Miata Mailing List: January 1999, Message #93

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        Miataphyles:

        'Hope you all had a great New Year's Eve. 

        My bride and I gave up going out on amateur night years ago so, 
we just went to the local mom'n'pop video store to rent a coupla movies 
[naturally, one I got I had seen before] and then on to the Orapax [our 
favorite Greek pizza joint] to get a pie to go. It was closed for the 
freakin' holiday. 

        Then we called another pizza joint [which turned out to be more 
of a crummy bar over by one of the Navy bases] that we figured could have 
a pizza ready by about the time we drove across town on our way home. 
When we got there, we discovered that they had written the order down 
dutifully enough but had forgotten to cook it. We were obliged to sidle 
up to the bar, have a beer, and listen to a bunch of drunken sailors and 
rednecks deliver to each other at full volume their expletive-ridden 
philosophies on 1998's social situation and political peccadilloes. 

        Now, I don't mean to imply there's anything particularly 
nefarious about being a drunken sailor. I used to be one myself. But, I 
had to give up sailoring. I'll leave it to the reader to infer his or her 
own relative pejoration of the term, "redneck."

        Anyway, when we got home, we discovered the pizza we'd escaped 
with had no cheese on it. Apparently the "Breakwater Lounge" doesn't 
regard cheese as one of the basic pizza ingredients. In their defense, 
however, it's only fair to mention that we hadn't actually thought to 
specifically *order* cheese. On the other hand, we hadn't specifically 
ordered the jumbo can of Hunt's crushed tomatoes that had been dumped on 
it, either.

        So, we sprinkled it with the graded contents of various baggies 
found in the bottom of the fridge's lunch meat'n'cheese bin and put it in 
our oven -- discovering, as we did, that the top heating element was no 
longer functional. 

        Debbie refused to eat any of result. I munched a coupla pieces 
then repaired to the couch as the remainder had coagulated too solidly to 
hazard a third. The remainder is now out in the garage. I'm going to take 
it back to the "Breakwater" next week and have them replace the two 
missing pieces. Then I'll replace the toy tire in MisteRedd's trunk with 
it as the pizza, even though it will take up less room, is much stronger.

        The other movie I got was "The Wrong Arm of the Law," an early 
British comedy with a young Peter Sellers who had not quite gained his 
stride when he made it. I saw several scenes of it. The movie I had seen 
before is called "Therese and Isabelle" for which I had high hopes for 
saving the evening. It turned out, however, that it was heavy on dialog 
and philosophical symbolism and far too light on redeeming social value. 
No wonder I didn't remember it.

        I'm afraid my celebration of the advent of 1999 concluded on the 
couch before eleven o'clock of 1998 but I, nonetheless, consider the new 
year quite rung in. 

        And, I'm *certainly* glad the old one has been rung out.

        Keep the Revs up!
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        Phredd  ~  Klassic Red 'XCIII-A  ~  "MisteRedd"

        God's Miata is Red!



        PS:  This new year's message would have had much greater Miata 
Content if it hadn't been for Spruille's Heating and Air Conditioning 
Service. 

        A coupla weeks ago, after we discovered we have a termite 
problem, the termite company emerged from underneath the house and asked 
if we still used the original furnace. After assuring them we did, they 
informed us that they thought we must've had a new system installed in 
the attic or something because most of the ductwork was disconnected and 
lying on the ground.

        Now comes Mr. Spruille who tells us that *all* the ductwork needs 
to be replaced. Mr. Spruille drives the only Maserati utility truck I've 
ever seen.

        The day after xmas, Mr. Spruille's crew comes by and drops about 
60 cubic yards of duct work and various insulatory materials in our 
driveway outside Door #2, which protects [and now entraps] MisteRedd. 

        They crawled around under the house cussin' and spittin' for 
about half a day and then announced they'd be back around Monday "to hang 
that shit."

        That's why we spent our travelling portion of New Year's Eve in 
my bride's POS Sable instead of my Miata.