JDoors

An appropriate reply in a newsletter I receive:

On this, I'm confused. Say you're slow-cooking some ribs. You might have your oven set under 300 degrees for hours. Now, why can't you set your oven to 300 degrees for a few hours to heat your house in an emergency? What's the difference? Do the ribs absorb the CO2 or something, making it safe to run the oven for cooking but not for heat? When the power goes out 'round here, and it goes at least once a month, I use the oven, set at a low temp, to keep from freezing to death. Should I put a slab of ribs in there first?

I''m with you on "outsourced" help -- though I did have ONE that was perfectly helpful ONE time. So it's possible. Aside: Had a recent "help" call where they said something like, "You have reached the so-and-so help desk in Arizona ... etc." Ah-ha! They KNOW! Have you actually checked the grounds in your home? There's an inexpensive plug-like thingy with lights on it that you simply plug in and read the lights -- if everything's hooked up right it'll let you know. Far as I can remember, any electronic device rarely or occasionally needs to be "rebooted," radios, TV's, automobiles, toys and

Don't know if we're in the same area or if it's just that the problem is universal, there was a recent fire in the news here too, caused by a space heater. In addition to your advice, make sure your smoke detector is working, also the CO2 detector if you have one (and you should if you have gas or oil fired appliances).

The broken mount absolutely could be the cause of your problem. The shifter is mounted to the body, the transmission to the frame. The engine and transmission rock and move on flexible mounts, however the shifter does not move with it. Hence as the engine moves TOO far due to a broken mount, it can seriously effect the shift mechanism. The engine can also contact the body and other mechanicals in places it's not supposed to, causing all kinds of sounds. I think you've found your problem. It's not too hard to do it yourself either.

I learned to drive while the family had both manuals and automatics. Talk about fun ... Stopping to pay a toll and forgetting you're in the manual <chugga-chugga--wump!>, reaching for the shifter & clutch when you're in the auto ... loads of fun.

If you have an Adobe product open I bet you're correct, the automatic update takes forever (even on faster connections it's one of the slower d/l's). A program that monitors what's happening on your system in real time: Process Monitor I use an older, less capable version whenver something suspicious is going on and it has eased my mind many times over.

It's always been a contentious subject because, as you can see from the variety of answers, there are so many variables and areas of concern. As for the "life" of components, I agree with HB, who cares if you extend the life of a component from eight to ten years? It's obsolete by then anyway. I hang onto things much longer than their "useful" life and having them eventually fail is the only excuse I can comfortably accept for replacing something (my entire system is seven years old and running ... C'mon! Fail already! -- as a point of information, I've left it on for months at a time AND I'v

That's definitely one of the better optical illusion sites; you can step through one-by-one using the "tour" button, or you can pick individual illusions using the thumbnails, it explains the science behind them, it gives credit where and when it's due, it has the most illusions. ------ Hmm, thought I'd look in my Favorites to see if I had any other sites to offer up -- That one was the ONLY one I had saved ('cept for a similar "puzzle" site). Not too surprising since it's the best.

... and anyone who CAN explain all that ... Got yer doctorate did you? Good boy! Yes, that's a GOOD boy!

Interesting -- "Turn your TV off standby." You CAN'T turn most TV's off standby. You'd have to unplug them and who's gonna do that? The anteater?

Cute ... but boy, you have to watch for a long time before something new happens (yes, I watched for a long time).

If you have or get a thin, stiff wire, bend a hook in the end, slip it into whatever hole you think the hatch wires should be in, twist the wire and hope the hook grabs the hatch wires -- then pull out the hook and hopefully the hatch wires will be entangled on the hook. Some junkyards'll let you trade the hatch you have for another, hopefully fully wired, one. What's with all the clutches going out? You DO know how to drive a stick, don't you?

Lol, where do you see that? Actually, I see the faces of two foxes (enhanced pic below):

I'm skeptical -- The entire frame is already grounded. If a charge is NOT getting discharged you need to have your electrical outlets checked to ensure they are properly grounded. If they are not it's a potentially dangerous condition. More likely, IMO, is that an internal chip had an error and turning the power off allowed the chip to reset.

Don't forget the FREE HAT!!!!!

Sooooooo mean! Did I tell this one before? The dispatcher pulled a ticket off the bottom of the pile, hands it to me and says to, "Take care of my friend." Unusual, we're so busy NO ONE gets bumped ahead, but what-the-hey, it's her friend. I finish the car and bring the ticket to her. Instead of putting it in the tube (those vacuum tubes that WHOOSH things from place to place, like in drive-through banks) she gives the ticket back to me and says to bring it to the cashier. That, has NEVER happened. I'm definitely perplexed. I take it to the cashier, who was busy. When she sees me s

You'll have to describe what you consider to be a good holiday. Exploring little-known spots? Seeing all the popular sites? Exploring wine country? Hiking, climbing, relaxing by the sea? Rick Steves' videos (maybe check his section on PBS.ORG) is the most knowledgeable traveler I know, and he separates holidays into various categories such as little-known spots, etc.

Never had that type of incident. Broke a gas line once & got gasoline all over the place ... The old man of the shop walks over, smoking his perpetual cigarette, drops it on the floor and steps it out. I sweated that one. A guy asked if I could help him, he needed someone to use a sledgehammer on a wedge while he held it and the part. I had to reach through the lift with my arms and swing the sledge at arms length. You can guess what happened. Yeah, on around the fourth swing, my arms getting tired, I hit him in the head! I was SO sorry! Like me with the cut nose, he manned it up and said

Oy! Working on cars in the cold, or soaking wet, or in the HEAT (burning your hands ... and other things ... on hot parts). Double-oy! How 'bout: I have a car up on the rack, working away with a power chisel. The muffler falls off the car and bounces off my face. Ow. I keep working (I'm the man!) until a moment later I feel a trickle of blood. Darn. I go to the dispatcher to let her know I need medical attention. The look on her face ... I still remember it ... pure horror. Like she'd seen Satan himself. Uh-oh -- maybe this is pretty bad. The first medical attention I get is from a nurse,

Funny stuff. There's this "kid" at work who traded his Pontiac Solstice for a Buick. I think there's somethin' wrong with him. "Oh but now I have a back seat, a comfortable ride, luxury touches, etc." Yeah, and a wheelchair will fit in the trunk, what's your point?

Hate to be a nit-picker, but the government didn't "require" lower compression, it was just one way of meeting the pollution laws on-the-cheap. You can buy high compression engines right now that meet the rules in other (more expensive) ways. The leaded I don't miss, lead is bad stuff (which they replaced with even worse stuff that cost more, which they now have to replace with even more expensive stuff), and cats haven't had any negative effect that I'm aware (except for cost). BTW, cats also help if you want to modify an exhaust; you can pretty much eliminate everything BUT the cats to get a

Always a good sign!!!!!

That's funny. For now. Reminds me of the infamous video of the monkey smelling his own butt.

Oh, way before then, though computers made them more complicated. The first change in American cars was the Ford Fairmont. I had worked on both foreign and domestic cars and when the first Fairmont came in and I popped the hood I thought, "Whoa, this is built like a foreign car!" Meaning: Plastic where domestics used metal, thin sheet steel where domestics used cast iron, etc. Now, do you SEE any Ford Fairmonts around? Nope, they all fell apart. You don't see many old foreign cars either for the same reason -- light construction doesn't hold up (unless you do what everyone does now, using th