Austin Part 3

So as of Monday, September 20 I'll have been here a full month. That's about 3 weeks longer than I'd planned.

For the most part I laze around playing video games because my bike hasn't been in running condition and my hosts both work. But we hang out, they took me tubing, I've been enjoying their pool, and other random stuff that happens when you hang around.

Here is a picture of a place I went while there was a thing happening:



Lucky Lounge is a pretty cool bar and Flush is an alright band. Check them out at FlushMusic.com but they definitely do sound better live.

I put my new radiator cap on my bike and filled it with coolant. Hooray! All fixed right? Life is grand. My funds are slightly below where I'd like them to be so I posted some ads on Craigslist for random IT work now that I can move around again.

I get a call later that day to fix some software issues with a laptop. I ride over to their place and it turns out my radiator cap is still leaking. I'm 100% sure now that that my coolant isn't circulating based on the fact that the level in the overflow tank hasn't changed a bit since Virginia.

Turns out I was fixing the laptop of an incredibly cool person. I went to do 40 minutes of IT work, and ended up staying there chatting for 3 hours. They're into bikes too and they said they'd help try and fix mine. They also let me ride their Nighthawk 250 around the block, and gave me a book to borrow. Here's to new friends!

While there I get called in to a Jamba Juice to run a software update on one of their machines. Now the way that works is I call Jamba Juice's own tech support line, get access to their server, download the software update onto a thumb drive, and then bring it over to the terminal and run the update. Turns out Jamba Juice's tech support wanted to leave work early so after waiting around and enjoying a complimentary smoothie, I ended up not being able to work and left. Only this time I was working through a consulting company so everything is on the books and I got paid anyway.

Did I just make money for meeting some awesome people and drinking a free smoothie? Yes I did.

"I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE LIFE! Sing it with me now!"

It's now about a week since I wrote the above and yesterday I performed my first cooling system drain, clean, and refill. I'm slowly acquiring mechanical know-how!

Today I rode my bike to a Honda service place and on the way it leaked coolant so I left it there and hopefully it'll be a relatively affordable fix.

Now I need your help, dear readers. I'm entering a helmet skin design contest but each entrant only can enter one design. The winner's design gets put into production, and the winner get's a free one. So I want you to tell me which design to go with:



or



Ah, the ages old battle of turtle vs. snake-like-thing-with-teeth boils over into the arena of protective motorcycle gear...

Yeah I kind of screwed up on the back of that turtle shell one but keep in mind that what they actually end up producing is just based on the winner's design and a professional artist tweaks it to bring out what we've intended so that turtle shell one will look more like an actual turtle shell if it wins.

So click that comment button and let me know which one you like more! Please?

Thanks a million, nay, a BILLION!