TOP DOWN WEEKEND!

[teb]

Hunting season is over, so maybe we can pick up some blaze orange suits to wear in the bird for visibility. We have big piles at intersections and I almost nailed a white VW Bug the other day as I was pulling onto a cross-street. It looked just like a pile of snow, only shorter and moving.

[jps]

Ya' got to watch out for those moving snow piles!

[shamustwin]

'Twas a beautiful weekend in California... but anywhere, snow or sun, is great cruisin' with the top down (I miss my convertables)!

[woodyng]

very similar and unusual weather up the coast in brookings,too,mostly low 60's but sunny,very nice! i believe last jan and feb it didn't stop raining at all. i miss the '91 miata i sold in memphis,but my partner has an older mercedes slk,so we get to motor it on the weekends....

[elreydlp]

Nice ride Paul!
I got to enjoy the two-hour drive from my house to a benefit for Surf Guitar Legend Eddie Bertrand on Saturday with the top down on my MR-2 Spyder. I just have the stock sound system, but listened to the "Cowabunga Surf" 4-CD box set with the volume cranked. I sure like your set up!
The drive home that night without traffic was 1 hour, 15 min.

[johnallg]

Believe me! I know it's wrong. Very, very wrong. But a little piece of me hopes a bird poops on your head.

Seing I had to shovel the end of the driveway before I could enter the street today, I can understand that.

[shamustwin]

Does Mazda still offer the Sound Bar option Paul?

[jingle_jangle]

Jerry, they never offered it, per se. I built the original for the San Diego Auto Show car back in '99. It was robotic--when the 1300W, 11-speaker stereo was turned on, the head unit would slide out of the dash and rotate into position, and simultaneously the Sound Bar's top half would raise 4", uncovering a super-tweeter on each side. The red arrow in the photo below indicates the line where the bar would split. Bottom half stayed as is and top half moved upward.



I re-tooled the Sound Bar without the robotic feature and offered it as an aftermarket option, along with my own line of accessories. The "Miata Mafia"* shut me down, however, and I went out of biz in about 6 months, after only selling a handful.

Here's a close-up shot of the first item, installed on my '99 Miata when it was new:



*Miata Mafia=There is (or at least, was) a group of Miata accessory manufacturers--specifically roll bar makers--who funded the biggest Miata enthusiasts' Forum (which is a commercial enterprise), and they actively worked to diss my products online. One character even wrote a negative review before I had finished tooling it, as though he'd bought one...The power of the 'Net, even back then...The demographic of Miata owners is cheap, fussy old men and women who can't afford a Porsche, so I lost.

This is my gesture to all the cattle who put chrome "show bars" in their Miatae.

Back to your regularly scheduled Reflections.

[woodyng]

hey! i resemble that remark! (the miata owners demographic....)
but i am driving a 2006 scion xb (yes-the toaster...) now,so my demographic has probably gotten much weirder....

[admin]

Paul: Simply gorgeous. Those "to scale" models are amazing. Do you have the original box?

[shamustwin]

Awesomeness.

[jingle_jangle]

Paul: Simply gorgeous. Those "to scale" models are amazing. Do you have the original box?

Oops! BUSTED!!!

[rickenbrother]

! wanna go for a ride in Paul's car!

[shamustwin]

I want those speakers blaring in my ringing ears!

[jingle_jangle]

It was a ice week, but temps dropped daily and humidity went up. Thursday AM I put the top back up.

Today as I look out, it's about 40F and THICK fog covers the landscape. We're going for a Valentine's Day hike in Muir Woods, 4 mi from our house. Tomorrow the winter rains return...