My 2006 Audi A3 has been leaking coolant for many months now. Usually it had been a slow leak, and I would need to top off the fluids about once a month. This is not standard – in most radiators the anti-freeze should stay level indefinitely.

My problem was that on long road trips, the coolant would disappear at a much higher rate. If I left from Boston at 10am, by the time I hit New Jersey around 3pm, the coolant indicator would be on and the coolant reservoir would be totally empty. This could be very dangerous and cause the engine to overheat, causing permanent damage and more importantly stranding me on the road. That would be a huge pain in the ass.

I’ve been reading around the interwebs and heard nightmare stories – A3′s apparently have a tendency to have leaky head gaskets and / or cracked cylinder heads. It is less than thrilling to have the engine of your 4-year old auto, just off warranty, dismantled and reassembled. The mechanic’s bill would make anyone cry. I was scared for my car.

Well, the resolution was a good one. This radiator was another casualty of I-93 and the shitty job the road crews did to clean up rock chips and asphalt while they resurfaced it last summer. While I worked at LogMeIn, I’d drive up 93, way too fast, on my way to work. For 2-3 months, the road was milled and shaved down, but not repaved. There was an unbelievable amount of debris on the road and my windshield was cracked in 3 places by flying rocks.

Turns out one of the flying rocks destroyed my radiator too.

The radiator. Obvious marks from dried / burnt coolant leaking for a long period of time. It was necessary to remove the radiator to see this damage. Two mechanics looked at it for estimates and couldn’t see the source of the leak.

Point of Impact. Probably a stone chip or bit of flying asphalt.

Wide open for easy access. The radiator is right behind the grille without any protection.

Another casualty of I-93 rocks. I’m going to need a new windshield soon.

We had a romantic date night. I made steaks with a special dry rub, along with Corn, Asparagus, and marinated green peppers, grape tomatoes, and garlic. The dry rub was made with Anecho Chile powder, Paprika, Kosher Salt, Pepper, Cumin, and garlic powder. Smoky and SPICY!

My Sexy Librarian

The Chef

Cutting carbs out of your diet really works. My good friend Beej Das has stopped eating carbs entirely and has lost about 30 pounds. He is my height. He looks great now. I’ve been trying to find ways to cut carbs out of my diet too, but damn I love me some good bread and pasta.

Check this out: replace your morning toast with a pita bread. It tastes good (my pita bread has high fructose corn syrup ! Yummy) and has a fraction of the carbs of two slices of toast.

My Morning Eggs

The Pita Bread makes a wonderful lid to help the eggs cook faster. Remember your Physics 103: Thermodynamics? The Pita heats up and keeps the hot air below it to cook the eggs. It also avoids folding the pita to fit it into a toaster oven.

A little butter, a little pepper, and voila! Delicious low(er) carb breakfast!

What a job this is

Amazing tunes from Devin the Dude, Snoop, and Andre 3000.

Just the MP3

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Devin the Dude – What a Job ft Snoop, Andre 3000.

I’m getting a streaming error “DRM Error” while trying to stream netflix. I watched an episode of Lost when I got home last night, soon after midnight, and it worked fine. What could be causing this error today?

Since everyone knows that Microsoft Silverlight is a piece of crap, it is the immediate culprit. I noticed that a Silverlight update was installed by Microsoft today or last night.

The Update number is KB982926 and it seems to have broken Netflix’s Streaming capabilities. It contained Silverlight Version 4.

FIX:
1. Go to Windows Update Settings and change it from “Automatically install updates” to “Download updates and ask me when to install” (otherwise silverlight will reinstall itself again)
2. Close your web browser
3. Go to Control Panel -> Uninstall a program -> Remove Silverlight
4. Go to netflix.com and start streaming a movie. It will prompt you to go to microsoft’s site and install Silverlight Version 3.
5. Restart your browser and it should work. Just worked for me on Windows 7.

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This printer is made entirely out of legos. It writes with a felt tip pen. Wow.