Great, Mike. Did you use their presets?

if i didn't already have a 360, i'd get one for Netflix.

Yeah, this will go in the music room since I don't want to put another cable box in. If I like it we'll add another downstairs.

Great, Mike. Did you use their presets?

I used Sonic Console and picked the 304 Sonicloop Digital, if that means anything to you. The thing is lit up like a digital Christmas tree.

I definitely like the size of the new one.

Nice purchases Mike, Mike and Al. I need to get the wife an eye-fi for her camera.

A few bar purchases. Angostura and Regan's orange bitters, Fee Brothers orange flower water, orgeat syrup and whiskey barrel aged aromatic bitters, Luxardo Maraschino cherries and a new Absinthe spoon.

Nice scores Jim.

apple wireless keyboad

Nice scores Jim.

Indeed.

Old Denon pro studio CD player.

Mine says delta-sigma D/A converter on the front.

Nice purchases Mike, Mike and Al. I need to get the wife an eye-fi for her camera.

A few bar purchases. Angostura and Regan's orange bitters, Fee Brothers orange flower water, orgeat syrup and whiskey barrel aged aromatic bitters, Luxardo Maraschino cherries and a new Absinthe spoon.

You are so going to mix some cocktails for me one of these days...

You are so going to mix some cocktails for me one of these days...

I have to say, Jim and Al, all these cocktail recipes going back and forth between you two is really intriguing! Too bad I'm too damn lazy to do anything about it!

Nice purchases Mike, Mike and Al.

x2. Nice job!

You are so going to mix some cocktails for me one of these days...

Sounds like enough of a reason to do a fall Chicago meet that doesn't have "uni" in the name .

Sounds like enough of a reason to do a fall Chicago meet that doesn't have "uni" in the name .

That would resolve some things for me ...

A Volvo transmission part that I'll need to get back on the road. Some sort of "relay" that needs to work right for the computer to tell the automatic transmission when it's time to shift. Same thing happened when I was in Canada in May and it the goons trying to fix it took hours on end before calling Volvo's technical support line, when they got an answer to my problem in 2 minutes. Problem solved with a $137 part and a bill for over $1,000 because of all of the "labor" for them scratching their nuts.

Of course (as it now turns out), the relay thingie wasn't what Regis would call a "final answer" but it solved the problem last time, at least for a couple of months. So it's where I'm going to have this new set of goons start tomorrow because it's the exact same problem. Once the engine starts acting up, whenever it downshifts from 10th to 9th, it won't shift back up, not even with a manual override. Then when it goes to 8th, it won't go back up to 9th, and so on until I'm stuck in 1st gear with my hazards on at 2 mph. Turn the engine off and let if sit for 5 minutes, and usually everything resets and it will shift straight up to 10th. At least until it starts acting up again another hour down the road and by then more severely.

Dangerous to say the least, although there is always the shoulder of the road on I-80 in case I need to pull over and kill the engine for a while. Just don't know how many times I'll be able to do that before I'm facing a major towing bill, especially out in Western Bumfuck Wyoming where the nearest wrecker big enough to handle 64k pounds may be hours away.

I'll have them put the part in as soon as UPS arrives in the morning. The true "final answer" will have to wait for another day cause I've got places to be and things to do.

One of the dozen or so guys I spoke to today at the various truck service places suggested that something is probably messing up one of the (many apparently) solenoids, but it's usually quite difficult to figure out exactly what is going wrong "sometimes it takes us a week to figure it out when those Volvos start having transmission problems", I believe was the quote.

Heh... I'll replace the transmission before I get caught up in that "diagnosis" game again... and here I was playing the "Blame Canada!" song in my head. Turns out they're just as bad in the States.

Took the Atom out, and did some donuts in a Church parking lot tonight to relieve some of the stress. (The rear tires need to be replaced, so I'm having some fun burning them out in the meantime.) Must have been a prayer meeting going on because a bunch of old folks came running out to see what was going on. Most of them seemed amused, but one old guy tried to chase me off. I was tempted to give him a one finger wave, but resisted.

@Wayne Does the Volvo have some kind of ECU that you can download error codes from, so the guys back at mission control can tell you whats wrong?

Or are you forced to rely on "I've never seen one do that before / Nah, they all do that" local mechanics to diagnose / troubleshoot / fault find?

EDIT: or this, even

http://www.volvotrucks.com/trucks/na/en-us/business_tools/sentry/Pages/sentry.aspx

EDIT: or this, (PTT)

http://www.volvotrucks.com/trucks/na/en-us/parts_service/diagnostics/Pages/diagnostics_ILF.aspx

Edited September 2, 201015 yr by Grahame

Sounds like enough of a reason to do a fall Chicago meet that doesn't have "uni" in the name .

How about ChiDrunkAmI?

How about ChiSuckItUniFi?

^^^ I like it. The wheels are turning.

Chi-liqui-fi ...

And how beautifully apropos is the theme?

I can bring my humble collection of liquors. Not large, but there's some quality there.

Chi-liqui-fi ...

And how beautifully apropos is the theme?

I can bring my humble collection of liquors. Not large, but there's some quality there.

I'll happily bring my thirst.

Chi-liqui-fi ...

And how beautifully apropos is the theme?

I can bring my humble collection of liquors. Not large, but there's some quality there.

Fantastic name!

Chi-liqui-fi ...

And how beautifully apropos is the theme?

I can bring my humble collection of liquors. Not large, but there's some quality there.

I'm in!

Also just bought a bottle of Plymouth gin, let the grand experiment begin.

I'm in!

Also just bought a bottle of Plymouth gin, let the grand experiment begin.

If we're serious and the group is manageable, I could host in the Casa del Mike & Debbie. I'm thinking November.

And I love Plymouth.

If we're serious and the group is manageable, I could host in the Casa del Mike & Debbie. I'm thinking November.

And I love Plymouth.

Works for me. You grill and I pour?

i'm there. do we want a thread to set this up properly? not that i have anything against getting excited about drinking and having the meet discussion occur randomly .