GTAMADDOG

Car insurance sorted for another year. Had to pay a little bit more than I was quoted online by other companies as my current insurer offers me a lot more cover than anyone else. Still managed to get £20 off their original renewal price though and it's half what I paid this time last year. Also going to look at/test drive the MK7 Golf today as well.

Early morning wake-up call from my sister saying the battery on her car is dead. Now I need to go to her house and sort it out while it's bucketing it down with rain. Does she really need to be anywhere on New Years Eve, I know she isn't going to work. I could still be tucked up in my warm bed enjoying a lie-in on one of my last days off work for a while.

I love how this band makes any day feel like a Summers day, no matter what the message of the song is.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKapVmknD74

Currently looking after Billy and Bow, my sister's two kittens. http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x104/GTAMADDOG/IMG_0301_zps00876501.jpg http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x104/GTAMADDOG/IMG_0305_zps810bb1bc.jpg No, the shoes aren't mine. Photos were taken on my phone.

He has offered me it and I said I would if I could, but I've got no-where to keep it. There are already four cars at my house and three at my mums house (four including the BMW). I'd probably have it as a project and bring it back to a really good condition standard car, although I'd probably replace the 8v engine with a 16v engine from another car. I'd ideally need a garage to keep it in while I fix it up, but there's no room in the garage at my house. It may only be a MK3, but I'm a sentimental person and I'd love to keep it purely for sentimental reasons.

Step-dad put a deposit down on a BMW 330D M-Sport touring yesterday. Car's got full BMW service history which they didn't mention in the advert which was a nice surprise. Needs a bit of a clean up to get it up to my standards, but I don't know if it would be worth doing as the MK3 Golf he's got at the moment is basically a bin, so I'd be surprised if the BMW isn't like it after a week. Engine seems healthy and suspension is quiet, don't know how long that will last. No rust on the wheel arches, 4 matching Michelin Pilot Sport 3's. First job is to remove the swirl flaps. Just means that the poor old Golf has to go now. Won't be scrapped, but we won't see 200,000 miles in it like we wanted to. It'll be the first time in many years when there isn't a Golf GTI owned by at least one member of my family so that's an end of an era really.

:oook: 24/03/08. Back in the day. Good times.

Well it was yesterday, but I got to see a lot of my family and Christmas dinner was awesome and I've still got a week left to do absolutely nothing.. apart from getting to see some of my friends tomorrow for our pub-catchup. Might be going to look at a 330D some time over the weekend as well, although it's not for me, it's for my step-dad. At least it'll give me a chance to have a good look around one without feeling under any pressure. He's going for a touring, I'd be looking at a saloon or coupe, but finding a decent mileage coupe with manual transmission isn't as easy as I thought.

Looks like they're going all out.. only a few months to go :excited: :panic:

What I'd consider the main presents: A new pair of Airwalk shoes. Some car cleaning kit (Gtechniq P1, yeah!) A new jacket A new camera bag so I can now carry both cameras and all associated camera gear rather than having to choose which camera I want to take and leaving the other behind. Also got so many pairs of socks I think I may have enough to be able to wear a new pair for every day of the month for two months :p

I may give it a go. I got some bottles of ale from my Secret Santa at work despite me saying I don't really drink alcohol, so I'll give them all a try. Won't be giving them away anyway :p Merry Christmas everyone.

I made a drug-dealer 3-Series. http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x104/GTAMADDOG/bmw1_zpsa60ee8dc.jpg http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x104/GTAMADDOG/bmw2_zps136c36f6.jpg On reflection it needs fake angel headlights with some tacky LED running lights mounted somewhere near to the bottom of the bumper. It needs some fake, tatty MV2s badly painted in matt black and the windows rolled down about 2 inches with a constant stream of reggae music on full blast and 'cigarette' smoke coming out. Oh, and I almost forgot, some M badges littered all over the place just to try and trick people in to thinking it might just be an M3 when it's actually a 318i.

The car insurance shake-up in the UK has meant that insurance for me on a BMW 330D has halved since I ran the quote last week. However, insurance for my car hasn't dropped much and quotes for me on a Fabia vRS are similar. At least it's all going the right way. Well under £1000 for the 330D and Fabia, under £500 for the 306. Thanks for the Christmas present insurance companies.

What I meant was that some people think it has taken some small exterior styling ideas from the A6, not that it compares to an A6.

The Leon doesn't look too bad, in my personal opinion it's pretty much level with the Golf in terms of how I view styling. Can't put my finger on why, but there's something about both of them which just doesn't make them look entirely right. I'll get stick for it, but I prefer the new Octavia out of all three, or as it's otherwise known in some circles - a slightly re-styled Audi A6. However, my mum doesn't like them, she's completely Golf crazy. If I was ballsy enough I'd get a new Octavia for myself :p

I find it laughable how much nicer the MK6 Golf dashboard looks when you've got a touch-screen radio, climate control and steering wheel controls. Couldn't bare to spec one without any of it, although saying that I couldn't bare to spec one to buy at all now that the MK7 release is drawing close :p Spec'd a Golf MK7 GT TDI 150 for my mum yesterday. She wants one with a panoramic sunroof. So that'll be her next car. Not completely sold on the looks of the MK7, but I'm sure I'll get used to it.

Survived the apocalypse. Work's Christmas dinner was pretty good. No more work until 2013. Yeah!

More Agalloch. Love how this band has made so many songs that just seem to click with me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ave0TvPi0DI

If you're that worried about the ramps giving way then put some axle stands under the car, spare wheel under a sill, whatever else. If the ramps are rated for 2 tonnes then they should take the weight of a 700KG Mini easily. If they don't you've either bought some dodgy cheap brand or you've seriously mistreated them. Of course if you want to use wooden home-made ramps and feel like doing a bit of DIY to make your own then that's fair enough. I'd go for option A most definitely. I just borrow my dad's metal ramps, jack and axle stands. All rated for 2 tonnes. They've supported my car, the Skoda, the Scenic, the Golf and my nan's Omega on numerous different occasions and they still look the same as they did when they were bought.

So much atmosphere. Love it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVwJAvlSXQM

Bit of a bump, but I decided to give this a try as it's Free-to-Play on Steam. I'm not very good at it, but I find it hilarious. I've been playing it with mistermojo and it's such a laugh. I do like trying to see what I can get the Sunderer truck to do, to the dismay of mistermojo. I managed to get it up a steep slope and on to a foot-bridge earlier which was quite funny. I also then proceeded to try and drive it through a building in a base and ended up getting it stuck under a low roof. I was in stitches. Here's a photo of said truck on bridge: http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x104/GTAMADDOG/2012-12-11_00001.jpg I really don't take it too seriously, but it's about time I found a game I didn't take seriously for a change :p

My sister's boyfriend bought an A3 1.6 temporarily. I think it had some Audi 12-Spoke replica (??) wheels on it which looked stupidly big for the car :p I liked it... to begin with. Unfortunately it put me off buying a car from the Welsh valleys ever again as everything about the exchange of car/money felt dodgy. The airbag light was on so they took the car somewhere. Probably some dodgy back-alley garage innit bruv. Came back 10 minutes later with the light off. Later found out the car was a cut-and-shut job which they 'unfortunately' failed to tell my sister's boyfriend at the time of sale. Yours looks alright, I didn't realise they came with such vibrant interior colours :p

I often see a guy driving an orange Mini going to and from work. Looks hilarious. He's got it slammed on some wheels which look so small to me they look like they belong on a wheel-barrow or something :p Looks tidy, I like the spotlights.