Super Dad: Thanksgiving

November installment of my Super Dad comic - I am reviving him so look for more and archives coming soon.

Tesla Motors

The Tesla Roadster

• 100% Electric
• 0 to 60 miles per hour in under 4 seconds
• 135 mpg equivalent
• 245 miles per charge
• less than 2¢ per mile

And it looks like something James Bond would drive!

 

It looks like interest in the Tesla Roadster is high; they have already filled available reservations for the 2008 model year and more may become available on a first-come, first-served basis. Wait list members will also be first in line when we begin taking orders for the 2009 Tesla Roadster.

For only $5,000 you too can get on the waiting list; just make sure you have the other $100k+ for delivery.

Tesla Pierce-Arrow

The original Tesla car was a 1931 Pierce-Arrow Touring Car; which just happens to be another of my favorite looking cars.

Tesla replaced the engine with an Electric Motor which ran almost silent.

The car drew power wirelessly using a black box of radio tubes in the glove compartment. The box had an antenna and Tesla would fool with some tuners and tune in the right frequency to receive power he was "broadcasting" from nearby.

J.P.Morgan (his investor) did not like the idea of wireless energy, because there was no way to meter it. Morgan stopped funding and Tesla's Wardencliffe Tower and it was taken down.

The new Tesla Roadster does not run on transmitted power, it uses a high capacity battery (one of the largest and most advanced battery packs in the world).  It promises the more than 100,000 miles of peak performance driving before you notice a performance drop.

The car is fully charged in about 3.5 hours and will get about 245 miles between charges.

Very Cool!

Candy Raid

Is it just me or is Halloween just another excuse for parents to make a pig of themselves without guilt? The kids go to bed and we say "they don't need all this candy" and take the parental duty of "thinning" their score.

It is hard job, parenting...sampling all that candy looking for razor blades and poison. You would think the little brats would be gratefully for our sacrifice!

Halloween Greetings!

The thought of a Great Pumpkin who rises out of the pumpkin patch he deems the most "sincere" and then flies through the air to deliver toys to all the good little children in the world (or at least those who truly believe) may seem silly to the un-enlightened mind, however I have it on good authority that this year the grand fruit (yes, pumpkins are fruit) himself will grace the Roloff Family Farm (I love their show!).

This is a huge slap in the face to Peoria, Illinois, 90 percent of the pumpkins grown in the United States are raised within a 90-mile radius of there and I am sure they were expecting him.

Did you know that U.S. pumpkin production in 2006 was valued at $101.3 million! That is a lot of pumpkins (556 million pounds to be exact). At 18 cents a pound I would have to sell like 50,000 pumpkins a year (with an average weight of 12 pounds) in order to make $100K. If every family purchased an average of 4 pumpkins I would have to sell to 12,500 families!

Or I could just sell 136,000 pumpkins to Wal-Mart at 6 cents a pound.....either way I don't see pumpkin farming in my immediate future.

Testing New Software

I am using new software from Microsoft called Windows Live Writer. The jury is still out on whether I will use it or now.  This will be its first post and it will automatically post to three sites - in all I want to ad twelve so we will have to do some testing.

A review of the software will come next.  I plan to test others, so I will include a comparison eventually.

Places I Have Lived: Summit Valley

The in-laws farm (looking out the front porch view). We will probably live here forever.


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Places I Have Lived: Sioux City

2718 Virginia St.
Sioux City IA 51104


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Why won't it partaaa!

Me and Dan having fun...we saw this and decided to make our own.

Father and Son Movie Night: 300

I went to see "300" tonight and I took my oldest boy (who turns 13 in a month) to see it. It was his official first rated "R" movie. With the exception a couple of breast shots and a little passionate husband and wife scene, I think it was a good movie for him.Oh and did I mention the gratuitous violence!

Oh, yeah baby, it was a man's man movie: I LOVED it!

It says a lot about what modern man is missing in today's world. We have lost touch with our "fight for survival" nature and that loss has causes us to grow complacent. We settle for safe because it is familiar.

Today's man is domesticated, stripped of his warrior instinct (often by the church) he is left asking: What battle will I have fought? What will they say about me when I die? What story will be written by my life?

It all made for a good talk on the way home with my soon-to-be teenage son. We talked about the importance of standing up for what is right even when it looks like it might not be in your favor. We talked about intentions and how what or how we think is sometimes not enough. We discussed how a man is judged not by intent, but by actions; that is where character is born.

I told him I was proud of him and that he was a good son. I told him that becoming a man is more about learning to think of the welfare of others than it is learning to take care of one's self.

He smiled and we joked around a bit… And then I realized that the battle I was fighting was the battle for my son's heart. I began to understand that after I am gone the only people who will talk about me will be my children and I should only concern myself with what they will say and remember.

And I realized that the story that I was writing tonight is named Daniel.