Car Talk

Beltane                                                                         Running Creeks Moon

driveway the day we got home
driveway the day we got home from Korea

Told Holly, our across the street neighbor, the snow tires were coming off today. “Oh, It’s an El Nino year,” she said, “we got two feet of snow on Memorial Day once.” Even so. Off they come. This is the second season on the Blizzaks so they’ll be evaluated, see if we can get a third out of them. Two aging drivers can use the extra traction in the winter. Better to get new ones if there’s any iffyness about them.

Brakes, too, probably. Not primarily because of the mountain driving, we use all the gears for braking, but 70,000 + miles. We bought this Rav4 in July of 2011 when our Tundra had complete organ failure, spewed vital fluids all over 153rd Ave NW and never moved again. The Rav4 was, in retrospect, a mistake. It’s not a bad vehicle, but it’s not a good one either. It was affordable, does what we need, but I’ve never developed any affection for it.

When I get back, more fire mitigation. Mostly cutting up trunks into pieces Seth can manage. He’ll get rid of most of them. That will leave the tops and branches to move to the front. And, of course, the other trees to cut down. When I finished yesterday morning, I realized Memorial Day was too ambitious a deadline. I’ll work at it until I get it done.