2007 has been a great, exciting, disappointing, frustrating, wonderful year for me.

I’ve gotten a ton of work done on the truck, and also been frustrated and burnt out on it, not doing much of anything for six months. I’ve interviewed and been offered several new jobs, taking a promotion at Dennis Kirk, rather than switching to a different company. I’ve had numerous oral surgeries to remove my wisdom teeth, and due to lackluster dental insurance been forced to cancel our plans to build a deck.

We celebrated our first wedding anniversary in November and thought we lost the baby. We’re only a month away from having a newborn son, and I’m overloaded with website projects both at work, and on the side!

We’ve been to Nebraska twice with Jessica, once because we thought Dad was going to need heart surgery, and once to hang out. Jessica turned nine years old, and Grandpa Curtis turned 80.

2008 is going to be busy with the new guy, Michelle not working for several months will make money a little tight, but we’re looking forward to it. Maybe not the lack of sleep, but definitely being new parents.

Hope your new year is as happy, healthy and fun as we hope ours is!

I have been working on websites the last two weeks, and haven’t done much in the garage. I finished modifying my welder cart to fit the new welder, and got some tubing for re-making my motor mounts. I have in mind what I want to do with them, so I’ll be happier with how they look this time around.

Michelle is getting pretty big with our little guy floating around in her. I think he’s going to be a couple weeks early. I just can’t fathom how she can get too much bigger without popping! She’s wasn’t very big to begin with!

Anyways, I am not happy with how my “1st” video post turned out, so I’m going to go back to my on-the-fly narration style, but with the better camera. If you happen to know of any good, cheap titling software, please let me know!

For Christmas, I took a photo of Michelle in front of our Christmas tree. She wasn’t too happy about it, but she sure does look good!

Ben

I was doing a little reading on the HAMB this morning, and came across this post from 2005 from Kevin Lee. I hope when the truck is done, I’ll be able to inspire a few next generation hot rodders with it!

“It was nearly 60 deg. in Kansas City Friday so it was pretty much a no brainer that I was taking the roadster to work. Drove the usual route. Forgot that I had ripped my makeshift windshield off to work on the cowl and ended up with a spray of melted snow and road grime covering my face after rolling through a wet intersection. Got to work and hit the bathroom to clean my face before work. Can’t wash my face in a sink without hearing my friend Jeremy’s voice calling it a “whore’s bath”. One of the rudest and at the same time funniest people I know.

Met some coworkers for lunch. Fairly uneventful - Mongolian BBQ was good. Step out side and see a kid standing in front of my car with his mom taking a picture. I yell across the street, “get in!”. They both turn and look at me. “Go on, it’s mine. Climb on in and get your picture taken.” The kid is beaming and his brother bolts out of nowhere and stands next to him. They’re both waiting for me to give them the signal to open the door. I explain that the doors don’t open and assure the kids and mom that they’re not going to hurt anything.

They climb in and waste no time finding the goggles. Stoked. Those kids sat in the car for a good five minutes mugging and racing while their Mom took photos and Dad and Grandma looked on. Grandma leaned over to me and said. “We’ve been at Crown Center and Union Station all Morning and those kids haven’t had this much fun. Thank you.” No problem.

It was finally time to leave. They went walking down the sidewalk and I got ready to leave. As I rolled by a coworker she said, “you should burn rubber for those kids.” I had already planned on it. Coasted up next to them and dumped the clutch. Tires were spinning and squealing for several car lengths before I shifted. I remember thinking I’d rev the motor before letting it out into second so I could spin the tires again. Never happend.

BANG, pop pop pop crunch cruuunnnch. I rolled to the curb. First, second, and reverse gave nothing but a knock knock knock sound. Finally got it into third and felt the car move when I let the clutch out. The family coasted up beside me. No sense in destroying the kids vision so I just waved and limped around the corner.

I sent everyone else back to work and limped home. After a few blocks I think most of the large chunks had found thier way to the bottom of the case and the remaining teeth and bits were systematically being stripped away and sent to join them.

By the time I made it home there wasn’t much more than the occational pop or clunk as an errant piece found a moving part. Got in my late model and went to work.

I wasn’t born into this. I’d never driven a car older than ‘83 before building my hot rod. And I haven’t really been that nice to my transmission lately. Or my car in general for that matter. Guess it was my own wierd way of finding out what it was capable of. At least I understand the transmission a little better now. I’ll have a lot more knowledge as it comes apart on my workbench. Wonder how much I can salvage?.”

Read the original here

Ben

We got another four or five inches of snow this afternoon, so I’ve been out plowing my neighbor and I out with the four wheeler, instead of working on the truck. Last night I finally got to really use the new welder, it’s slick! I chopped apart my old welder cart, and added six inches to it, along with a better cable rack. As I was tacking the cable rack into place, I ran out of wire, so I had to stop. I’ll finish it up in about ten minutes tomorrow or Thursday, then go back to the transmission mount, and then reworking the motor mounts (they are just too darned ugly!)

Hopefully Saturday or Sunday I’ll be able to get back to finishing boxing the front part of the frame, then I can wire up the motor, and give it a test fire!