Dog Day Afternoon

These pictures were taken with my phone camera, so they're not the best.

We had an exiting afternoon here in the marina. I heard some noise and saw about 20 cops running around with guns drawn and pointing at the water. Plus two LBPD boats, two LB Lifeguard boats and a LBPD helicopter. The cops were hollering "come on out Scott, we know who you are and we know that your here in the water and were not leaving until we get you. Scott apparently had a different plan so he remained in the water.

As I understand it, the suspect AKA Scott, tried to make an unauthorized withdrawal from the First National Back of Best Buy Electronics. Some techno-geek contacted the coppers and the race was on. Out of the gate was Scott leading by a few lengths. Right behind our leader was a LB Motor cop chasing him through the Marina Pacifica Shopping Center parking lot. At this point, the race turned into a steeplechase when Scott vaulted a wall into the Albertson's parking lot. A new set of hounds in a LBPD B&W now took up the number two position. Scotty now added jaywalking to his rad sheet when he tore across Second Street against the light and ran into the marina parking lot. He ended up running down gangway 33, my and Sadie's home turf as it were, and jettisoned his gatt into the briny deep. The steeplechase now turned into water-sport as he did a one and a half gainer into the Pacific. Cops everywhere. LBPD cops. Marine Patrol cops. Some "plain clothes" cops with shaved heads and white Izod type shirts that had some stinking badges on lanyards around their necks.

It turned out that Mr. Scott was hiding out under a dock. The coppers searched about 45 minutes for him with no success. Enter Sgt. Kaynine with his trusty companion Fido. Fido had something the other cops didn't have. A nose. Apparently our armed robber first tried to hide out in the Duffy in the slip next to me. Fido was sniffing and barking his ass off. Sgt. K9 let Fido loose on the Duffy but our purp was already somewhere else. Fido figured there where in no time at all as he tried to chew his way through the dock. The moron then tried to swim for it. With half of the LBPD standing over him two feet away. Sgt. K then hollered to the purp, give it up or the dog goes in after you. The moron didn't listen, the dog did his best Ester Williams and shark fins started to appear as Mr. P lost a pint, or so. All of this is happening off of the bow of my boat.

Anyway alls well etc. As the story closed it was cops 1, purp 0.

Cupcake

Just a quickie. By now, you should know how much I like quickies.

Last evening, I went up to the park in Signal Hill to listen to the concert. I've been attending many free concerts this summer. The LB Municipal Band, Bellflower, Cerritos, The Peninsula etc, but my favorite is Signal Hill. They have really good musical groups and being it's a hill, as in Signal Hill, the hill forms sort of a natural amphitheater. There is a eclectic mix of people there and it's dog friendly. Hey, they're free. Cheap is good, free is better.

Last evening was a Beatles tribute band. I'm not big on tribute performers. Most aren't very good and a few are plain outright bad. These guys were The Silver Beatles, and they were fairly good.

There are a few food vender's up on the hill and I'm told that I should try the cheeseburger that is grilled over charcoal on site. A saw a few people walk by me with a cupcake and all of a sudden, I found myself Jonesing for a cupcake. I have lost thirty pounds in the last three years and keeping the pounds off is almost as big a struggle as losing them. Rarely does my tongue touch ice cream anymore. Ditto for pies, cakes and doughnuts. Trail mix is just about my only sweet indulgence anymore and the occasional dark chocolate bar to share. If you catch my drift. Wink, wink.

Anyway occasionally I feel that one must slip off of the wagon or a big fall will be imminent. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. With a large guilt like when my dog swipes food that she knows doesn't belong to her, I slither up to the cupcake line knowing that this is so wrong on so many levels when I spy the bill of fare. Cupcakes $3.50. Three fifty for a freakin' cupcake??? I can't think of a cupcake on this Earth that's worth $3.50.

I'm saved.

All is not lost, I know I'll be back for the cheeseburger next week.

My Day

I originally was going to call this post My Day, but my day swiftly morphed into That Was The Week That Was.

Back in the Stone Age, you know in the days before Kennedy was President, back in Ohio, in the Cleveland Press was a column written by Elenore Roosevelt called My Day. I never read it because when I was real young, I didn't know who Elenore Roosevelt was. Later on, when I knew who she was, I didn't care at all about her day. But I liked the title. Old Elenore sure was ugly, but she may have actually been the first, modern day, blogger.

If you are over forty, you may know what TWTWTW is. It was a weekly British television show with David Frost that looked at the weeks news in a humorous vein.

Mine was a doosey.

On Friday, I realized that my registration had expired on my BRT, Big Red Truck. I called the AAA and got a recording saying that they were open on Saturday from 9 to 2 PM. I headed over the next morning only to find a notice Scotch Taped to the window advising that they, AAA, were closed on that holiday weekend Saturday. Of course they were also closed on Monday to commemorate the Fourth of July.

Tuesday I returned with all pertinent paperwork in hand to surrender my hard-earned cash to The State. My membership had expired for non-payment. OK, I knew that. Go stand in the casher's line to surrender more cash to the AAA. After patiently waiting in line, the afore mentioned cashier informed me I first had to go see some other paper-pusher. After waiting to see Paper-Pusher 2, I coughed up $65+. Line three was to effect the actual registration renewal process. After hemorrhaging $300+ I was told that the BRT needed a new smog check at a test only facility. I now dutifily drove to the smog tester and shelled out another $67 for the check. Guess what, it failed. Bad O2 sensor. Off to AutoZone to buy a new O2 sensor. Which one asked the guy behind the counter. Some vehicles can have up to ten. The BRT only has two and we figured out that I needed the post catalytic converter sensor. $65. Of course you need a special $25 socket to change it. AutoZone will actually loan you the special socket. Just leave a $25 deposit. Return it intact and you get your 25 bucks back. Changing the sensor was relativity easy, almost too easy. This is not a good sign. Started up the motor, oh crap the Check Engine is still lighted. Think, think hard. Maybe the on-board computer needs to be reset. How the hell does some guy from Cleveland with limited resources do that? Try removing the positive battery cable, IE unplugging the freaking thing. Go take a tinkle in the head and by then, it should have dumped whatever the hell it had on it's evil little mind. Aha!!! It looks like that actually worked. I drive back to Smog R Us for my free retest. Mr. Smog asks me if I had driven the BRT for "a few miles". I did. He hooks up the umbilical cord and advises that I probably haven't driven it enough yet because all of the codes haven't reset it yet. I need to put on at least seventy five miles. Hither and Yon I drive. Instead of taking the shortest possible route, I take the long way.

Wednesday I go back to Bellflower Smog #3 to get the damned truck a clean bill of health. First the computer won't speak to the BRT's On Board Diagnostic (OBD2) computer. Then their computer lock up and everybody at BS#3 starts swearing and bitching about getting a tech in to fix things.

Thursday I call BS#3. Tech been in yet? No? When?

Friday, no tech yet. I'm getting pissed. I got a truck with expired registration and if the computer at BS#3 won't talk, I want to take it to BS#1 or #2. After bit of double talk and excuse making they finally agree. I go to the Cyprus facility and Mason the courteous and obliging tech there plugs the BRT into his computer. It won't sync up. Now I'm really screwed. What the hell do I do now? My OBD2 isn't talking to the outside world. About that time, some guy from Jiffy Lube comes in on other business. Mason explains that we're having communication problems and that he doesn't know what to do now. Mr. Jiffy Lube offers his little hand-held diagnostic reader to see what that tells us. We trek over to JL and the handheld not only communicates, but it also tells us that there are no fault codes being displayed. Hmm, maybe all is not lost yet. I head for the marina and as I approach Seal Beach, I get an idea. I stop at the smog test shop located in the ARCO station and talk to some guy named Al.

I tell Al all about my problem and ask him if he will hook up his machine and see if it will talk to the BRT's OBD2. If it will, I will gladly pay for a second smog test just to get this nightmare over. He agrees. It talks, but he can't do the test today. But he can tomorrow and they open at eight AM. I'll be there at 7:59.