TMoney

I survived my first HPDE track weekend with the Audi Club up at Thunderhill Raceway. What a cool track. Way out away from the Bay Area but lots of interesting elevation changes. Coming over the hills on some of the blind corners requires guts when you can't see what is ahead of you. My goodness, that was fun. I was so glad to have explored my limits and my car doing autocross before getting out there on the big track with other drivers. Knowing what my tires and brakes can and cannot do helped a lot. Audi Club was really accommodating to us first timers. Only the most advanced drivers and the instructors are allowed to go out solo. Every one else has an instructor riding along in the right seat. I really enjoyed the coaching and we were able to pick up pace each session out there. Unlike autocross, you get a ton of seat time doing HPDE. There were 4 26-minute sessions each day split between the morning and afternoon. 26 minutes goes by in a blink when you are locked in and focused. Driving on a race track at pace... oh my god is it fast. I was very nervous to start and only started to relax after a few sessions. Driving in traffic on track was also new to me. The speeds you can get up to out there are no joke. I hit 130 on the front straight before I started to be a bit more judicious and easy on my brakes by coasting a bit once I hit triple digits. I used to wonder how people memorize all the corners, but after two days on track and a bunch of study time I could recite them from memory with my eyes closed. Lots of fun... also very expensive. I bought a full track day policy just in case, and my tires and brake pads are pretty well used up and will need to be replaced this week. They call them consumables for a reason, but the butchers bill from my mechanic shop is not going to be pretty. Can't wait to get back out there in the fall!

^ When?

Bully - Lucky For You What can I say? I'm a sucker for alt-pop. I dig her sound and I'm excited to dig through her back catalog. I guess I missed my chance to see her on tour as she was opening for the Pixies who I think have already come through town.

What the hell am I watching? Who and what is this thing for? Why would I want one? I'll give them credit though, they really went for it. No Oculus ripoff here.

Rodrigo and Gabriella last night @ the Fox Theater in Oakland. Love that these two are still doing their thing and fun to get to see them at my favorite Bay Area venue. That woman can really play some rhythm guitar! Rod ain’t bad on lead either.

I am so excited for Diablo 4. I'm going to try and take Friday off to go full degenerate if I can finish my work for the week by the end of the day tomorrow. Early reviews sound fantastic.

Thank you for getting this stuck in my head, Mrs. Davis.

RIP to the queen of Rock. What an amazing life and an amazing talent. To have escaped from that monster and had the late career rebirth in the 80s was just so impressive.

I had fun tracking these two back-to-back at Exotics Racing in Las Vegas. Expensive to lap their cars, but where else are you going to get to drive them on track at pace? I can see why KG bought the C8 w/ z51. It is a riot to drive and the v8 sounds amazing. My lap times were quite a bit faster in the GT4 despite the horsepower advantage of the C8. Porsche cars are just so easy to get in and get up to speed and the GT4 is no exception. They make you feel like a better driver than you really are. The bigger, heavier 'vette felt like it might bite if you didn't keep a handle on it. I can't even imagine how quick the z06 version must be. I somehow was fastest of the day and 12th fastest of the month, which I am very happy about. I think it is because I know from auto-crossing how to find the limit of what the tires will do and use that to carry a more speed in the medium and slow corners than the other drivers in higher horsepower cars. I also am used to driving a pretty quick car so the speed doesn't scare me the same way it would someone who isn't used to what a modern sports car can do. My lines and brake points sucked, but the instructors riding along gave great advice. I've got to be a lot smoother on the big track than I am on the autocross given the speeds involved. Unsettling the car at 60mph vs 100mph feels pretty different! Rolling on to the pedals really helped vs just smashing the brake and letting the ABS figure it out. In case you wondered how they feel confident letting people off the street walk in and drive 700hp cars with a minimal safety briefing, each car had the brake pedal wired so that the instructor had their own brake pedal in the right side seat so they can save you from yourself.

HBD, diablo jenkinZ!

Have a wonderful birthday, Rob!

Happy birthday!

"Rare misses aside, hearing Faltskog and Lyngstad’s impeccable voices weave through a battalion’s worth of riffs, bells, and whistles is an indefatigable source of ecstasy. Listening to “S.O.S.” or “Dancing Queen” or “Super Trouper” for the first time can feel like hearing “Good Vibrations” or “Born to Run” in the same fashion: Your pleasure centers are overwhelmed until they blow up like the Grinch’s tiny heart, expanding beyond their old size and becoming something new."

I found a website, openstreetmap.org, that has most (but not all) of the stairs, lanes, paths, and public rights of way marked. A lot of them are not on google maps or Apple Maps. This is so cool! A lot of these paths are barely marked and you could walk/drive right by them without knowing they were there. I've been plotting out interesting walks while I've been stuck on conference calls and double checking that the paths are actually there on google maps street view. Some fun looking routes in southern marin that I hope to do. Corte Madera Stair Tour: Sausalito Stair Tour: Mill Valley Stair Tour:

Happy birthday, Shelly!

Did the “SF Stair Challenge,” a walk around San Francisco put on by a neighborhood advocacy group to promote making the City more walkable. This is a very cool route. I’d recommend it to anyone who wants to explore some of the hills of the northern part of the City. https://abc7news.com/sf-stair-challenge-walk-san-francisco-what-to-do-best-walks/13181267/

It's a competing ortho in a similar price bracket. Seems relevant enough to me even if I can't see ever paying $7,500 for a pair of headphones any time soon.

Happy birthday!

Rodrigo y Gabriela - In Between Thoughts...A New World. As long as these two keep making albums, I'll keep listening to them! Bought tickets to see them when they come through town this summer.

What the hell is this show? One of the stronger pilot episodes I can remember. Buckaroo Bonzai vibes crossed with The Prisoner, starring the brainy bombshell from GLOW. I’m intrigued.

New Metallica is honestly pretty good! Metallica - 72 Seasons

Oh the middlebrow slander! 🙃

Happy birthday!

A few more autocross shots from my event Sunday. Loving autocross. It is like cars and coffee and racing in the same day, only the folks all actually drive their cars they way they were meant to be driven!

For as big and heavy as she is I am amazed how flat she stays under cornering.