Yes Dear!

[Grumpy Bear]

She can sense everything isn’t alright. “Why so quite?’ she prods.

 

“I got nothing. Not a single good idea for quite a few days now. Actually…not even one bad idea. Nothing at all.”

 

What I do have is a growing irritation. That non-descript feeling it would be better for everyone concerned if they just kept on walking. Instead I jump in the truck and head off for a quiet little breakfast spot we discovered. "I'll be back in a bit". I offer heading out the door.

 

On the way there I turn on AM radio 670. A local sports channel that’s yacking about college football playoff formatting and the ‘committee’ that sets the national rankings and how messed up he sees that to be. The how and why of its structure is summed up by this fella in this line,

 

“Controversy creates financial opportunity….” I hear nothing past that point as the bells and alarms go off in my head.

 

I totally missed the boat somewhere between my last year in school forty years plus ago and retirement where we designed, built and sold goods and services based on economic votes priced by supply and demand and fought for those votes with things like INOVATION, QUALITY, HONESTY and RELIABILITY. Where your best customers were those most informed and most willing to promote a ‘good thing’. Where what was BETTER was cream rising in a can.

 

When did this switch over to chaos driven ignorance and mudslinging take enough root in things that matter to uncouple rational thought and reason from the experience of living it?

 

What does that have to do with college rankings? C’mon man! The same thing it has to do with a sea of products and services that offer not one single contribution to increasing the quality of life. Or the performance of your truck in any way measurable.

 

A big one in the news of late was the story about headlights. That designers no longer care about functionality…just branding the mark.

Doesn’t matter if the driver can see at night or if oncoming traffic is blinded by them IF everyone looking at them in the daylight can tell the make and model at a glance and get a warm fuzzy that makes them want to share in it enough to die for it. Literally! They get your money either way.

 

Doesn’t matter who has the best conference record either. Just who will draw the largest paying crowd. Good grief Charley Brown!

 

I had a really good omelet today made by a gal that lived in isolation most of her life on an eastern Colorado commune where her father was the minister and hasn’t been brainwashed into calling a tight dry scrambled mess on a plate an omelet. It made me smile that, although rare, there are some yet untouched by a world going mad.

 

“Wow you look better. Have a nice drive?” she asked.

 

“Yes dear I did and one heck of an omelet as well.”

[NEFisher11]

Not going to lie I enjoy reading these for some reason.

[Grumpy Bear]

I’m in no mood to cook and she’s hungry…and tired…so, “Let me take you out”.

 

This meets zero resistance and she has questions I field in the truck on the way about a test drive I did for her. Many birds and a single stone.

 

Honestly, that isn’t what was on my mind though. Winters effect on fuel efficiency was. Even my much loved Honda Civics get taken to the matt in cold weather loosing upward of 25-30% of their toasty summer averages.

 

You can’t beat good instruments for sorting riddles such as these. There are literally to many variables and too few eyes to go around to do this long hand. A plug in lap top would be ideal but I will settle for the cheaper and just as effective Scan-Gauge II. I’ve been poking this dead thing with that stick for weeks now.

 

“It’s 18 miles to church and my trip average is 22 mpg”. I offer blindly to the unsuspecting wife.

 

“We sit there for about 2 hours and that performance is repeated on the return trip within a half mile per gallon”.

 

“Okay”. Knowing more is on the way. We’ve been together 25 years.

 

“If I make that same trip without the 2 hour break the trip average increases to about 26 mpg”.

 

“Yeeees”. Patients isn’t a suit worn long with her so getting to point better come quicker.

 

“If I make a 20 mile trip after a full warm up it will return pretty close to 30 mpg every time”. Said in one breath with a quick pause to inhale I continue, “ So from that information what would you say the difference was that created such a drastic and yet predictable increase in efficiency?”

 

“Heat!?” Man she’s quick…”but I had no idea it was that much”.

 

“It isn’t magic, it’s physics”.

 

"Imagine running through a swimming pool knee deep in water. Again knee deep in cooking oil. Again in honey and finally in wet cement. It's what happens as the temperatures plummet".

 

"Imagine the effort it takes a motor to turn itself over in in cold oil, cold trans fluid, cold diff. lubricant and cold axle grease compared to water thin fluids at full operating temperature. Fuel efficiency is 100% load driven and in the winter viscosity is a HUGE LOAD".

 

“Warming your motor up idling it is zero miles for a maximum amount of fuel used. BUT a block heater three hours in advance of a well planned trip….” I let it trail in the air...

 

​"Maybe you should install one then". she dead pans with a crooked smile taking credit for the idea.

 

“Yes dear”. I say out load, "YES!!!" I yell in silence.

[j-ten-ner]

nice move...;)

 

so long

j-ten-ner

[Grumpy Bear]

The below is my absolute favorite study of marketing. Taken and dissected from the first five verses of Genesis you have to really want to know how this works to move past the usual biblical reference resistance. Even an atheist can appreciate the deceit. It is todays class in marketing I present in about an hour. The wife is reading my manuscript. Look over her shoulder.

 

‘Now the serpent was the craftiest of all the wild animals of the field that Jehovah God had made. So it said to the woman: “Did God really say that you must not eat from every tree of the garden?”

 

At this the woman said to the serpent: “We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden. But God has said about the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden: ‘You must not eat from it, no, you must not touch it; otherwise you will die.’”

 

At this the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die. For God knows that in the very day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and bad.’”

 

To know how this plays out we need to know exactly, word for word, what God did tell this first pair of humans. It goes like this from versus 16 & 17 of chapter 2:

 

“”Jehovah God also gave this command to the man: “From every tree of the garden you may eat to satisfaction. But as for the tree of the knowledge of good and bad, you must not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will certainly die.’”

 

This crafty salesman starts with a misquote meant to confuse the ‘marks’ thinking, a ploy to alter her reasoning. It’s framed as a question testing her recall and more importantly avoiding any liability from an accusation of misrepresenting what it is he is trying to sell. Gives himself plausible deniability. He certainly is a crafty fellow.

 

Unfortunately for him she has excellent recall. She is, after all created perfect. Recalls perfectly, reasons perfectly.

 

Well what’s a fella to do? What he chooses to do is lie. “You certainly will not die”. But he is quick to his next point as this idea that her perfection and the perfection of Eden were created by a liar won’t stand long. So he floods her with information. Part of it true and part of it additional lies meant to add credit to the first lie. He continues:

 

“For God knows that in the very day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and bad.”

 

He says three unrelated things in rapid succession meant to be absorbed as a single thought:

 

“Your eyes will be opened…”, Implying that God is withholding something from her. What could that possibly be? Let’s see.

 

“…you will be like God”. Wow, that’s’ a biggy! And lastly in the way she would become god like.

 

“…knowing good and bad”. Telling her she did not need God to set THE standard of what was good and bad, right or wrong, implying she didn’t need God at all. That she had the ability to write her own operating system. Her own set of instructions.

 

And it comes with a false assurance or guarantee. “You certainly will not die”. The lie that’s selling god like ability comes with an unenforceable warranty. How slick is that?

 

Now even a perfect mind cannot know what it doesn’t now and in such a dialog he has created “doubt’ and offered a seemingly reasonable expectation of something called “BETTER”.

 

He has to seal the deal and he does so visually. Pretty packaging. Verse 6 chapter 3 continues:

 

‘Consequently, the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was something desirable to the eyes, yes, the tree was pleasing to look at. So she began taking of its fruit and eating it’.

 

Was he actually selling her fruit? Not at all. Was he selling her independence from gods laws and standards? The illusion that this is true is paramount of the actual thing being sold. She has to believe she’s going to be in control for this to work.

 

So…what was he selling"

 

This is good if you give it some thought.

 

He was selling the idea that HE was a better setter of standards.

 

He was selling himself as sovereign of the universe. He says in effect. “Let me open your eyes to the truth”. Which was a lie brilliantly told.

 

She bought it, lock stock and barrel. And as “they” say, the rest is history.

 

 

She looks across the table setting down her morning smoothie with a puzzled look. “This is your manuscript for today’s class?”

 

“Yes, why?” taking a bite of toast.

 

“People are put off by things like this ya know”.

 

“Kids are smart dear…don’t you think they will understand it?”

 

“Understand it? Yes dear. They will understand it. Their parents might not”.

 

She makes a good point and I go back to the computer. I have an hour left before class starts to think of something else.

[Grumpy Bear]

“Eye candy” she said giving the nod to a Mazda 6 Grand Touring in a lovely shade of medium blue pearled metallic. White leather with all the bells and whistles. “We could trade Daisy and your truck and maybe get close?”

 

Daisy is my garage kept, never sees salt or rain 09 Buick LaCrosse with 40K on the clock. Also leather with the CXL package.

 

Not a chance. Even if so inclined, and I’m certainly not, both the car and truck together come up 10K and taxes short. Still, it is a knock out look.

 

“I though you wanted a AWD SUV?” Never make eye contact when upsetting an apple cart.

 

“Yea….well….”trailing into silence.

 

We’ve bought and traded four in three years and managed to stay right side up but I think I’ve about run that table as far as the house will allow. They do let someone win every once in a while or no one would play but 95% of the time their dealing from the bottom of the deck. We are in this lot today due to such an experience yesterday.

 

Wife spots an “Internet” sale on her I-phone at one of the bigger Mitsubishi lots here in the Windy City surrounded in a “Sale” price boasting $6,200 off the MSRP on 53 units. BOOM! A new Outlander Sport is in sight and she has her checkbook in hand. She’s been looking for quite a while and has her heart set on this big time. Salesman meets us at the door. Senses her eagerness and tells her he will bring it right up. Well he wants to but it isn’t not on the lot, yada, yada, yada. But he has something close to test drive. He tries the up sell. She drives two and settles on a package, color and model then the other shoe drops….

 

“Okay then, let’s see what discounts and rebates you qualify for....” and I choke on my coffee. She drops her purse. Thud.

 

“Qualify? For a sale?” my voice noticeably throttled back and he sits back a bit in his seat.

 

He explains, or not, that all the lots have been doing it.

 

“Doing what, exactly? Lying?” I reply.

 

He excuses himself to check with the boss. Wife hands me the check book and leaves tearfully whispering “Good luck”. She is embarrassed and heart broken. We drove separately.

 

“Luck isn’t what I need dear”.

 

“Not you”, she sobs, “him”. She knows how I get when lied too. Worse when it hurts her.

 

He walks back in the room as if nothing has happened and attempts, feebly, to let me know how he fought for me and got me the first of many qualifiers for this “sale” totally dismissing that lie by excusing it from further note. “Where’s the Mrs.?”

 

I smile, I think, and start, “Let me make this simple for you. You couldn’t sell us a box of matches after that” It was a terse smile.

 

He looked more frightened than stunned and apologizes explaining he doesn’t like the deceit anymore that I liked hearing it. He goes to fetch his boss so he can explain how sale doesn’t mean an actual sale and I walk outside for a breath of air. I should be walking to the truck but I can’t help myself. I gotta hear this and walk back in.

 

This fella explains how some other dealership has been using lost leader tactics to steal customers and he proceeds to defend an indefensible position for the next five minutes. Finally he runs out of breath after failing to convince me that sale doesn’t always mean sale.

 

“Does that line of crap EVER work on anybody?” I dead pan then continue. “Your saying that as the store manager you’ve decided that the best strategy is to lower the bar so low the competition can’t limbo under the bottom rung…did I hear that right?”

 

He ask what he can do to “fix this” misunderstanding and offers to take off a few hundred more. He’s not getting it.

 

“Misunderstanding?” I gasp. “The only misunderstanding we have here son is your understanding of what a lies effect has on trust or that you have a chance yet of making a deal’. I draw a breath and exhale slowly. I haven’t been this upset in decades. “The only fix for this is for your to remove yourself from between me and the exit”.

 

And tonight I’m explaining to the wife why two cars, each more valuable than the one she’s looking at, are not worth together as much as the ask for this gem.

 

“Worth and Value are not the same thing”. I conclude wearily.

 

“Yes dear”. She steps up into the truck and snicks the door closed.

[Grumpy Bear]

“Horse. City bus. Pogo stick. Puppy pulling a cart. Unicycle. Car”. I list.

 

“What do they have in common Shelly?” My daughter is looking at a new car. One she really doesn’t need nor can she afford. That said it isn’t’ up to me. She’s forty and just making conversation. She surely doesn’t need me to treat her like she’s ten. But as the Geico commercial says…’It’s what fathers do’. Or would if this were a commercial.

 

“Move something from one place to a different place, your feet will do that too”. Not that I expect she should carry my grandson everywhere they need to go I’m just making the point.

 

You can rule out many of these as your choice based on your needs. Like it’s Denver and winter and I’d like to stay warm so inside something would be good. Something with heat even better. Continuing the rundown.

 

“Something going my way when I’m ready to go and can get me there in the time I have to get there”. Sounding allot like a car or truck perhaps. She was a quick study as a child.

 

“You have one of those. Five years old with under 50K on the clock that doesn’t cause you an ounce of trouble. And you just finished paying for it”.

“I know”, she whines. Some things remain the same. She’s still my little girl. “But…” and I listen for the next twenty minutes to her list of wants. Pretty impressive and well thought out list too.

 

Problem is the car she’s after is well beyond her means. At least based on current market worth it is. Based on value not so much. And I offer the same explanation to her as Sugar Bear got.

 

The current market worth doesn’t not value the car she has because the markets, which are people, don’t value the intrinsic. They place value in perceptions. And not their perceptions about the car but about the people buying the car. More to the point how people will view them seen driving what they drive. The more favorable that illusion, the more it cost. As things age that illusion disappears and so does it’s worth.

 

Need proof? Just about every option worth having is standard equipment in a Mazda 2 these days. Touch screen. Air. Cruise. The most advanced drive trains going. Even heated seats. Same heating pad in that seat as in the Mazda 6 GTO. Passes the same safety protocols and standards, ABS, TC.

 

But people look at you differently. Thirty thousand dollars differently. Then again they look differently at you if you trade your Mazda 6 for a Mercedes AMG. There’s another step in difference to a Maserati Ghibli and, and, and........

 

You’re not paying for how they feel when they look at you…you’re paying for how you feel about that look a stranger just gave you and you pay enough consistently and constantly to put a gap between what a thing is worth and its true value.

 

And you thought it was supply and demand. No? Greed and grab? How about ego and opportunity. It’s why you will let someone lie to you and yet you will still buy from them what you would not accept as a gift if the “look” wasn’t just right.

 

“Sounds allot like a good old fashion cluster….”.

 

“Yes dear”. I interrupt. Some words shouldn’t come out of your daughters mouth.

[Grumpy Bear]

Wife is like a ten year old with a quarter burning a hole in her pocket. Looking for something to spend it on. A newer AWD SUV the goal. Which means we visit allot of dealerships lately looking for, once again, the right deal. But I’ll take a spot of humor too when I can find it.

 

Second dealer we visit on Black Friday take us to a Buick/Cadillac/GMC dealer. As it’s been several days running I’m more window shopping and lot crawling than anything else. She is a bit more intense. Enough so that a sales lady notices from the show room a longer than average pause at a Terrain and bounces out like Peter Rabbit.

 

I roll down the window, it’s cold, “Just cruise’n girlfriend”. Hoping she will get the hint. She doesn’t. Right away at least but with a bit of encouragement she bounds back to the warmth of the building she came from and I continue the slow look for the Mrs.

 

She’s hardly back in the building when the Sales manager comes running at a good jog in a light sweater. “Gezzz Louise, these people can’t take a hint”. I say out loud.

 

“Isn’t that the guy you stuffed last fall”. Recalling an exchange we had over disrespecting our boundaries.

 

“Yep”.

 

“Love your truck”, He leads as the window comes down.

 

I stop, shut it off and open the door and before I can clear the space he’s all up in it and talking to himself. “Wow, what a nice truck”. It echo’s.

 

I take a step back and let him ogle then he backs up and rest himself on the box rail. “Really”! I say in a medium annoyed tone.

 

“Sorry” he says in earnest. “Would love to see your garage”.

 

“It ain’t all that. The effort goes into the ride”. I explain.

 

“I would love to have this truck. Pay top dollar for it too”. He continues hardly taking notice of my voice.

 

“No dealership will ever get this truck”.

 

“Not what I mean”, he says, “I want it personally”.

 

“Mister” and a pause, “it’s real easy. Pick up a phone and call Fort Wayne and order one. It’s what you do right?” He still doesn’t remember me.

 

“Yea, yea, I could but one that’s been primped like this is rare, I want this one”.

 

“Now that’s funny. I was told these didn’t exist when I was looking for one”. And that look of recognition comes to his face. Awkward…for him that is. “Fact is I was looking for this exact truck with a 3.73 Posi and a 6.2 and you told me then they didn’t exist and could not be ordered and I’ve have run across two since I bought this one. I was told NOBODY wants these anymore”. I'm getting up a head of steam. “Everyone wants to sell you what they have or what they can get overnight in a trade with another dealer but nobody wants to order what you what when it is possible to do so. I think sir that it is this NOBODY you all talk about”.

 

His hand is in the cookie jar and it’s no use debating it any further. Lord that felt good.

 

We visited about ten dealerships that day and this was the first of three offers for the truck by sales people that wanted it for a personal ride.

 

“I don’t think they get it Sugar Bear?”

 

“Yes dear. Probably not”. It’s late. It’s dark and we have better than a hundred miles to go for home. (976)

[SnakeEyeSS]

Not going to lie I enjoy reading these for some reason.

Watching someone lose their mind?

[NEFisher11]

Watching someone lose their mind?

Maybe I'm losing my mind and that's why it makes sense.

[Grumpy Bear]

When and if you see it coming there might be a few seconds or perhaps as little as a few milliseconds between the point of recognition and the impact. That’s what a stopwatch would tell you. What your mind tells you is these two events are separated by infinity. It is a mind numbing and emotionally painful experience even when you get out of it in one piece. And for whatever reason the more horrific the impact, the longer infinity becomes.

 

Up to that point of recognition you either don’t fully grasp the bucket of crap that’s about to unload on you or you don’t see it coming period. The ones you see have a trigger point attached to them. A line between “I can do something to fix this” and the point you recognize “I’m just plain screwed”. You don’t even have time to brace for collision. That other stuff like putting your arm in front of your baby and hitting the brakes happens while you stupidly believe your still in control of this sick situation. Shortly you will understand the meaning of…’not so much’.

 

When did you actually did have some influence on this situation?

 

Before you believed lane divergence warnings prevented accidents for those who think driving distracted is a basic right. That forward collision and autonomous braking gave permission to test the laws of physics and challenge the other drivers legal position. Before you believed that speed limits and no passing zones where suggestions meant for less skilled drivers than yourself. Before you believed that all this safety gear made you ten foot tall and bullet proof. Before you believed that a lack of law enforcement meant physics was suspended in your case.

 

Before you became self-indulgent and arrogant enough to believe this very moment…would never happen to you.

 

Before you lost your mate or child or parent or killed someone. Before the months or years of recovery that despite medical professionals best efforts leave you crippled and scared, inside and out or watched it happen so someone you loved. Before your prison term and restitution payments. Before lawyers bills and bankruptcy. Before this moment when this life and it’s choices were still yours alone to make.

 

Survival does not start when you apply the brakes. It starts years before you ever get behind a wheel. It starts when you begin to value life. Everyone’s.

 

Every ounce of safety gear and engineering in a car or truck cannot be a substitute for sound judgement and training.

 

It isn’t there to give you permission to be an idiot. And sometimes none of works anyway. Even it has limits (see the video)

 

“Yes Dear”.

 

 

[Grumpy Bear]

“I see you’ve rearranged the cabinet where the recipes are kept”. That is a statement of fact. She’s asked me to make a pot of southwest chili for company tonight and I need the grocery list. “Where might I find those loose recipes?”

 

From the other end of the phone I hear, “It wouldn’t be with the regular recipes. It would be in the ‘catch all drawer’ below where you recharge your Android”. A quick pause later she adds, “You had it last, don’t you remember where you put it?” I haven’t made that dish in over a month.

 

Grrr….This sort of logic makes my head explode. 1) It isn’t where it should be. 2.) It IS where it shouldn’t be. 3.) I know exactly where ‘shouldn’t be’ is. It’s a space I created. 4.) I disavow any knowledge of it where-a-bouts but am sure it is ‘where it shouldn’t be’ and not ‘where it should be’. 5.) This is your fault.

 

The first two tell me she’s ‘sure’ of where it is because she has just said that it is, in fact ‘where it shouldn’t be’ meaning she either placed it there OR recently enough to remember, saw it there. The next two tell me she’s not as sure while swearing she is. Confused? Me too.

 

Her memory is faulty enough to not remember her actions more recently that make her certain enough to argue AND YET good enough to clearly remember my actions of over a month ago.

 

We have very little counter top and when I work with a recipe it is either held with magnet to the range vent OR if allot of prework is involved slid into the trim of the cabinet door above the work space. A place I can see without touching it with my messy hands. Left up to me they would never be moved from these two places. I didn’t put it anywhere but there.

 

There will be no chili tonight and I’ll serve grapes and cheese. This isn’t going anywhere good.

 

“Yes dear” is my mild reply. “I’ll look for it”. I do. Don’t find it, but I am certain that within five minutes of coming home she will find exactly what she can’t now remember.

 

Will this too be my fault? “Yes Dear”!

 

How do I know this? Patterns.

 

Last night she found in a few minutes, after getting home, some insurance cards “she never touched” in the place “she never put them”. That I could not find looking in a place I hadn’t a clue was the place to look. This after being told I had them last. Even so, this was my fault.

 

Why? She was POSITIVE it was on the end of the counter where I was looking but not seeing it. Also done over the phone. In essence I was being told I was not seeing what I was seeing from someone that was not there and who later found it somewhere else she had not put it after not touching what she had touched. Oh, and had misplaced in order while looking for something else earlier. Good Grief Charlie Brown.

 

What she had remembered was the license sticker being placed there. Which it was. I was saying insurance she was thinking license. Guess why that was my fault? Because during the conversation a day later when she handed them to me I misspoke saying sticker instead of card. Yea, a day after the fact a statement made now substituted for one made half a day earlier. “It could have happened ya know”.

 

“Yes Dear”.

 

[Grumpy Bear]

“How many days are in a week?” She is use to this out of thin air sort of behavior and for the most part takes it pretty well. I will get one of two responses. Seven if she’s curious as to what I am up to or some other number if she’s not in the mood for whatever is coming next.

 

“Seven”. It is then without looking up from her soup. It’s what’s for dinner on a cold Friday evening.

 

“Can you think of any place on earth or for any modern culture this is not true?” I continue.

 

“Not off hand dear, no”. reaching for her drink.

 

I offer nothing further and let that settle in while I take a few bites. She rarely sees this response from me and that pricks her curious bone.

 

“And?” she says, tired of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

 

“Nothing” I reply and at once get THE LOOK. That don’t play with me look. “In six days God created the heavens and earth and on the seventh day he rested from all his works”. I offer paraphrasing Genesis 2:1,2, “it’s were the number seven comes from”.

 

“Before the Law was given to Moses in the wilderness do we have any idea what the calendar may have looked like?” I query then continue. “ Evidently so. Moses wrote the first five books of the bible under God’s direction and at times by his finger which includes the creation account of six days of work and a rest day completing a cycle we’ve come to know as a week. That account makes note that each day had a evening and a morning to mark its passing. That God separated the day from the night and called each by its name.”

 

“Never gave that any thought”. She thoughtfully replies.

 

“Yes dear a universal fundamental Biblical truth held by every religion, government, people or race on the planet. Even those that don’t believe in him. Can we say Irony? Even atheist hold this biblical truth so close to heart that they meter their entire life by it, it predates human existence”.

 

“The clock in your trucks computer that runs the ECM depends entirely on it and is based entirely on man’s continued subdivision of this basic concept of time”.

 

“Desert?” as she clears the table.

 

“Why yes dear”. Chiefs/Raiders game is coming on. Go Chiefs!!

 

[Grumpy Bear]

“You’re wound a but tight today”. An observation she makes often. Twenty five years of familiarity will do that to a couple.

 

Little use in hiding it, “I have an itch I can’t get scratched”.

 

“Oh…I see, One I can help with?” Sounds like a question but she’s baiting the hook.

 

That makes me smile. “Na…it isn’t that kind ‘a itch, it’s under my skin and deep”. And I’ve taken the bait and she’s off the hook. She doesn’t even have to actually listen. Just make me believe she is. She good at that.

 

“I asked for a bit of information on the truck site with a base of thousands of subscribers some of which are GM employees, mechanics and engineers as well as hundreds of private shop and lifelong truck owners and came up Snake Eyes”. This isn’t my first forum or my first day on earth and I know the answer is a few keystrokes away but the chances of getting it are slim to none.

 

“So now what?” she responds on cue.

 

“I do what I always do. I take the thing apart and measure it or buy one and measure it”.

 

“Seems wasteful” she comments as she turns the page on her tablet and adjust her readers.

 

Oh and it is…and then again…

 

A spring for example has a rate. Rate is the force it takes to deflect a set amount. Around here it would be pounds per inch. It can be measured or it can be calculated if you have the correct information such as wire size, coil OD, free length, compressed length and number of active coils.

 

You see it isn’t that information is unknowable. It’s that it is unobtainable without turning heaven and earth. That shouldn’t be for a site whose purpose is to provide such information.

 

The WHY of that is the itch that can’t find a scratch.

 

“Where are you going now?” she mumbles as I’m leaving the room.

 

I mumble back, “Garage to find an answer”.

 

“Yes, dear”.

 

http://www.pontiacracing.net/js_coil_spring_rate.htm

[Coby7]

Reading through these, if your wife is still with you, you're the luckiest man in the world, she's a keeper. By the way you do know the forbidden fruit was a metaphor for sex right?