Naranja Westy Refresh Wrap Up
Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2016 8:46 am
I broke up the Naranja Rust Eradication Marathon on January 12th by driving off to camp in the preserve outside of Inverness FL. Yeah, I camped for all of twenty minutes. Said I to myself, "you have not had a shower in four days and your hair is matted with undercoating and your teeth taste like sand and it is coldddd, and I must watch the last State Of The Union by this, my favorite, President."
Camped at a terrible (and they are all inexorably becoming more terrible) Motel 6 in Wildwood where the surly check-in clerk tried to tell me unconvincingly that the reason it costs $54.99 instead of the online $38.99 is because is because is because online costs $38.99 and it is $54.99 if you just walk in. I got a little heated with a review of my experiences over the last fourteen years where online reservations only give you a ten percent discount, so what is with this 30% mark-up? Surly dad/manager/franchise owner came out and hovered behind the clerk I guess to see how she stood up to my withering disdain, or perhaps to punch me in the nose. I cancelled my check-in, walked out to the Naranja Westy, fired up the laptop, found a wifi signal, and made an online reservation for $38.99. Smirkily, I sauntered back in to the counter, "I have a reservation." Her dad/manager/franchise owner came out and darkly stared at the computer screen.
"You can't just . . . "
"Oh, but I just did."
The State Of The Union address always gives me an infusion of feeling like an American. This tradition is a sorely needed moment for me, where I get to see a group of human beings who call themselves a nation come together and chart a course into the future. Sometimes, SOTUs are just a laundry list of accomplishments or a list of priorities. This one was was different. Professor Obama gave a four point decision matrix, where the choices we make will answer the immediate need for a decision, yes, but also define who we are as a nation. What I liked about this SOTU, was that it felt like an adult discussion. The chatter on CNN afterwards made me feel like slitting my wrists, such mindless gossipy inanity, God Help Us. The shower on the other hand was a magnificent cleansing moment.
Next morning, I stomped out of NAPA because the counterpersonhowmayIhelpyou was too interested in helping this befuddled guy figure out what engine he had in his old Camaro, see, I was standing there with a $34.99 gallon of StaLube GL-4 gear oil, and the price for this gear oil was making me as annoyed as waiting for fifteen minutes. The price of crude folks, is 28% of what it was eighteen months ago, why is gear oil still so damn expensive?
Drove to the gates of the Weisswurst Waddle Worry where hens worriedly waddled, and pulled into the building for Round Two. What a mess.
What an unmitigated unchecked unkempt disaster of cans and caps and extension cords and lamps perched on tables and there's the vacuum cleaner cord ready to pull over the halogen lamp tree, a rickety thing at best, and sand. Sand is the natural ground cover here, but it is an organically sticky sand that clots to your feet in the morning dew and after the rain that likes to pop up occasionally. The equipment here is comprised mostly of side-of-the-road type acquisitions. That means much of it has problems. The halogen lamp tree has collars that allow the lamps to slide downward any old time, if you lift them back up, the collars fall out of the tubes. The vacuum cleaner did not have any sort of filter. I found this out when vacuuming the interior and discovering that the peppery sound behind me was the outlet discharging sand and bits against the ceiling. In the spirit of creative improv and rumpled object churn that permeates this place, I fashioned a filter out of a roll of screen and a wrap of paper towel held together with duct tape. Worked splendidly. Good for two full days per paper towel rewrap:
List of Things Done
*painted headlamp rings and buckets
* door seal channel rust eradication
*lubricated window regulators and door latches
*disassembled door handles, removed paint overspray, repaired key return springs, lubricated door pull springs
*replaced right vent glass frame
*re-adhered door panel vinyl in 48 steps of visegripped 1x1 wood clamps and 3M Super 90 adhesive (this did a good job of straightening the warped lower areas of the water-damaged masonite)
*painted door panel masonite with engine enamel clearcoat
*made new vapor barriers with new! improved! weighted! flaps
*painted door seal channels
*waxed all inner door painted surfaces
*toothbrush-cleaned air extractor slides and grills
*removed "Spark-O-Matic" 6 x 9 door speakers
*painted speaker grills satin black
*repaired sheetmetal at tailgate button and painted
*re-keyed new tailgate button to work with my old key (a bit sloppy seeing as the new key was a later symmetrical style, but I dremeled the tumblers and it'll do)
*cracked the pricelessly perfect tailgate panel but good when I couldn't get a stupid black retainer button to come out - had to epoxy that thing as perfectly as possible then paint in the wood grain pattern with Chloe brown kick panel paint, man that was a disheartening moment:
*painted all worn wood panelling with acetone reduced clearcoat + Chloe brown kick panel paint (need to shoot an "after" shot)
*removed front bumper, rust-eradicated nose panel and "deformation element", and painted (no "after" shot)
*cleaned all upholstery and carpet
*painted the bleach burn in the passenger compartment that had been covered with a most hideous throw carpet. I used Chloe brown kick panel paint again to imitate the brown specks in the original carpet. Although it looks too green under the halogen lights, it looks fine in the daylight:
Shall I go on?
. . . there is so much more.
Colin