GM, what do you have? Crossovers and luxury cars. Chrysler? The same. Sure, there are plenty of rear-wheel drive offerings that I would love to own. However, I live off of a county dirt road and even if I didn’t most of the options cost more than I could justify spending.

I drive a Subaru daily. I love it. The recent economic climate has made me think twice about driving a foreign car. (Though the entire Legacy and Tribeca lines are built right here in the USA at a “green” facility that is officially a protected natural asset.) I can get any Impreza or Legacy with All-Wheel Drive (of course) and a manual transmission, including the potent GT, WRX, and STi variants. I could buy a Mitsubishi Evolution or Lancer. I could even step it up a notch (into the Taurus and LaCrosse price ranges) and get a well-equipped BMW 338xi or Infiniti G series.

It’s not that the “Big 2 1/2″ aren’t capable of building a sporty AWD car. They’ve done it in the past and offer several in Europe (Ford Focus RS, anyone?). America just doesn’t want to buy them. For most drivers on the expressway, it’s too much work to check one’s blindspot before changing lanes. Why would they want to have to row through gears as they enter and exit the highway? Come on America! Wake up! Pay attention! Put down that cellphone and cheeseburger and learn to drive! That’s the only way we’re going to get cars worth driving in the showrooms.

I stuck some of the clear rubber bumpers that you put between a piece of glass and a table top (among other uses) on each of the directional buttons, and another in the center (for the “ok”) button.

I’ve finally jumped ship for Wordpress. Why? I guess I just want to fit in. It seems that the internet loves Wordpress and there’s a lot to be said for doing things the same way as a lot of other folks. I don’t spend as much time maintaining my site as a I used to and the tools developed by thousands of folks are more rich and diverse than those I can come up with on my own. I will still do some interesting custom stuff ( like the modified moblog viewer plugin on the homepage), but for now, I’m liking the simplicity and organization of an app designed for blogging. And yes, Brad… I finally have comments.

Gina and I are in week 2 of phase 2 of the P90X plan. We’ve had to skip a day of workouts last week and this week due to illness and schedule, but have otherwise stayed true to the diet and exercise plan. Phase 2 is more intense and the workouts seem even longer, but we’ve both noticed feeling better since beginning the workout. The end of this week marks the 1/2 way point.

We’ve been trying to complete our home updates, but our race season, Gina’s work travels, and our workout plan have severely limited the amount of time we can spend on our projects. Christian’s new company (Degen Development) is keeping him pretty busy, but we’re trying to book him before the end of the year. On the list are crown moldings for the den fireplace, new basement doorwall, and continued work on our basement finishing/theater.

I’ve been thinking about my options relative to my current race car. It’s never been built up beyond my initial prep for Spec Neon apart from a header minor top end cleanup before my first season of 100% ITA. The engine is tired, I have no limited slip diff, I need a real suspension setup, and bigger diameter/wider tires and wheels. The cost of everything combined is close to the cost of a complete, competitive race car. Though I considered staying in ITA, it’s a class where you have to keep up with the Jones’. I don’t have the funds to keep tweaking my car. My other option was to switch to a spec class, such as Spec Miata. But, that has become a very expensive class over the years. I’ve decided to switch to Spec Racer Ford and race alongside my father-in-law. I’m working on getting a new car now and will have more updates soon.

Gina and I recently began our 3rd week of P90X. While we’ve struggled at times to keep up with every movement in every exercise, we’ve been doing remarkably well. We’re even following the diet pretty darn faithfully. The biggest downside is the length of the workouts. They usually run about 90 minutes and are extremely demanding. “Do your best. Forget the rest.” Can I get an “Amen?!”

For the sake of over information: the digital tuner is hooked up to my Windows Media Center server in my basement which feeds my extenders. Nobody actually watched TV on that monitor (it’s an old 17″ Dell) and runs at 1280×1024… to VGA works just dandy for this purpose. Before I was using the FireSTB hack that John told me about. The catch was … Read Morethat I couldn’t watch live TV in HD because of the weird way it recorded SD and HD in parallel, then deleted the SD file after it was done recording, replacing it with the HD version. The hack also let me change channels (usually) via firewire instead of IR blasting. Unfortunately, the hack also turned the volume on my cable set top box down one “click” each time it changed channels, effectively muting SD recordings after a few days. The digital tuner solution fixes all of these issues. The catch? Technically, you’re supposed to have an OEM media center PC with “supported” DRM-friendly bios. There are now workarounds for this…

As noted in previous news updates, Gina and I have been working on a mini-remodel of our den and kitchen. I’ve installed new recessed lighting, other lighting fixtures, run some complicated a/v wiring, and significant drywall work to prepare for our first experience with professional painters. I hate painting… hopefully seeing how easily the pros do it will make it easier to decide to go this route more often.

In other news, I celebrated my 34th birthday last Saturday. Gina made an awesome coconut cream cake, bourbon-glazed ribs and cheesy potatoes. I was able to relax a bit, play some games (finishing Ghostbusters and House of the Dead: Overkill), and get some work done on my race car and around the house.

In related news, I’ll be racing at Grattan Raceway this weekend. It’s my first race of the season and apart from a few maintenance parts missing (ahem), I’m just about ready to head out on my old tires and get on the track!

The hum of our neighbor’s generators made sleeping difficult and the next day (Sunday) arrived without electricity. After a quick check on our sump, I decided it was best to drag out our hand-me-down generator that is likely even older than our lawn tractor. I topped off the oil, added some fuel and it started right up. Emulating Brad, we powered our fridge, sump, cable modem, router, and a laptop. We were able to download the Bahrain F1 race (since our Media Center was out of commission and unable to record it) and watch it before ending the day. Power returned by evening, and it looks like everything is back to normal.

I haven’t been able to find anyone playing games online (PC or PS3) that I wanted to join. They’ve all switched from FPS games to MMORPGs and RTS. The few PS3 friends that I have are either playing Karoake or sports games. I really liked going home and hanging out with my friends while playing games (especially because we all live pretty far apart these days). In the one night that we’ve had the XBox, Brad spent almost an hour explaining the XBox interface and XBox live system to me. Additionally, he shared the gamertags of friends that have XBoxes as well… which already outnumbers the PS3 friends I have. Plus, the XBox users actually play games on their consoles… not just sing Karaoke and play videos. (Yes… I’m talking about you, Paul.)