Feeling a much better this week after finally getting some better news. I'll start with news from Mike, that high school buddy that I drew the set of three automobile concept drawings. He had a luncheon on Friday with the CEO of that major car manufacture that I mentioned on my previous journals. It went rather well after calling Mike. He had my drawings made part of a presentation that he got printed professionally up. Mike gave the folder to the CEO. Mike told me the CEO looked impressed after looking at it. He promised to pass it on to the correct department. This made my pretty happy that someone that high up not only get to see my work but also impressed by it. *beams* Chances are still mighty slim if anything comes out of it but who knows. At least it'll generate some interest and an opportunity could appear here.

Second bit of news I got was th letter I got on Saturday. It came from the collection agency for the insurance company wanting the money back. It was rather nasty and accusing me of delaying and stalling (like I want the nightmare to go on and on). I talked to Mike about it and he said that they're trying to scared me and all that, pretty standard M.O. for them. I heard this from several other people but it still stress me out. Well, he gave them a call and they where much more responsive since he is a lawyer. Mike told them to close the claim out and send it back to the insurance company. I should get no more correspondences and everything will go through him now. Mike said it's now a cat-n-mouse game and probably end up negotiating a settlement for a lower amount. I can live with that but it'll be another month or so before everything gets settled. I now barely saved enough to pay it off if it comes to that. However, getting it drop or even a lowering the amount will just be dandy.

I have another piece of good news. I have a co-worker here that has a friend that used to be a repoman (gotta love all these connections). He talked to him and gave me some advice. He wanted some information on BK (The scum who has my car. Refer to my previous journals if you want more background). While I as gathering the information, I revisited BK's Myspace site and noticed he updated it with where he is working at now. I knew he moved to another town not too far away but now know he got a job at an university. This is big news since I have a chance of recovering the car. I plan to verify that he is working there and hire a repo guy to tow the car. I heard it should be no more than $300. It'll be worth that to get the car back.

My best case scenario is to have the insurance company dropping the case (or settle with a lower amount is good too) and to recover the car so I can sell the POS (I hate ricers. They suck on so many levels). The only issue I might have is BK blaming all this on me, the victim. Seems these guys blames others for the problem that themselves create. I don't know why they react like that but I'm getting all too familiar with it. It's like watching a slow train wreck and can't stop it no matter how many warnings and giving helping hands.

I learned my lesson that these people do it to themselves and trying to help will drag you down with them. I'll still help people as much as I can but no longer will stick my neck out so far like that. I can't make people responsible. They have to earn my trust, but even then I'll be more careful.

Needless to say, I don't trust BK at all. Now that I know he has a violent past, I want to protect myself. And to that end, I'm thinking of getting a CCW permit and prepare myself if he tries to come after me. Maybe a restraining order too if it comes down to it. This dragon has ran out patience for people of that ilk. But that's all planing for the future.

So in summary, this is the best news I recieve in a long time. My chances of resolving the issues are in my favor. While it'll not likely I get everything back, it could recover a good chunk. And that would make happy. This year started crappy but has turned around to the good side. I hope it lasts.

Well, in other news, I replaced the alternator in my Trans Am. I gone ahead and upgraded to a news, better style. The TA already had the beefer 17SI alternator in it (originally 108A output). I replaced it with one out of a savage yard last year but it wasn't charging. I did some research and found out the newer CS144 unit is the same physical size as my original and would bolt right in with minimal modifications. I know that the early CS series like the CS121 and CS130 are just downright horrible (last less than 100k miles while the SI series can go for decades). The CS144 is different. It's build much better and can last a long time. Plus the CS144 puts out a lot more power and doe it at a lower RPM too. I has a few other features to make it better to run all the electronics in the modern cars (lower noise, quiter operation, run cooler, etc).

So it was a no brainer with all the benefits. And it was only cost $10 more (I paid around $108US for a lifetime warranty rebuilt unit). Now there are some modifications that is need for the wiring. But it was pretty simple. GM (Delco) makes an adapter harness to convert the old SI series to the new CS144. I opt to make my own (I'm an engineer after all). I did found a problem with the factory wiring harness (Maybe why it's not charging in the first place? Kinda moot now that I upgraded). I didn't have to change the brackets but I did made a mod last year by using the new belt tightening bolt that makes adjusting the tension so much easier.

I got great results with the new alternator. Before upgrading, I can't recall ever recall the voltage going over 13 volts, even with the factory original alternator. Now with the new one, it stay well above it unless I run it at idle with lights on and the stereo blasting (600+ watts RMS - Yep, that's real true watts and not that marketing max watts crap that doesn't mean anything). In addition, the car seems to run better too.

I need to add one of those stiffing capacitor and/or a battery in the rear. Perhaps bumping up to bigger wires. A project for he future. If anyone wants more information on the conversion, ask me and I'll see if I can put a how-to together. I think it's well worth the time and effort, especially if you run a lot of electronics. I read that people are making the same conversions even for non GM vehicles too.

One more thing (Yay! the journal almost over), I want to remind people that I recently opened a chat channel #The_Lair on the IRC network FurNet (Click on the chat button up in the left corner for more info on how to connect). I plan on submitting a more detailed channel description and rules hopefully soon. It's new so not much is set in stone yet but I have a pretty good idea where to take the channel. I ran several other channels so I got experience at it.

I want to keep it friendly as possible. As you can imagine, I had enough real life drama. I really don't want more on line shenanigans like flooding and trolls (Thankfully they are rare). Any of those will be swiftly dealt with (Smashed to a fine red sticky paste). Otherwise, just about anything goes as long as it not harassing anybody. There will be fun times to be had.

Eep! I just got tagged by Shub-Yoggoth. I don't have the time to do them these days. However I'll refer to an earlier one I did that's similar to this one. It's at http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/89673/ if you want to check it out. I'm not bothering tagging the eight other people but if you want to do it, the rules are:

Rules:
1. Post these rules
2. Each Tagged person must write 8 facts about themselves
3. The tagged person must post their facts in the journal they were tagged in.
4. You have to inform 8 people that they have been tagged on their userpage

There, that concludes our lovely journal. Don' be afraid to ask any questions you have. I don't bite... much.