Exhaustion

I had intended to have the second installment of the Black Cactus up, but I haven't taken some of the updated pictures. I've also had to slow down work and wont even spend the time I intended on it this weekend.

So the theme of the last two weeks, is even though I work three jobs now, Hubby can still earn debt faster than I can earn money. Ouch! Good thing he'll be a great earner when he graduates.

So this post is the tale of the mystery job. One of the guys from church called around the beginning of May. He knew a company that was hiring, but they wouldn't let him disclose any information. Kind of strange, but knowing that the "do or die" time was rapidly coming, I graciously accepted the opportunity. Hubby and I revamped my employment history resume into a skills resume and sent it off. We didn't hear anything for a couple of weeks. Then one morning, 8 am, I get a phone call. The company is doing interviews later that morning and can I come.  So I went.  Its a decent print shop and copy center. You would think that I would know better after years of horror stories from my brother-in-law. They offered my the job at the end of the interview, with a paycheck of pocket change. I agreed and started the next day. So now I am "print girl" and "production grunt". But, the work is interesting and usually not boring. The shop has definitely been busy. I also get an inside look into the local construction industry, which could some day be very helpful. I've met at least one of the local Landscape Architects and learned of one other.

So now I work all day, much of it on my feet, and then come home and run J'Leen. Amazon sales are still doing, but it does take longer to get things done, which is always unfortunate. But a nice long weekend should do well for production and maybe even get the new catalog out.

For now, I will sleep well, sometimes when I don't intend to.

Adventures of the Black Cactus, part 1

So here she is, the Black Cactus. Notice the lovely paint job, it gets all sorts of comments. The guy who did it was into quality workmanship, notice the bright yellow streak by the passenger door hinges. This is what it looks like when you use a textured roller to apply bed liner to your vehicle (not recommended). It leaves sharp bumps, so we call it cactus coating. It tends to cut anything that brushes against it. At least we wont have to worry about door dings.

The first shot really doesn't do justice on how ugly it used to be. The hard top it came with had bolted-on plexiglass windows. You couldn't open the rear window, which really limited what you could put in the back.

So this is our lovely replacement hard top. What a great find at the salvage yard! It has real windows, they open, and best of all - you can see out of them. It is a lot less noisy too. Though we do currently have a gap between the window and the tailgate, but that may get fixed when we replace the tailgate.

Here is where many of our problems lie. We've spent a lot of time staring at these parts. So far we've replaced the valve cover gasket, front struts, rear shocks, tightened a drive belt, removed the destroyed air conditioning compressor, and replaced the tie rods.

We also replace the negative battery terminal and the battery. We have the bracket to secure the battery now, but haven't remembered to install it. When we bought the vehicle the battery and negative terminal were held in place by one plastic zip tie (that's about as good as duct tape).

This is our lovely power steering system. We bought it with a leak, replaced the pump and hoses and still have a leak. You can also see our new oil filter.  Once upon a time this view was blocked by the AC compressor (which someone before us destroyed instead of removing it).

This is now what we seem to do for recreation. Obviously the vehicle purchase options in our price range left a little to be desired. Check back next time for updates on the power steering and fun and games with doors.