Grease Monkeys

Hello friends!
I hope all of you had a great weekend.
I've been itching to blog, but I was so busy this last weekend and haven't had a chance to write.

I went down to College Station to hang out with my dad and my sister and put in some quality family time. {Too bad my brother wasn't there :( he went deep sea fishing.}
My dad is going to be leaving for Germany on August 10th, and will be gone for a couple of weeks. He'll return for 2 or 3 weeks and then head back to Germany, most likely, permanently!
So, I'm going to try to make a trip down every weekend {or at least every other weekend} until then because I'm going to miss him so much when he's gone.
He will no longer be just a 2 hour drive away... instead it'll be a 5,000 mile plane ride away!
He's going to finally be with my mom {he works here, she works there}, will maybe take a German course, and will be on the look-out for contracts in Europe.
But hey, I'll always have a reason to go to Germany every summer/christmas!

So anyway.
While I was in College Station, we went to see the movie Savages.
I was a little iffy about it in the beginning, but it turned out to be really good!
Benicio del Toro killed it as the character, "Lado."

My sister and I did some brainstorming on ways for me to become more competitive
when I apply for the University of Texas/Texas State.
Volunteering, starting my own business, and starting a non-profit were a few of the ideas.
The rest of this year and the next is going to be pretty eventful and jam-packed with lots of new things coming my way.
I'm starting to get excited!

Also while I was there, my car needed to be worked on.
Here's a fun fact!

I can work on my own car.

Whaaaaaaat?

Yep, you heard right. 

Don't let this sassy face and blonde hair fool you.

I can get down and dirty and all greased up just like the boys!

My dad has always pushed us to be independent and hard working,

especially when it comes to our vehicles. 

Why need a boyfriend/husband/mechanic to depend on, 

when it's feasible to do it yourself?
ALOT of stuff is actually pretty easy to do on your own, once you've been shown how to do it.
All you need is a little direction, a little elbow grease, and a little TLC {tender lovin' care}!
And my dad has a massive amount of information stored away in his noggin',
so that comes in handy too. :)
He's such a smarty pants and can fix just about anything when it comes to
cars or jet skis or fabricating things. He's got pure talent!

It's awesome getting real hands-on experience and learning new things from him.

When my sister got her first truck, my dad helped her pull out the entire engine and take 

everything apart.

Then, he made her put it all back together.

By herself.

She had to figure it out and be able to problem solve without

relying on someone to help her.

Now it's my turn!

It's a really great bonding experience and something I really enjoy doing with my dad.

So far, he's taught me to:

* drive a standard

* change a flat tire

* install new break pads

* change spark plugs

* rotate tires

 * restore headlights

* change the oil

* install a new oil filter

* clean my air filter

* make a new gasket

and

* do port matching on the intake manifold

Pretty awesome, huh?

I know.

I cleaned my air filter and we changed the spark plugs.

We also did port matching on the intake manifold.

This is when you grind away the metal in order to match the openings of the runners to the gasket and the cylinder head.

{The gasket is the thin black piece sitting on the manifold.}
Auto makers don't match up the port openings at the end of the intake manifold to the port openings
on the cylinder head.
The resulting mismatch causes congestion of the air/fuel mixture as it travels toward the
intake valve, which slows down the velocity of the airflow.
So, in order to remedy the issue
you line up the intake gasket with the openings, trace around each circle and cut away the excess metal.
You're basically just opening it up so it can breathe better.
This will increase the horsepower and give you better gas mileage.
Who doesn't want better gas mileage!?


So, I'd say the weekend was a success!
I'm going back this weekend to finish up the porting, change my break pads,
and do whatever other maintenance that needs to be done.
Maybe we'll get to see another good movie too. :)


Here's to learning to be independent, self-suffcient, daddy's girls!