Maybe you and a Volkswagen were made for each other.

Maybe.

Timing Light

During the nascence of my enthusiasm for air-cooled Volkswagens, I often had occasion to help Melcher with his Beetles (a '63, a '74 Super, and a '71 Standard; none driven concurrently) in addition to my own car ('73 Fastback). We always used his timing light, a really good (re: expensive) one if I remember correctly. Certainly of a brand good enough to honor a lifetime warranty. Despite its pedigree, it had an annoying tendency to short out so you had to whack it once in awhile while using it, and even then it didn't always flash at each firing. It made timing the engine kind of annoying.

But it didn't seem annoying at the time because it was the only timing light I'd ever used, not that I thought it was supposed to work like that. When I got and started using my own timing light in the mid-1990s, I retrospectively understood just how annoying it had been. It flashes when it's supposed to! Replace or fix your timing light for chrissake, Melcher.
Hint: if you hook up your timing light and the engine stalls out when you pull the trigger, you have the red clip clamped to the wrong post on the coil.

Lowering is for Chumps

Just thought I'd put that out there. (To the unfamiliar: this is not our bus.)

Presidents Day 2012

Tater Tot and I took a little drive to the fish hatchery and goose pond yesterday.

 I'm looking at the fish. It's pink.

This kind of fish is called a "i-BYE-no". 

These are spotted fish. 

This is a bubbly spring. 

This is named "Big Ugly". 

Here's some ducks and geese. 

Here's Ludwig.

More Embellishments: The Toolbox

It's not just Ludwig who gets adorned with stickers. My trusty but slightly too small toolbox has received even more garish treatment. The box itself I got in 1995 at the latest. You can see that some of it is painted black because there was a brief, feeble beginning of an attempt to paint it yellow (yes, yellow again) with a black stripe to match the car at the time (Freida). The stickers perhaps deserve explanations.

Rob Zombie: I like White Zombie and Rob Zombie (less so).
SST: SST Records was a dependably fantastic record label up through most of the 1980s (think Minutemen, Black Flag, Meat Puppets, Hüsker Dü) but became a shadow of its former self in the 1990s and now is formerly itself altogether.
Firing Order/Cylinder Layout: All air-cooled VWs share the same cylinder layout and the same firing order. Over my twenty-one (!) years of ACVW ownership I've adjusted valves and done the timing at least a hundred times on several Type IIIs, Beetles, and Buses, and I still--still--second guess myself when it comes to remembering which cylinder is where. Recently I've taken to simply diagramming it in marker on the back of my hand. If I were employed in a less professional capacity, I'd very seriously consider getting this drawing (by Peter Aschwanden, from The Idiot Book) tattooed there--and the ACVW shift pattern tattooed on the back of my right (shifter) hand. Seriously.
Timing Chart: I taped this photocopy of the Type III timing marks (also from The Idiot Book) up there for the same reasons I did the cylinder layout and firing order.
ART4ALL: We like the Missoula Art Museum (closed Mondays).
Montana AAA: Triple A is always sending out stickers and I'm always putting them on my toolbox (see below).

You Are A Bus: ...is "Subaru" backwards.
Independent: Skateboard truck/fashion company.
Keep Missoula Weird: It seems every town which thinks of itself as weird has their variation on this. I've seen sticker-borne sentiments imploring us all to retain the weirdness of Portland, Madison, Bend, and Austin as well. 
AAA/Fasten Seat Belts: A good idea.
Jets to Brazil: We like Jets to Brazil.

Jucifer: What can I say, I like Jucifer.
My Cat....: In the 1970s my parents had a veterinarian who believed such a thing was possible. We like cats anyway.
The Mooney Suzuki: I thought they were okay. They were handing out stickers after the show so why not?
SoCal AAA: More AAA.
Subaru (Pleiades): If we had to get a newer car (<10 years old) tomorrow, we'd get a Subaru. No question. Personally, I don't think I would consider anything else except maybe, just barely maybe, a Hyundai. A Volkswagen? Pfffft. No way man. 

IXΘYΣ [ichthys]<Science: I think we all know what this is about.
IAC: For kinder, more personal ACVW advice and less snark (and fewer demands to "do a search!"), try itinerant-air-cooled.com.
Nebraska #1: Go Big Red? I hate football in general and the Cornhuskers specifically, but N Street Liquor is my second favorite liquor store in Lincoln (my favorite: Geno's Beverage, aka 11th & G Beverage.)
Big Blue Is a Friend of Mine: ...and of yours.
Cat Lovers Against the Bomb: Like I said, we like cats. The bomb we could do without though I suspect we're stuck with it.

Apple apple: What happened? When I was in elementary school, all the computers were Apples (II+s and IIes). Now everyone's stuck with this PC garbage.Oh well: history is replete with instances where the inferior product controls the market (see also: QWERTY vs. DSK, VHS vs. Beta, standard vs. metric (in the U.S. at least)).

Save the Bays: They sent me a sticker so I stuck it here. It covers up a KYB Shocks sticker.

BodesWell.com: Hey, I thought it was BodesWell.org.

Brandt Money Handling Machines: There was a time in my life when I had to use money handling machines somewhat regularly. I got this sticker from the service guy (obviously).

AAA: Again.

The Man in the Van....: Mike Watt at 1:08.

90.3 KRNU: KRNU was the first college radio station I ever heard and I loved it but since this was Lincoln Nebraska and all, I assumed there were even better ones. Not true. KRNU is easily the best college radio station I've ever listened to.
Larry's Foreign Car Repair (Ventura California): We got Ludwig's rubber front mat from a wrecked bus there.
Reverend Horton Heat: Do yourself a favor and go see RHH. If he's not playing near you soon, he soon will be.
punk is whatever we made it to be: D. Boon, one of the true greats.
The Only Good Clown....: I don't like clowns. Who does?
Precision Skateboards: "Precision" Phil was (is?) a V-Dub man too. 
BodesWell.com: What? Two?
Hippies Smell: ...like patchouli anyway. I kid, I kid.
Copyright Notice: I found a stack of these at work. They're for the copy machine.
GoWesty: By now GoWesty has entered the untouchable realm of the gods I suppose. Do they still give you a free sticker with your order?
Bob's Mobile Sharpening Service (Seward Nebraska): Much like my experience with money handling machines, there was a time when I had to worry about things like the availability of sharp knives.