HB Mike.

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2003 3.0i White/Black 5 speed Manual.
Options: PP, SP, DSP, NAV, XENON.
Mods: Aluminum Running Boards, 4.6 Body Kit, 20" Style 132 Wheels, Eisenmann Sport Exhaust with Oval tips, Aluminum pedals, Xenonmatch Fogs, M3 Steering Wheel.

Can I have a sip of that HATERADE you're chuggin?

Happy Birthday, A-Dude!

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Happy birthday, A dude.

Happy Birthday! And thanks for the wealth knowledge you bring to the forum much appreciated

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EDELSTEIN MARTIN & NELSON
www.law-pa.com
www.insurancedisabilitylawyer.com

A belated thanks everyone for their greetings and well-wishes. I had a very nice wonderful birthday followed up by 1 very nightmarish day and half which prevented me from getting on the internet.

Monday, July 16, was my birthday. All the family birthday celebrations took place over the weekend, so the intent was to spend the day with my wife, as well as make it a car day. Early in the morning, the wife and I headed over to Inglewood to visit the Chemical Guys showroom and stock up on car detailing supplies. We were greeted by Paul Schneider, an energetic young man who possesses a gift of gab and a couple of Lotus Exiges among his stable. We hit it off immediately and spent the next couple of hours talking to him about cars, CG products, car detailing, and life in general. One thing I learned, CG does a very small online business and that they are European owned. Their bigger business is selling car detailing product to other companies, mostly European, under a rebranded names including one very famous Swiss detailing company. Anyways, he demo'd a bunch of products for us. We walked out of there with $165 of products along with another $75 of free goodies (wheel wax,that Paul dumped in our bags. Based on my experience with Chemical Guys polishes and waxes, I would have given them before going to their showroom, but now, it's my preferred brand.

Next stop was Tito's tacos in Culver City, the tastiest tacos in all of L.A. We waited 25 minutes to get to the window. 3 tacos for my wife, 5 tacos for me. Yummy.

We went home and I washed and clayed down my wife's new (to her) CPO 330ci which I originally thought was in very clean condition, but I was amazed how dirty her paint really was. No saran wrap test was needed, you could feel the dirt build up with your fingertips. I ended up using a full bar of clay; normally I need only 1/2 a bar to complete a car.

I stopped detailing after the claybar, thinking that I'd finish her car off on Tuesday, so that we could go to dinner. We headed over to Arcadia, had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (crusted blackened salmon for me, pasta and tiger prawns for the wife), then watched Transformers at the adjacent AMC theater.

Then the shit hit the fan. When we came home at 2:00 am, our neighbors out in the street in their night clothes. Evidently an transformer blew out, and the power was out. We went to bed, woke up, still no power. The South Cal Edison crew was on hand. The report was that the mainline leading up to our complex branches off 3 ways from the junction box; the 3 lines were fried leading out of the junction box were fried and needed replacement. However, Edison could not find the main junction box because over the years, it was paved over repeated by various asphalt companies. The blueprint that Edison had of the property was wrong. They dug and came up with nothing. So they had to use other means to pinpoint the location of the box in order to begin line replacement.

Long story short - no electricity from 2:00 am 07/17 to 06:00 am this morning which is why I'm so late in responding.

Unfortunately I could not use my orbital to finish off the detail job on my wife's car, so I ended up applying 2 layers of CG ProFinish glaze and 1 coat of M-Tech sealant by hand - 6 hours. I'll never do that again - not without my Porter Cable. I was too dehydrated to hand wax the car, so I postponed that to Wednesday morning. But I will say this much - the paint now looked great with only glaze and sealant.

Since electricity was still out, we went back to the movie theater, paid for 1 movie and watched 3 (remember that high school trick?). Live Free - Die Hard, Ocean's 13, and Ratatouille and killed off the entire evening, followed up by a 2:00 am dinner in our favorite Little Tokyo eatery.

Got home at 3:00 am this morning, and the Edison work crews had built a new underground junction box and were pulling wire. Electricity was finally restored at 5:00 am.

I decided to finish waxing my wife's car off this morning. It won't start. Battery's dead or so it appears. So instead of getting waxed, it's going to get flatbedded over to New Century. Kind of strange - the battery tested fine according to the CPO checklist 2 months ago.

And my 5 day vacation now cut short to 2 days, as I have to return back to work today to work on the Harry Potter 7 shipment scheduled to appear in bookstores everywhere this weekend.

Anyways, that's my birthday story... 1 half detailed car, 4 movies, no electricity, and plenty of good food.

PS - mD - I'm catching up with you. I'm 54. I was thinking about this earlier in the week - my childhood was spend watching B&W TV, listening to a mono phonograph, my first 6 cars or so had no air conditioning. The only ventilation on cars back then were the wing windows. Things have changed - some things for the better, some things not...

No lechon for this birthday, Eugene...

The potlucks are reserved for the birthday parties of the nieces and nephews which is when my wife and mother-in-law make the lechon, lumpia, dinaguan, and pansit. Believe me, I would have been happy with a big pot of dinaguan, a plate of lechon, some gulay on the side, and a cooker full of rice.

Thanks, Andaya! We're thinking about coming up in Sep. Maybe we can drop by and see what's new with your X5!

two days late.. but Happy B Day..

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"When two people agree on everything, one of them is not necessary" - Arliss

happy belated, mike!! hope you had a good b-day!

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No problem kuya,just let me know ahead cause I might be in different place like now I'm stil lin Hilo Hawaii I'm here since last month.Maybe I'm back in Cali at that time so see you there.Take care and regards to Ate.