DogHouse

AOL is no longer hosting images.  Millions of people hung with AOL because it is a big problem to move images around.  I’m using Flickr.com now.

I don’t have the time or energy to go back over every post and insert new images.  This is a big suck.

I hope I get this back together before Stacy comes home.

Yesterday, I changed the rollers and drive belt on Stacy’s 2004 Vespa Gran Turismo 200L.  Her Vespa has 10, 518 miles on it.  Her belt and rollers looked as good as new.

 Getting Ready

Pretty Scooter

Work Space

Remove Plastic Cover

The 2004 has a different air cooling intake.  Also, It has no filter.

Loosen the Air Box and Remove the Dip Stick.

Insert Clutch Holding Tool and Remove the Nut.

Remove the Housing and Tape the Oil Fill Hole. 

Remove the Fly Wheel and the Clutch Bell.

I have a tool for holding the fly wheel.  A philips head screw drive wedged between the bottom of the fly wheel and the oil compartment will work in a pinch but is not recommended.

Remove Outside Half of the Variator.

Notice the shim/washer.  At full speed this shim prevents the belt from riding to the top.  Notice how dirty the tape over the oil fill hole is.  That is why I tape the hole closed.

Remove the Clutch Assembly and the Drive Belt.

Remove the Inside Half of of the Variator.

 Notice How One of the Yellow Plastic Guides Fell Off. 

Rollers and Variator Shaft Bushing.

New Rollers.

Re install Bushing, Inside Half of the Variator, Belt, Shim, and Clutch Assembly.

Another View.  Notice Placement of the Shim/Washer.

Install Outside Half Of the Variator.

Install Fly Wheel, Tighten the Nut, and install the Clutch Bell.

Get another beer.

Finished.  Wipe off all the grease smudges. 

I washed, dried, and Oiled the Foam Air Filter Before I Reinstalled the Air Filter Box.

Tomorrow, I will change the oil and oil filter.  Then I will install the Stebel horn.

offered a good position at the Navy Exchange yesterday.  I accepted and start on Monday.  It is an office job doing inventory investigation and management.  No more heavy labor and I got a raise.  Nice.

Let’s see what happens. 

Tomorrow,  I have Vespa fun.

Almost done with configing.  New verb that!  BTW PsychoCats rule!

Here is a script from PsychoCats to replace  Nautilus with Thunar.

#!/bin/bash
echo ‘
Making sure Thunar is installed
‘
sudo aptitude update
sudo aptitude install thunar
echo ‘
Downloading new .desktop files
‘
mkdir temp
cd temp
wget -c http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/defaultthunar/nautilus-computer.desktop
wget -c http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/defaultthunar/nautilus.desktop
wget -c http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/defaultthunar/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop
wget -c http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/defaultthunar/nautilus-home.desktop
sudo chown root:root *.desktop
echo ‘
Making backup copies of old .desktop files
‘
sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop.backup
sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop.backup
sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop.backup
sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop.backup
echo ‘
Replacing old .desktop files with new .desktop files
‘
sudo mv nautilus-computer.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop
sudo mv nautilus.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop
sudo mv nautilus-folder-handler.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop
sudo mv nautilus-home.desktop /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop
cd ..
rmdir temp
echo ‘
Thunar should now be your new default file manager in Gnome
‘

######################

so copy the script and do the chmod+x thing to make it executable.

So now I login to Intrepid Ibex and e16, Enlightenment.  Then I get my user  menu to launch the gnome-panel without too much Gnome stuff and no Nautilus.

Pretty cool and stable.  Intrepid should be gold next week.  

Lesson Learned:  Never buy Sushi from a gas station!  What was I thinking?  Oh well.

Ummm… How to get Nautilus back as the default Prince of Darkness.  Since you asked…

Now go out and vote early for Barry Obama.  Do it.

#!/bin/bash
if [ -f /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop.backup ]; then
  echo -e "\nRestoring Computer .desktop file\n"
  sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop.backup /usr/share/applications/nautilus-computer.desktop
else
  echo -e "\nYou’re missing a Computer .desktop backup file–nothing to restore\n"
fi
if [ -f /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop.backup ]; then
  echo -e "\nRestoring Nautilus .desktop file\n"
  sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop.backup /usr/share/applications/nautilus.desktop
else
  echo -e "\nYou’re missing a Nautilus .desktop backup file–nothing to restore\n"
fi
if [ -f /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop.backup ]; then
  echo -e "\nRestoring folder handler .desktop file\n"
  sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop.backup /usr/share/applications/nautilus-folder-handler.desktop
else
  echo -e "\nYou’re missing a folder handler .desktop backup file–nothing to restore\n"
fi
if [ -f /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop.backup ]; then
  echo -e "\nRestoring Home .desktop file\n"
  sudo cp /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop.backup /usr/share/applications/nautilus-home.desktop
else
  echo -e "\nYou’re missing a Home .desktop backup file–nothing to restore\n"
fi
if [ -f /usr/share/applications/network-scheme.desktop.backup ]; then
  echo -e "\nRestoring Network .desktop file\n"
  sudo cp /usr/share/applications/network-scheme.desktop.backup /usr/share/applications/network-scheme.desktop
else
  echo -e "\nYou’re missing a Network backup file–nothing to restore. If you had Thunar as your previous default file manager, this is normal.\n"
fi
echo ‘
Nautilus should now be your new default file manager in Gnome again
‘

I’ve been having fun futzing with Enlightenment a.k.a. E16 or just E.  I was a mazed when I grabbed my conky in the pager and was able to move it around on the screen.  That’s one hell of a window manager.  I am running the gnome panel on the desktop but no Nautilus and minimal gnome stuff.  This works a lot better than replacing Metacity with E.  Nautilus hogs the mouse buttons.  This is the default Orange Juice theme with my background picture.

I used to have the nice Suse graphical grub menu "grub-gfxboot" installed but, with Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex the stage1 files do not read correctly.  I had to chroot into the Intrepid system and then remove grub-gfxboot and do a grub-install.  Not fun.  I’m sure this will get fixed after Intrepid is fully released.

On the Intrepid hard disk I have Enlightenment (e16) as the window manager instead of Metacity.  I’m learning how to make a theme for Enlightenment.  More fun than compiz, IMO.

It is no secret that I’ve not been a fan of doctors.  My ortho surgeon is the best.  I am very pleased at the results of the operation.  I am not yet healed but I’m better now than I have been in years.  My left shoulder is better than my right shoulder in some respects.

I have been trying for about two years to get a pain management doctor.  I have one now and he is my "Gregory House."  Doc sent me for MRI’s and lab tests that my GP should have sent me for.  He diagnosed my pain and got me off pills.  Exercise, diet, and a pain patch are my treatments.  The future is looking better now.

All I need now is a winning lottery ticket.

Thursday, Darren and Tasia came to Memphis to pickup the Big Ruckus.  The intrepid GeoCachers Stayed the night with us at Murphy Springs Lodge.  We dined at the Neighborhood Bistro.  Yum. 

On Friday, Darren and I headed out on our scooters with Tasia following in their Jeep.  Our first stop was a GeoCache in Olive Branch, MS.  We would hit two other spots on the way down.  We arrived without incident at Magic City Scooters where I received the most awesome welcome of my life by Big Will.  Wow.  We hung with Will for an hour or so, I dropped my camping gear at Eileen’s house and we headed to Rojo and DJ’s unofficial B’day party.  After a while we went to Bottle Tree.

Bottle Tree was jumping as there were scooter people for all over the region because of Vintage Day’s at Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum. There was a jackass grrl from "planet way out there" who caused a friend of ours to get punched.  AD was an ass, as usual.  We ended up closing up the upside down Plaza. Ryan had to leave his scooter locked to a hand rail because he broke a shifter cable.

 A bunch of us ended at Will and Steve’s place.  We stayed up talking until 6 am.  Ryan and Will made breakfast at about 9 ish.  Fun and Yum!

After breakfast,  Ryan and I rode to Magic City Scooters to get a shifter cable.  I hung with Big Will and "shop girl" for a couple of hours and then headed over to Bogart’s to test ride the Piaggio MP3 500.  The ride was great.  I was not expecting to like it that much.  Hanging at Bogart’s is like being at Disneyland.   Eileen put up with me hanging around until she got off work at 3:30.

We took the scenic route to Cantina! and had fish tacos.  Yum, the best fish tacos ever.   Then we hung out at la casa Gladys until it was time to meetup at Bourbon Street.  I was shocked at the dive but I was immediately impressed with the service.  When the Karaoke started up I started whining.  The place went from empty to full in a few minutes.  Soon I was having a blast along with the 8 scooterists at our table.  Much fun! 

Sunday morning was coffee at Crestwood Coffee Company.  There was a large showing of over a dozen scooters.  We rode up to 29 Dreams Motorcycle Resort.  What a nice ride on a great day to a fantastic place.  We ate and hung out along with about a hundred two and three wheel motorcycle enthusiasts.  The ride down the mountain was just a fun as going up.

We rode back to Crestwood Coffee Company and visited for a piece.  Then I headed back to Memphis on US 78.  Home, Sweet Home.

Big Will

Bottle Tree

Crestwood Coffee Company

I don’t have to see the surgeon again unless there is a problem.  I still have 3 month more of healing but I don’t need his care as I am doing well.  Good news, that.

I’m going to change the belt on Stacy’s Vespa GT 200L someday soon.  I thought I would post these pictures of the belt change I did on my Vespa GT 200L.  This is not a how-to, tutorial, or instruction manual.  I just am sharing my pictures I too while I did this procedure.  You should have this procedure done by a qualified Vespa Service Technician.

I wonder what is for desert?  Hmmm…

Click on image for a larger sized image.

A plugin for Pidgin, pidgin-audacious2.so,  was no longer working.   I tracked down where the developer, Yoshiki-san was uploading his revision at this link: http://freehg.org/u/honeyplanet/pidgin-audacious/

Ubuntu LaunchPad at:https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pidgin-audacious/+bug/217949 .

 Note: To make life easier do this first ~

sudo apt-get install automake autoconfig autogen pidgin-dev audacious-dev

I did an

autogen

./compile

make

sudo make install

and the new plugin, pidgin-audacious3.so works as advertised.

Thank you, Yoshiki-san.