Livin it One Day at A Time

Mike (my roomie) came down to tell me that he has proposed to Chenoa. So by the end of March I gots to find new digs. Suck.

Don’t get me wrong. I am happy for him. I just don’t want to move again.

Oh well. I am still talking to Omniture about working for them. So my future is pretty much in the air.

I will be going up to Utah for Gordon’s wedding, so that ought to be fun.

Welp time to talk about my newest toy. I just got myself a Addams Family(TAF) pinball machine.

And yes I have to say that it is cool.

Here’s the skinny. In my youth I found a TAF at the local arcade. I was hooked. I spent hundreds of quarters playing this game.

Fast forward to two years ago. I started looking on e-bay for a pinball machine. I couldn’t find one for the cost that I wanted to pay. So I resorted to my usual tactics. I started looking thru groups.google.com from there I was able to find Dan Goooch in Denver, who has a source who finds arcade and pinball parts. For two years I bugged him asking if he had a TAF. I was hoping to get it for cheap. This was not to be.
So I get an e-mail from Dan in Denver, December 7th. He told me that he had a TAF that had just come off a route. So it was unshopped (dirty). He didn’t want to send me photos, so three days later I jumped into Jolly(my Tundra) and headed to Denver.
By the time I arrived he had two TAFs. I ended up buying it for 2700. Not the best of deals. Even less when I kept finding things that were wrong with the pinball (thing knocker, etc)
So within a few hours I was driving back with the cheaper TAF in the back of Jolly. The TAF was wrapped in shrink wrap.
Let me tell you, pinballs aren’t light.

So I get it back to the bachelor pad. I call up Michael and had him come and help me move it into the house.

It sat there for two weeks. Then it was time for my siesta to Utah I wrapped it up in a tarp and stuck it into the bed of truck and took off to Utah.
Now you may ask why I took it to Utah. Well…. I didn’t want to be bored. I was up there for two weeks.
So I get it to Utah, and unpack it, much to the surprise of my family.
So my TAF got its first plays in Payson at my parents digs.
Ross (my uncle) started to play it a lot after he helped me get it set up.
It was the hit of Christmas. Even my grandma played it.
So after Christmas I started to shop the pinball. I then headed out to Action Pinball to gather parts.

Here is a partial list of what I bought:

Lots of light bulbs.
Some diamond bright.
1,2,3 Novus cleaner.
Wax for the playfield.
Ramp screws.
Flipper Rebuild kits.
6 balls.
Coils.
Pinball dolies.
Bumper plastics.
Transistors.
New rubber kit.
IR input/output boards.

So I then went to freight harbor and picked up a cheap DMM and a dolly. At rat shack I picked up some solider. Got cleaning supplies and solidering pen at home depot and various tools from Walmart (where the unwashed masses shop).
So for the next week I took the pinball apart and cleaned it. It was filthy. Ross helped me with the electronic side of things. We accidently blew a fuse (nother story).
I then got it back in my truck drove it down to Cheyenne. Me and Michael killed ourselves getting it downstairs. But it now sits in the basement.

So now I have added the following:
Uncle Lester
Pinball Pro Subwolfer

Hopefully my toy keeps going up in value. I plan on buying a Twilight Zone and a fishtales if I can. I plan on creating a screen scraper so I can see if a pin I want becomes available.

Questions welcome

Blech

On Call Again

Welp, I have finally been able to sit down and write down some information.

First off lets go to the barenaked ladies.

Well this concert was par for course as far as askinaningg a girl / person to go with me

Here is the breakdown.
1) Angie – Wedding. Not only that but I said something stupid which hurt her feelings.

2) Michael – Last minute he realizes that he has to go Utah for thanksgiving.

3) Heather – Says yes. Then the day of she realizes that she’s on call.

4) I call Kelly Barkdull. No luck

5) I call Kaylee with 2 hours to go. She says yes. Later on she realizes that she was 5th on the list and feels bad.

So we hit the road and I grab myself a Big Hunk candy bar. So I am chewing on it and I mushed down a filling which drove me nuts.
We get to Denver with plenty of time to go. In fact my gps had us drive right past the tour bus.
So we get to the theater. As we go to grab the tickets we run into two of the girls who I met at the Red Rocks BNL concert. So the tickets were ok. We ended up four rows back Steve side (I would have preferred being Ed side).
This was a BNL only show. Two sets. First set was almost all Everything for Everyone. This really solidified my love for “Aluminum”, “Celebrity”, and “Next Time”. Steve talked a bit about people giving him grief for putting politics in his songs. They had a “ask the band”. It was ok. I do wish that some better questions had been asked. But there were some real knobs.
Then they left. Me and Kaylee went and got some pretzels.
They then came out and did an acoustic set.
The concert rocked.
As the final encore finished I yelled to Tyler “You rock!”. Tyler then turned to me and pointed at me and mouthed back “No, you rock”
So I had to go change my pants
So I begged a sick Kaylee to go out and stalk the band at the tour bus. So we go out there and there are like twenty people out there. We mix and we meet some of the wierdier people. Joe the security guy let us line up and so we waited about an hour and the band came out.
So I got pictures and signatures with all the band. Here’s the breakdown.

Kevin: Just a photo
Jim: Told him that his song Ali Baba rocked. Asked him if he wrote it. He did.
Ed: Told him that I appreciated his music. He said thanks. Told me I was a big man while Kaylee was taking the photo.
During this time the woman next to me had her camera batteries die. So I took photos for her as well (scored a book on digital photography for it. Thanks Dianna!)
Steve: Told me that he had the same camera as I, and that he liked it. Very reserved fellow.
Tyler: Told him that he rocked. He said thanks.

We then dispersed, photos and autographs in hand. One of my dreams were realized. I was on cloud nine. We then went to Village Inn. It was a good night to be alive.