Learning to shut up. Don't shut up.

Why are 'older' people more boring?
What makes them the same?

Well, ultimately, they 'shut up'.

They shut up their ideas, mouths, take the safest route and shut up.

There may be reason to shut up.  You don't want to be sacked or cause something to be uncovered at work which causes something to be time consuming.

Of course this has a down side.  Nobody put the idea forward, however many faults it had which could have been ironed out.  So whatever it was never got suggested.

I do a part time job (well until mid May when I will retire).  In this job there are people who work 'above' me.  They have seniors, who have seniors who have seniors who have board members above them.

Over my years in the job I have had some good and less good ideas.  One of these was a stoke of genius which the company took on.  However my boss told me never to send any ideas in ever to the ideas email address as it might make her and her boss (the upper of these two was let go fairly recently) looks like they were not doing their jobs- I guess this includes thinking.

Again recently I had an idea.  It could work at any senior/ secondary/ college/ university about building an electric car conversion.  I contacted one school who didn't reply and then more recently the very well funded 'Prior Park College' where I know a member of staff there.  Every couple of weeks I am apologised to for the school not getting back to me.  I will be interested to see if they just take the idea on.  The value of the project to the schools is the positive publicity they can throw out to the news papers.  I don't know if the reader is aware, but there is some sort of financial/advertising measurement that you can give to newspaper coverage.  So in this case, Prior Park when they finish the car project might invite the paper round to talk about 'The Future of travel' and what the students had done.  It is very positive and more fun than most of the other activities the school (and other schools) offer.  Prospective parents will be impressed.

When is the moment that I should become more protective about these ideas?  Would that actually be helpful if I controlled the ideas instead of suggesting them?

I hope I don't shut up for some time.  I am really bored by the conformity of people in all sorts of areas- work, music, money etc.

Oscar Pissedoffalot- but he looks so happy!

He shoots guns out of the top of his car, bathroom doors with unconfirmed toilet users and people's feet in a restaurant.

BUT he looks so happy.

How did this gun runner get in so much trouble?

Removing a locking wheel nut. Part of sorting out the kit car.

Ok, so this wont probably work for every type of wheel nut, but it did for mine.

http://youtu.be/mJUUyjJqk5A

Googled last night and working today.  I hammered a similar size to a 14mm onto the top of one just like this:

Handbrake on, the best chance you have is when it hasn't yet moved.  A sharp first move followed by half a rotation and suddenly it was free!

This is the last of the two on the rear of my Firecat kit car, which I am going to use on track days.  It needs a bunch of mods before it goes on track, most of them cheap and already purchased.

I have removed the awesome stereo including speakers = 10Kg and the soft top (sold on- no turning back) including the frame 6Kg.

A video of the car is on youtube here :

Buying a green coloured car- here is why...

This is about buying a green car.  Its not a cool colour, so somebody who is boring will have not thrashed it and may well have originally been purchased by an elderly person who keeps the car in a garage.

I owned a green armoured vehicle.
I sold it for more than I paid.

Completely by accident, I bought a green coloured Saxo in 2006.
It was the cheapest VTS around and had several things replaced on it, such as head gasket, gearbox etc.

Apart from a radiator leak it gave no issues.

I didn't think about the colour at all.

That car became more and more of a track day machine and eventually ended up being worth more in parts than as a whole car, so was broken for parts.

I then made a mistake and bought a red MX5.  It was riddled with issues and made from rust.  It had clearly passed its previous MOT with help from the garage that put it through, with no catalytic converter and some worn bushes.

Time to scrap it when it got to MOT time.

I made another mistake.  A blue BMW.  Again it had a 'fake' MOT as the caliper setup one side was different to the other due to crash damage, resulting in the pads hanging off the back of the disc.  The eventually meant binding of the brakes to the disc.  It ran out of fuel at quarter of a tank.  The light height adjust was broken.  The rear suspension had the wrong springs on the rear, leaked water and the door seals had gone, so the inside misted up.  I sold the car on with the faults declared and the 5 threatening people buying it who wanted a fast test drive must have done something special as the police popped round to ask about the car two weeks later as it had been involved in a crime.

Then I looked for a Passat TDI.  Around £2000 (much cheaper for a petrol model) gets you a high milage model.  Having missed out on four cars which were on ebay auctions, I then tried with dealers.  This didn't work out either.  Then on Gumtree I found a GREEN one for £850.

Did the test drive, asked if there were any issues; just the central locking.  So I drove the guy back to his house.  On the way, I said there was nothing I could do now, having paid for the car... so whats really wrong with it.
"Nothing"- he said.
Two months on and it is still going strong, including a trip up to Manchester and back.
I did change the oil, oil filter, air filter and I have the fuel filter still to go.  The clutch will go at some point but aside from that, it is fine.

It was owned by this guy's mum.  Its boring.  The paintwork and panels are not perfect but nothing that stands out.  So dull, it doesn't warrant a picture.

If you want to get from A to B- buy a green car.