"Friends Again . . ."

I managed to link up with former Fraternity Brother Hank Bernard. It was a nice thing to see the return email and now Hank is in my address book. I had sent a letter in the dark so to speak and it struck gold!

But the more interesting side issue is that Hank and I had a common friend from New Iberia, Leon Harris. And since Leon and I communicate quite a bit, I sent a message to Leon with Hank's email address (with his approval).

Today, I saw Leon's email to Hank. I hope they are well linked up now.

Our worlds grow and yet shrink. Our youthful buddies come back into contact. Today we are so mobile you never know where we end up. Hank ended up in Lafayette, just a few miles from New Iberia. Leon ended up in Grants Pass, Oregon, many mucho miles away in the mountains.

Ahh, that's life. . .

"A Visit From Abbe . . ."

We had a delightful visit from Abbe Sunday. She was enticing, adventuresome and cute. Who is Abbe you may ask? Well Abbe is a found black dog. And she brought her new owners to visit too.

James, Joan and Jammie captured Abbe along side the road across from the old Morganza High School in Morganza, of course. She was to near the highway and they picked her up to keep her from being squashed along the road. She was shaky and reputed to be full of fleas.

The fleas are gone. They took her to the Vet in New Roads, and they pronounced her healthy.

And they decided to keep her. She had no troubles traveling and still does not mind a long ride.

She is about 10-14 weeks old, black from stem to stern, with an almost chocolate color. She is otherwise a black dog of mixed ancestry. And she seems to be very intelligent little dog.

She is already house trained and yet just a puppy.

She is cuddly, quite and generally well behaved. It took a bit of work to entice a bark out of her. Right now she is more curious and very content to be an owned puppy.

So there is a new dog on the scene. A new member of the family.

Welcome Abbe . . .

"Looking for People . . .

In the past year I have tracked down a few of my old fraternity brothers. Some were easy like Yvie Poret (fellow USAF retiree, LT Col), others difficult like Terry Dardeau (I found his obituary), Bernie LaFaso (successful man), Dwight Paulsen (very successful man) but have yet to locate Brother Kieth Irwin. I know Brother Woody Bergeron married a girl from Livonia, a cousin with the same last name. He is in Atlanta region, a retired Delta pilot.

Dwight and Kieth were both from Franklin, LA. I looked there for Kieth but to no avail, then all over Louisiana, still no joy. Contacted Dwight and he thought he was out in Colorado. So I did a search out there and did find a Kieth Irwin.

Next step is to send him a letter. That does not always work, sent a letter to Brother Joffery Fusilier and got nada, nothing. Heard that Joffery was a very successful lawyer. I guess he forgot his college buddies but that's life for you.

Others like Donald Littlefield died early. Saw his obituary in a Lafayette paper. Today, I think Don was probably a homosexual and died of AIDS. What a tragedy, an early and unfortunate death. Don was the son of a very wealthy man, drove and Austin Healy 3000 sports car while at LSU. Sorry that his life ended so soon, I'm thinking no one missed him, pity to get caught up in the flotsam of life.

I think Hank Bernard is a lawyer in Lafayette and he does not respond either. He is either too busy or perhaps too sick. We had a common childhood friend in Leon Harris. Leon and I swap Emails regularly, he lives in Grants Pass, OR with his life love and wife. Leon done well too. Leon's brother, Johnny married Leah Raye Mougeot and lived in New Roads. Sadly Johnny passed on some time ago due to cancer, Leah Raye and I met at ex-brother-in-law's funeral. Through her I connected with Leon.

Well I am gonna sent Kieth a letter and see if he responds. It is interesting that those of us that are successful have no problems in responding. It seems that those of us less successful are perhaps embarrassed and thus do not respond. That's a shame because we don't care one way or the other, they were our friends at a formative time of our lives.

Life goes on . . .

"Got Tired of Screwing With It . . ."

Yup. I got tired of screwing around with the old weedeater and went got a new one. Oh, I will work on the old one, it is too good to give up on. But work had to be done.

I am more careful with this new one. It is a Troybuilt, a brand now owned by MTD, same folks as the Cub Cadet but a couple of steps down the ladder so to speak.

So all the tool heads attach, like the blower, the edger and the cultivator. And of course several versions of weedeater heads. So I have lots of weedeater stuff.

I am taking my time breaking it in. This one simply says use 40:1 oil mix where as in the past it said 40:1 but run a tank full of fuel that is mixed at a lower ratio for break in. I looked through the cheap but bountiful instruction sheet and saw no such break in directions.

It is a 25 CC engine, the same size we use on model airplanes in gasoline applications. So I doctored the fuel with a 2.6 ounce bottle of special blend 2 cycle oil and added about an ounce and half of Castor oil. I have plenty of Castor oil from my Radio Control applications.

Castor oil is unique in that it will blend with alcohol or gasoline while basic automotive grade oils will not mix with alcohol. So it blends in well and is a super additive for break in. It is a higher temperature oil and when it gets hot, it morfs into an even larger molecule. So it is excellent for break ins. It forms a varnish type coating and is good for bearings. Plus it smells good or at least in my mind smells better than the normal exhaust for a 2 cycle gasoline engine.

I am giving it heat cycles. Run for a while, let it cool down and then do it again. We call this temp cycles in the model business. After five or six cycles it will be essentially broken in. So I am treating it gently and feeding it good stuff. I hope it lasts.

Now I gotta go edge some more. . .

"The Weed Eater - Again . . . "

Had to tear down the wead eater power head again. Nothing wrong with the motor or carburettor, it is the pull start mechanism.

It is not a complicated thing, just have to figure out how to get into it and out again. First you have to take the trigger throttle/kill switch/handle off. Not hard actually, only five screws, four hold the handle assembly together and on the output shaft. The fifth screw is short and in fits a screw hole on the shaft to hold the handle in one spot. So when reassembling the handle one has to center that screw over the specific hole in the handle. The trigger throttle goes back to the power head carburettor and the kill switch fits in a little pocket on top of the handle convienent for the thumb to turn off the engine.

Next one has to remove the base where the power shaft fits on to the power head assembly. There are three screws holding that in place. Kind of chinsey, but it seems to work. Under the housing is the clutch.

There is a spring assembly that threads the power shaft drive assembly together. It is a flex cable and the end is squared off so it fits in a shock spring that fits ovet the end of the clutch housing. Easy in and easy out.

But now one is left with the silver clutch output assembly where the flex shaft feeds into and is held in place by the shock spring and housing assembly - nice lose fit as described above.

But how do you get the clutch housing off? Aha, there is a secret. One uses a torex bit screw driver and goes down the housing shaft. There is a screw that holds the housing on to the spring clutch assembly under it. You can not see it, you have to know its there. Unloosen the screw and it comes off. The screw is retained inside the clutch cover assembly so you never ever see it. This is where most home tree mechanics get stymied, took me a while to figure it out but I did.

Now one sees the clutch spring assembly. It is a centrifical expanding clutch. The springs hold it in the non-engaged position. When RPM goes up the mass of the assembly overcomes the spring load and engages the clutch assembly housing by explanding outward which inturn powers the flex shaft. Simple. Good design.

Once again, one has to resort to magic. A pair of lock pliers applied to the shaft of the spring clutch assembly and a large pair of water pump pliers are used here. The threads holding the spring clutch assembly are always counter to the rotation of the engine so are tight at all times. But with the water pump pliers, I grip the outside of the spring assembly and turn, and off it comes. Just unscrews off the flywheel shaft.

Now I can remove the front of the motor housing which houses the recoil starter asssembly. The flywheel has two spring loaded swing arms that reach out and engage a prawl assembly. So that when one pulls with authority, the prawl is engaged by the swing arms. The prawl is a star shaped nylon item and subject to wear and tear. It is a matter of clearance and reach.

Any way, one bends the swing arms so that they will engage the prawl when activated. The manufacturere cleverly does not tell you about this and after a year or two of operation, it kind quits doing its job. The result is the normal user will (a) take to be repaired or (b) junket for a new one. Repair shops are hard to find and expensive and so it usually becomes a matter of getting a new weed eater. Planned obselence is work.

Well it is all back together now but too cold to try out. Will do so tomorrow and get her going again. Then I need to change the oil, it is a four cycle engine of 50CC capacity. Works good when it is running. Lots of power.

Spring has sprung, grass cutting season is upon us once again. Never ending cycle . . .

Next Up . . .

I am next up on the cataract surgery path. We had joint eye appointments yesterday in Grapevine. Judie worked around her schedule to have a trip in May to Madison.

After we got her set up, then we had to set up my schedule. I will have the right eye done first, then after a month or so, the left eye. The right eye in the examination was very unstable.

The optometrist, Dr. Coldrick, said it was a level 2 to 3 grade now. The rating ranks from one to four. So it has reached the time to do it. When they do one eye then they do the other one right after it.

I unlike Judie will have Crystalens installed. She had ReSTOR which are alleged to be better for dry eyes. In my case, Crystalens is better for intermediate vision as well as night vision. I, of course, do not have dry eye issues as does Judie.

So late spring and early summer will be eye work for both of us. Judie's PRK is delayed until her Thyroid hormones are stabilized. That may take up to six months.

In my case, there is no follow on Lasik, Lasek or PRK necessary. While I have high levels of astigmatism, the "machines" indicate it is not a problem. So there is potential for me not to wear glasses again. If so, it will probably be reading glasses. I have worn glasses since I was thirteen, that is 58 years! I probably will be uncomfortable without them for some time - self conscious too.

Time ever marches on.