physical constitution and different mindset about drugs than anybody I've known in Hollywood, because I don't abstain from doing drugs, but I won't allow myself to have a fuckin' habit. I won't allow it."

When's he gonna get HIS fucking medal, give HIM an Oscar, seriously. Dudes hangover-black turds on Sunday morning will now literally entertain me more than Heath Ledger can BECAUSE HE'S FUCKING DEAD. All hail Axl, this century's Mark Twain!!!!

FUCK Heath Ledger, and fuck the Jokers that made me think this movie was gonna be sweeeeeeeeet!