Quick Update

This is the "Readers Digest" version of what has happened over the past year:

Former wife filed divorce paperwork May 9th, 2007 . . . after all the BS it was finalized February 20th, 2008. Started going out and God brought someone (Peggy) new into my life, and ironically the first serious date occurred the very day the judge signed the paperwork. I proposed May 5th, 23 years to the day I was confirmed in my religion . . . a great testimony to faith. I've worked hard on being a dad and backing my words up with actions. After going through the year of seperation/divorce/etc... I've got my friends back, my self back, and I'm much deeper in my faith in God. Peggy and I are fantastic together and we have done a lot more projects and things together than my former wife and I ever did. Who knew that painting a room, cleaning a garage, or making dinner together could be so much fun?

On the cars . . . the MGB has been sitting forlorn in the garage . . . another victim of "do I dare do anything lest it come up in the divorce." The Dakota project finally got done and was on the road a number of months before the headgasket really did let go. It never got hot, but I have one steam cleaned #2 spark plug. No water/oil mixed so it's gotta be a minor breech of the gasket . . . and I had just moved it into the garage to fix it when some more funny things happened. I drove the truck in and started working on it, but between my fiance, work, church, etc... it's a little hectic at times.

I noticed one day that I had some fur in the front seat of the truck and figured that the cat must have been bored with the MGB seats and wanted the posh fabric of the Dakota. No problem . . . I'll roll up the window. Well, I also noticed that my cat was leaving "little suprises" around the litter box. I thought maybe he was having issues. I seen the cat at the neighbors house hanging out and it turns out he was sick . . . I ended up putting him down. It was sad because he's been my shop cat for a long time and provided me some comfort when I came home to an empty house. I was leaving to go some place one day and happened to catch a glance of something moving in the truck . . . I went to the driver side and opened the door and the smell of cat whee nearly knocked me out. Apparently the neighbors cat had gotten in the garage and had been hanging out in there. That would explain the rapid food consumption, and the new surprises I found. He was in the truck for 3 weeks, but he was still alive! The neighbors say he was missing for 4 weeks, so I suspect he was hanging out in the garage for a while before I rolled up that window on the truck. It made a lot more sense why the neighbor's other two cats were outside crying at 4 AM in the morning when I had Bucky (shop cat) put to sleep!

So . . . what do you do with a urine soaked truck? Well, you yank the seats and carpet and see what you can do . . . which wasn't easy. I cut the driver side carpet out just to get the worst of smell out. Then my son yanked the bolts for the seat, so we took it out and then the rest of the carpet. I didn't anticipate that little wrinkle in the truck repair project, but with the interior out, I can possibly change to bucket seats and get it looking a little better. My sister did the same thing to her Dakota and Dodge Shadow/Sundance seats bolt right in with one minor bracket bend. It's half off weekend at the junk yard this weekend, so I'll see what they have available and go from there. I think the seat might just have some minor urine issues, and I've read on how to wash the seats at car wash, so I might give that a go also.

Well, that's about it in a nutshell. Former wife is gone, kids are good, cat is at the Rainbow Bridge, and the soon to be new wife is fantastic. Hmm . . .life is good. The MGB project is on back burner, but the best part is looking forward to having someone who is willing to help and be right by my side as we do the project together. That's an awesome feeling.