ND Recap (hella long)

["Shannon Fenton" <sfenton@amazon.com>]

Ahhh..home.

	Little background info for you all. Went to Momentum thursday diagnosing a
prob and getting it somewhat fixed we thought. I cant say enough good things
about the Shawn and the rest of the crew for fitting me in at the last
minute so I could have a chance at making the show. A word of warning, if
you are out on a test drive with him and he looks over and asks "how strong
is this gearbox?"....dont bother answering, just grit your teeth and hold
on. Back on track, headed back down to Seattle under Schrick power...niiice.
Got to seattle at 8pm or so, stopped at delongs shop and changed the oil had
a couple beers. 9:30 back home.
	No laundry had been done in prep for the trip. Dig through summer clothes
and find the same shorts and sandals I bought last year at ND. Packed them
up and called it done. Packed the beer. Packed my "working chair". Forgot my
scooter, sunscreen, sleeping bag, decent CDs, oil, coolant, etc. Got contact
info for the meet up at the hotel, fought with roommate till midnight.
Finally went to bed to find out downstairs neighbors were having a party.
Ughh. Have a couple of beers to help me sleep. Passed out for about 1.5
hours. Staggered to car at 3:10am.
	Got to the meet point at 3:50 where we were supposed to meet at 4am. Delong
called and is putting his socks on still. Andy is on his way, Kelly is
blasting up with the 1.8T. Leave meet point, stop at next exit for gas and
smoke. Andy develops the first of many electrical problems and losses dash
lights. Wiggle some wires and they're back. Hit the road.
	Car is running fantastic even if it is running a little warm. I started
probing the 276s around dawn south of Olympia. 5th gear 80mph, punch
it...whoa was that torque steer!! 80-110, Jesus its still pulling hard, easy
big daddy the only Scirocco left in site is Kelly in the 1.8T who just paces
me like we are doing 65. Start chuckling a slightly insane chuckle.  Apply
shit eating grin. Radio for Kelly to saddle up along side and pace me. Punch
it. 110...120 mind you the car is pulling like its at 60 or 70.
125...woohoo, lines blur into solid white streaks, airbox is howling,
whistles from both window seals. Kelly has not moved an inch from my bumper.
134 holy shit its still accelerating...slowly lift. Finally I love these
cams. Radio over to kelly and he says his speedo read 140mph! Thats a big
difference from mine so we both do the speedo check with the mile markers.
Sure enough, at higher speeds my speedo reads low and Kellys is still dead
on. He also says the governor on his car which kicks in at 143 came on. Now
I always doubted the stories of rocs hitting 130+mph. With 276 cams its
possible.
	Andy develops another electrical problem and his brake lights flicker on
and off with bumps. We never do find a fix for it. Delong is getting
slightly better gas mileage this year, averaging 150 miles or so to a tank.
I wish I could say the same for Andys bladder. No more Latte stops.
Strangely enough we end up stopping at the same places we stopped last year.
But they lacked the entertainment value of last year without Mr.Barwick
looking like a fish out of water. Made it up through the mountains in good
time and started the slow decent into the 7th ring of hell. Better known as
California.
	Almost as soon as we crossed the border out of Oregon shirts had to be
removed and both windows rolled down. Its hot out. I mean melting hot.
Increased speed to increase the airflow, Im sticking to the seat now. Ukk.
We are now getting close where we have to get off I-5. I printed the wrong
directions and we had to pull off to be sure of where. When we pull off
Kellys car decides to get a flat so we change Andys full size spare onto it.
Well actually we all stood around and watched Kelly do it. I try calling
Collins and all the other contact numbers to no avail. Head back onto the
road and make it to the Hotel.
	We get to the hotel and its deserted Scirocco wise. We went through the
"holy crap were at the wrong hotel" thing for awhile. Then Dick Wong shows
up. Head to Bennigans when Doogie Hauser shows. I pee myslef when the bill
comes, 4.50 for a damn Heiniken!! I hate CA. And good God, 2.50 a gallon for
gas!! I see no point to CA existing and pray it falls into the Pacific
sometime very soon. Well after the scantily clad women move to Seattle that
is. Finally the so cal group decides to make an appearance. Few beers drank,
Randy I go on a beer run. Saltyweazel expressed concern on my driving
condition and I reassured him that I have no plans on sharing a jail cell
with Randy. Thanks for watching out for my best interest, theres no telling
how Randy would react in a confined space. Car reverts to running like
complete shit. Randy is loaded enough he is impressed. Arrghh. This pretty
much ruins most the weekend for me. Well that and Chris and Andy bitching
about my bitching. They complained endlessly all weekend.
	With beer supply replenished we set about watching the Saltyweazel get
completely hammered. Hes such a cute little monkey when he stumbles around
and tries to be coherent. He upped the entertainment value when he decided
to attempt a burnout in the automatic. I thought about expressing concern at
his driving abilities but remembered I wouldn't have to share a cell with
the weazel so I figured he could have his fun. The oxidized orange blur did
a couple of hot laps around the upper floor of the parking garage. I thought
of his next license plate...SPDWEAZ. Doug's spider sense kicked in and he
moved his cars. No amount of proding could get Mr.Block to give another
adhesion demonstration. I could see Dirk making mental notes for the stories
he is surely telling in Germany. "stupid americans...". I sensed that
something was missing however from the night. I pondered this and had a
couple of beers. Mr.Meze had yet to make an appearance. Word came in the he
was on his way.
	Meze showed up finally with Dan May. Dan passed me a note when shawn was
busy changing his oil cooler. The note read "help". For once my ride wasnt
the one marking its territory as the meze-mobile began staining pavement.
But I felt better that our little dysfunctional family was complete now that
the last coo coo had landed. More beer was drank. Andy did a burnout, Chris
did a burn out, I made a poor attempt at accelerating my badly missing car.
Tberk advised us that we had had our fun. Doug looked nervous. Shawn looked
ugly. Dirk looked confused. Saltyweazel looked hammered. Dan looked scared.
Collins looked unamused. Daun looked...well duan is daun. I needed a smoke.
Tberk attempted to end the fun by packing up the beer with doug but we would
have none of that horseplay. More beer was found and drank. Andy and Chris
went sleepy time and I represented for the northwest. I eventfully relented
to being alone in the lot with Meze. We headed in and in a fit of stupidity
I got into the same elevator with him. Stupid Mahfuker hit all the damn
buttons and of course Im on floor 12 or 13 and that shit is on 3. Ding,door
close,ding,door close,ding,door close,ding,door close,ding,door close
arrghh. No one had told me exactly which room on the 12th floor I was in
either. I went down the hall trying my key in every lock at 3am.
	Saturday we all caravanned to the BBQ held at Guidos. Very hot...did I
mention that hell is cooler than California? And Chris wouldnt stop bitching
about the heat. Watch Meze attempt suicide while removing a 16V body with a
razor. Luckily while he was not successfull at first Guido reopened the
wound in an attempt to restart the blood flow. I had a burger and watched
Lisa Lutman slowly turn pink. Dirk at this stage was so red you could see
his legs from space. Much commotion was had while Meze attempted to get a
crankshaft pulley bolt for poor PJ and his wounded Corrado. I found out
rather late in the game that that sneaky guido had the damn AC running in
the house. No wonder he was rarely seen doing anything but entering and
exiting the house. I hid inside for a bit. The group gathered to hear PJ
start the Corrado and collective "awww shit" was heard when it sputtered to
life with 2 bent valves clacking. Then the mountain cruise got under way and
us NWsters and Meze headed back to the hotel. No reason to bring a poorly
performing car on a spirited cruise and Meze was still leaking copious
amounts of oil. Washed the cars and did a little turd polishing.
	When the cruise folks made it back more bullshiting beer drinking ensued.
The renner boys found our circle track and took advantage. vrrrroooom
whossh, rrrooooom whoosh. I need a turbo. Met Ivo and others, cool folks.
The .org collective headed to dinner at my bewilderment. There was plenty of
liquid dinner left so the NWsters stayed at the track. Kelly gave George
from Renner a ride in the 1.8T. It was funny to watch Kelly blow past a cop
in the oncoming lane at 90+. Why Kelly is not in jail right now I will never
know. Everyone eventually filtered back to the lot and more BSing ensued
while the renner folks cleaned their cars. Plans to meet at 8 the next
morning were made when Security kicked everyone out of the lot. I walked in
the direction of the hotel till he left. TBerk in his haste to be a good
citizen left the case of fat cat all alone in the dark and scary parking
lot. I decided to tuck it safely away in my belly and hang with the underage
crew and school them on why the 276 idle is so damn cool and why trance
really sucks. Bedtime.
	Bust ass to make the parking lot by 8 and find it almost completely
deserted. WTF. I get a flashback of last year when the group took off for
the carwash without waiting for anyone and attempted to leave for the show
in the same manner. I found a bewildered looking Jim and Ben wandering the
lobby. We rounded up the rest of the folks who apparently are not cool
enough to drive or ride with the group and hit the road. Ken bought me a
donut and we bonded. I like Ken if not for his lame taste in music. You need
to ditch the NSYNC of trance Ken. Transporting the homeless listers we all
made it to the show in plenty of time with no wait at the gate.
	Show was pretty cool. The hanger was way cool and stayed pretty cool temp
wise throughout the day. Not very many notable cars outside the MK1-2-3
generations. Lotsa big wheels and big stereos and thats about it. Some very
nice B5 Passats however. Some cool S4s as well. Put my completely thrashed
euro intake came out and had a couple offers...but I could not bring myself
to take anyones money. The second best part of the day...watching Hoonole'
wander around with his cute little water back pack thingie on! heheh...that
was funny. The best part was of course getting the Peoples choice award. I
dont know how or who voted for me but thanks. It made my captain krylon
intake and crappy running car worth driving down to Collin's Inferno. Thanks
again.
	The ride home is an entirely different story filled with parking lots,
hairy women, pitbulls, hot beer, tities, dead cats and a night dishwasher
"that aint too good". Maybe some other time.


Shannon Fenton
Telecom Resource Management
Desk 206.266.6736
Cell 206.953.6170
Pager 206.541.7831
http://internal.amazon.com/it/infrastructure/telecom/
www.amazon.com


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