Posted by Raul on January 31, 2011
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
The girl insists of the need for a fancy restaurant where to have lunch.
Paying for the bill with an “overheated” credit card.
His sport utility vehicle have all powered system, “as it suppose to be”
But the engine oil hasn’t been changed in the past seven thousand miles!
We live in a world that shows us one reality, and we interact in a world that has a completely different reality…the one in our minds.
So we see, hear and interact in a physical world and reality that has nothing to do with the reality of the world we think we interact in.
-I am a high class person because I don’t accept less than … (fill in the blank)
-He pretends his reality so not to be less than me
-I compete with his worded reality so not to be left behind
-We believe our worded realities as true realities until the whole system collapses
He was laughing as we talked about the supposedly realities of the supposedly being that interact in a supposedly physical world.
“It’s all in your mind” He said
“But what about the tangible reality of the physical objects?” I asked
“Are they really physical?” He replied
He got a point…so I had to pay for the coffees!
Raul
Posted by Raul on January 27, 2011
So the sheep keeps dreaming of being a wolf, yet spends an entire life being a sheep. But because it doesn’t work, the sheep pretends to be a wolf. Then the sheep talks, walks and smiles like a wolf, but still remains a sheep. The corral is covered with signs saying “You Are a Wolf!” And with contentment, the sheep accepts the lying words as the truth of its world.
So the sheep learns one day it has to step on the other sheep to be above, but has to fight the common thought of holding hands with love. So the sheep rebels and fight the common thought, just to find itself being left alone.
Until one day it discovered the common thought was promoted by the creators of the signs.
<How could it be? Such a contradiction on its own! Who’s behind this?> the sheep asked in a thought, and “Mirrors” was the response word.
So the sheep types and types, while the sheep reads and reads, while the sheep cries and cries, while the sheep dreams and dreams.
“My goodness, you are a sheep!”
“I’m sorry ma-a-a-a’am, I’m a wolf”
“But you have a wooly skin”
“But I have cold thoughts!”
So one day the sheep woke up from its daydreaming and found a wolf by its side, seating on the floor.
“What are you dong here?” It asked.
“I’m your counselor” was the wolf’s response.
Plop!
Posted by Raul on January 24, 2011
If you decide to diagnose your vehicle why it doesn’t start, check first the Crankshaft Position Sensor instead of the Ignition Pack and harness…it’ll save you a lot of time!
Last week I’ve been spending a lot of time with a vehicle that simply refuses to show what the problem is and why it doesn’t want to run. I’ve checked the ignition; timing; wiring; fuel delivery system; vacuum controls for leaks; etc, and it shows everything fine, yet it refuses to run!
For many years I’ve considered cars as a reflection of people; not only because we all tend to choose a car for a shape and characteristics that suppose to reflect us in many ways, but mostly because vehicles tend to “behave” in the same way we people do.
Take for instance this vehicle I’ve been working on (and still not finished); doesn’t it look like those situations where we are asking a loved one “What’s the matter?” and the only response we get is “Nothing”.
So we quietly think and analyze every memory we have from the past couple of days, trying to find a reason why our loved one is “functioning” in a completely different way than normal. We ask questions, but the answers don’t give any information of what the problem could be.
With the vehicle I’m working on, if the problem showed clearly, it’ll be really easy to apply a solution and the necessary corrections to make the car run smoothly again. The whole process would be quick and painless, and would avoid any unnecessary frustrations and loss of time.
With an honest answer to the question of “What’s the matter”, a change in common actions, or corrections of results about past ones, could mean the solution to the affecting problem, so the situation would be corrected, the problem solved, and friends again, without any misunderstandings and bad moments to everyone involved in the situation.
But just like some vehicles simply refuse to tell openly what the problem is, and somehow start a game of deceiving, with a loved one the same exact situation can happen, leaving us all like that car mechanic (me), who is trying to find the solution by just observation, testing and analysis of responses as the only way to get to the real reason for the change in operational mode.
I know in human situations many times the refusal to “talk” could be with the intention of not hurting feelings, but if both parts have love for the other, then the one with the problem could trust the other and be capable of openly telling what the problem is, and the other part should be able to accept a possible painful criticism that could mean the need of changing a personal behavior.
A car mechanic would want to know what the problem is in the vehicle because his intentions are to fix that problem, and is willing to accept the possibility to have to disassemble lots of components just to reach the part that is the reason of the failure; compared to the driver of the car that, normally, is not interested in fixing anything by him, but in only to have a good running car to use.
So, instead of being just drivers in our love relationship, we have to become mechanics ready to diagnose and repair any problem the relationship might incur in, no matter how much work might be involved from our part.
And like that stubborn car I’m working on, please, please, just tell what the problem is, instead of playing games that only make the mechanic think of the possibility of sending a still good working car to a junk yard!
We already have too many “good working units” roaming the lands in despair after being “discarded”, just because too often in their relationships they refused to tell what the problem was.
Raul
Posted by Raul on January 13, 2011
When you take a look at car manufacturer information about the fuel consumption (or economy) they claim, you’ll see that you live in an era of extremely efficient cars. If you make the calculations for yourself, you’ll see that is not so.
The internal combustion engine (gas and diesel engines) have a design that is more that one hundred years old, and what is being improved throughout the time is the efficiency of operation, but the concept is still outdated. A gas or diesel engine uses about 30 percent of the fuel it consumes…the rest is lost mostly in heat.
Looking at the information sheets in windows of new cars you’ll see mileages of 18 to 25; 25 to 31, etc. But a simple procedure will tell you how much fuel you are really burning in your daily errands.
Next time you fill up the tank, do it until the nozzle jump off by itself, then set the partial odometer to zero and drive as you usually do. When the time comes to fill up the tank again, do it also until the nozzle jump off by itself, write down the mileage in the partial odometer and divide that number by the amount of gallons shown in the receipt. You’ll be surprised by the numbers.
With this little test you’ll be able to discover several things:
-The real mileage your vehicle is giving you
-Which brands of fuel gives you the best mileage (there is difference!)
-Which driving habits give you better mileage
-Early detection of mechanical and electrical problems in your engine by the drop in mileage (if you keep doing this every time you fill up the tank)
From what I’ve seen, sport utilities and pick up trucks usually give around 14-18 MPG, while a four cylinder car will be in the 20-27 MPG margin, which is a 50% more miles per gallon.
If you drive an average of 1000 miles a month (which is normal for most people), and switch from a sport utility vehicle to a four cylinder car, you will save around 20 gallons of fuel a month, which in turns, could be a saving of 50 dollars a month, or 600 dollars a year!
If we multiply this savings in gallons of fuel by the number of cars in the US, we could see that several tankers can get lost in their way here. The amount of pollution can be greatly reduced, and even the streets will become instantly “wider” by the use of smaller cars. All on top of personal savings for everyone driving a car 
Raul
Posted by Raul on January 10, 2011
When I see high school teenagers driving a fairly new sport car, having lunch at a restaurant, meeting at a Starbucks for a friendly chat while sipping a coffee or some surfing in a modern laptop, it makes me wonder how their lives will be in the future.
What would happen when, from an early age, a teenage kid gets accustomed to experience and enjoy some “pleasures” of life that are supposedly reserved for an adult that already have accomplished something in life?
The first time can be magic, but the time number twenty is not that much, and by the time number fifty, it has become a routine that classifies as a standard necessity instead of a pleasure to enjoy.
Parents provided and children had an easy life. Asking for a car at the age of fifteen; having money to eat at restaurants, having a coffee at Starbucks and using the latest cell phone in the market; living the life of a well paid professional when still going to High School and sometimes not even getting good grades!
How much money they will have to generate in the near future to sustain a higher life that has become just the base for them? What could be a nice honeymoon trip when graduation from high school with a “C” implies a cruise to the Bahamas?
I can understand the concept of giving the “taste” as a motivational way, but when the results in school don’t reflect constructing the base to reach the presented image and standard to achieve; then the good intentions become a misleading guidance.
Instead of earning every little advantage, that should create the mentality of working hard to supply the needs and enjoy a small luxury from time to time, the concept generated in teenagers these days is that they have to be surrounded by the expensive and the latest, and disregarded the part of generating the income necessary to supply such luxuries.
It is acquiring prestige by the possession and continual use of the latest material elements, rather than the pride of being good at something.
And then, what would happen when the material possessions are lost due to…let’s say…a falling economy. Those who have lived a life of pride based on owning material luxury would become lost and without identity when loosing the material elements; while those who acquired pride by the sense of knowledge and expertise will still have their pride, even if is under a new, deprived economic situation.
Something to think about…
Raul
