Joiner's Musings

Rear quarter view driver's side Audi at cottage 2003 rear view of Audi Coupe  After a long winter sleep its time to get the Audi on the road. I managed to start it at least monthly through the winter just to keep it lubricated and the battery charged. For a 34 year old car it is in pretty good shape. Needless to say it was kept in a garage away from the salt and snow. 2005 photo of Audi Coupe GT On the list this year its to get it roadworthy, that is, safetied since much of the work to get it to that point has been done and to look into a new upholstery job for the front seats. The back seats are in okay shape having never really been used. I have the fabric which I ordered specially from Germany last year. A friend of mine knows somebody in New Glasgow that will do the job. Otherwise brakes were done last year and some tune up parts installed.

Belem Tower  I have tons photos of our trip and thought I would posts some unusual ones. The first is one of several balconies at Belem Tower. The tower is interesting but the tour of the interior is a little underwhelming. I guess I was expecting more of a museum than simply a spartan interior. However, the admission was free because we had our Lisboa pass. The mall area at night  The main mall, called Amorerias Mall is actually quite nice and reminded me of many North American malls with the wide variety of shops. While there we had one of our meals at the Block House restaurant and it was surprisingly good.  No, I didn't use this public urinal. I was not sure if it was functional or not but the prospect of being somewhat on display while urinating did not really appeal to me. Besides I did not see anyone else using it. Getting a head in life  Optical illusion? Getting a head in life. I looked at the man waiting for a bus and thought why is that he...

From Sao Jorge Castle  There are plenty of must-sees in Lisbon during the week we spent in that fine city. We managed to see quite a lot and I am pretty certain that we hit all the main touristy spots. We even managed to sample the food and thanks to www.tripadvisor.com we were able to find a few out of the way restaurants that we were glad we discovered. Sao Jorge Castle  I all, I took 2300 photos thanks to my recently acquired Panasonic G6 and older 14-45 lens. The camera was a joy to use, very light to carry and quite usable on the fly. I took three lens with me, my 45mm, my 40-150 and of course my 14-45. I ended up using the kit lens the most as the other two lens are not stabilized. My biggest challenge was selecting the right ISO setting for the interior shots, many of which are ISO 3200 and ISO 6400, though I tried to stay away from the much higher ISO settings. In the churches and museums you simply cannot use a flash. I shoot aperture priority and I like ha...

Belem Tower  A city that has always been on my list of places to see is Lisbon, Portugal. Now I know that a week is not a very long time to visit a city which is such a distance form our home in Canada but we managed to see just about everything we wanted to see during our brief stay. Monument to the Discoveries I look over 2300 photos but I thought I would post only a few photos which represent some of the iconic views / attractions of the city. The first two are of the monument and tower in Belem which in itself is worth a visit. We paid the extra to go to the top of the Monument to the Discoveries and enjoyed a spectacular view of the city. Jerome Chapel  Next is the Saint Jerome Monastery and chapel. The monastery side is now a natural history museum which really did not interest at all but the church / chapel was well worth seeing. Of course, I took dozens of photos. Parliament Building  The parliament building is impressive but too many steps up...

I can probably go faster using my son's WRX but alas it is in Victoria BC (with him, of course). Anyway I have been pounding out this blog for over a year now and have not quite found the right rhythm as for the type of post and how popular my posts are. It seems that clocks, cars, cameras and scenes of our family cottage get the most page hits but like anything else blogging is a voyage of discovery. Anyway help me get the the 10,000 page views and we'll see where we go from there. Maybe I will develop a theme of some sort; just don't know at this point. Like me on Facebook and check out my ads (hint; if you click on them I might get a penny or two).

Westinghouse Model 512 console radio with Seth Thomas Adamantine clock on top  I am not really sure that this radio, made in 1936 by Westinghouse Canada, is a model  512 but the radio chassis certainly is a 512. There is no doubt about that. What I have learned from other projects is that the radio chassis number does not always correspond to the model number as the chassis may have been used in a number of sets at the time. Otherwise the radio you see is original, the knobs, grill cloth radio chassis are all original. There is an inlay at the top sides of the radio which appears to original. If I stripped the radio I would have a hard time replicating the design. Bottom line, leave it alone. Trim piece with a few nicks So, do I strip it down? The advice that I have been given by expert re-finishers is that I look at repairing or reconditioning only those sections that need a little TLC, not the whole radio cabinet. The trim needs some work, that is clear. I think...

Front disks completed  Today I started the Coupe for the first time since last fall (2013). And do you know what! It started just fine and idled very nicely. I have got to get this thing safetied so that I can drive it this summer. These are some shots of the brake work, both front and rear. You have to realize that it has been 30 years since this work has been done on this car so this is quite an achievement. the car is now 32 years old! Rear brake work completed  Here is the front of the car. As you can see the paintwork is pretty good and if I have to do anything it would be to have some stone chip touch-ups done. I am anxious to get this thing  on the road and it is only a matter of time. Front view of Coupe GT  As you can see this is the engine compartment. A lot of tune-up parts have been replaced as you can see. Engine compartment of the 2.2 liter inline five  Here it sits in the garage most of the time. There she sits in the garag...