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| I'm starting to believe that all the best cars in the world have already been built. The next generation of cars seem soul-less and boring, as well as ugly (a lot of cars this generation were already hideous - Acura TL, Pontiac Aztec, BMW 5-series just to name a few). I predict by 2020, most cars will either be hybrid electric or fully electric. While great for a daily driver such as a Honda Accord or Toyota Camry (basically, a point A to point B car), it completely eliminates anything fun on a sports car. A sports car should have a special sound, feel, and character. When you think of something like a Porsche 911, you think of its rear-engined character. It likes to snap-oversteer, it's fast, and it handles. It also has a distinct sound, thanks to the horizontally-opposed 6-cylinder engine. The Subaru Impreza WRX STI also has an extremely distinct sound, thanks to the boxer-4 engine. BMW inline-6 engines (particularly in the generation of M3 I own) also have a distinct sound. I can tell another E46 M3 coming from far away. While some may quote the Tesla as a "sports" electric car, I don't consider it a sports car. I consider it a concept demo or a marketing scheme. It doesn't have sound or character. It's nothing more than a gutted out Lotus Elise with the soul and character removed and a rehashed face. There's no sound from the high-revving inline-4 that should have been in the car. There's no feeling of adrenaline when pushed. Furthermore, going 120 mi/hr (the Tesla's max speed) isn't all that impressive (I've been there many times, in both my old and new car). Things don't start getting fun until you get to around 140 or so. I challenge any electric car in the next 10 years to hit 200 mi/hr. With an electric motor, you can't really have a manual transmission either. Half of my fun comes from rowing my own gears. Electric motors in a lot of future concepts (including one BMW concept) are placed at the wheels, meaning no transmission. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I still want at least a high-tech clean diesel in anything marketed as a "performance car." This just gives me reason to hang onto the M3 as long as possible. It may be the last true car I own that has character.
Oh yeah, is it bad that I kept up with my friend's SMG M3 (the one with the electrohydraulic clutch that shifts in 100 milliseconds) during a launch?
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| Happy Thanksgiving!!
Is it bad that I've done this before?:
I was actually going 5 mi/hr faster than this when I did my speed run. I've also done formation driving at 120 mi/hr with 2 other M3s, a turbo Nissan 300ZX, and a pick-up that couldn't keep up. I've also drifted the M3 at 90 mi/hr...
Oh yeah, I ran the Holmdel Park running course twice consecutively today. It was just about 7 miles. It's amazing how much altitude changes running. I was ready to run a third time, but decided not to keep the parents waiting. I wasn't even phased by running 7 miles up and down hills. At USAFA, I'd be pretty tired.
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| This is all I want for my birthday this year: One single good day between now and graduation. I haven't had one since May. I don't care about anything else. Great, I'm 21, so what? That doesn't matter if I continue to have shitty days until I graduate. | | |
| I've had a solid week from hell ever since last Tuesday:
Tuesday 3 November 2009: Spotter dropped 245lbs. on me when I was starting my second set out of five. I was bleeding everywhere, but I guess I'm pretty lucky that none of my teeth got knocked out and I didn't break my nose. I'm even more lucky that I wasn't outright killed.
Wednesday 4 November 2009: Went to court in service uniform and ended up paying $245 for my speeding ticket and getting 3 points on my license. It was better than the original $255 and 6 points, I guess. I came back to USAFA and finished the workout that I couldn't finish on Tuesday, due to the incident. I then became nauseous and couldn't really eat dinner. I spent about 3-4 hours that night with chills and in bed.
Thursday 5 November 2009: I spent 5 hours debugging hardware on my robot, only to find out that the microcontroller circuit board they issued me had a broken trace leading to pin 39. I found out when I connected pin 39 of the board to the oscilloscope, only to see noise and voltage floating between 0V and 5V. I ran 7.2 miles on the treadmill (860+ calories burned) after school, only to have a repeat episode of nausea that night.
Sunday 8 November 2009: I wake up with a stomach ache and ended up sharting myself... I'm dead serious. This happened. I had to discard a pair of underwear. I then proceed to the bathroom, where I find out that my digestive system was pretty much in discard mode... Didn't really have much of an appetite all day.
Monday 9 November 2009 (today): I wake up with the same stomach problems, minus sharting. I'm going to go to the clinic tomorrow if this continues to be the trend. I've visibly lost weight from this last week. I'm starting to get concerned. I'm just hoping it's not an intestinal parasite.
Please let this shit end... | | |
| I made the brilliant mistake of dropping 245lbs. on myself while benching today. I busted up my lip pretty badly. There was so much bleeding, haha. The guy spotting me let go of the weight a little too quickly. I caught it on the way down and slowed it enough to not crack my skull in half. | | |
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