I need some help, and I think David will be the one with the most knowledge and experience on this one. We're going to give our big dog away. Several reasons for that but I won't bore you with the details. The problems are #1-He's a great dog, #2- I'm a softie. I rode out to the pound this morning to talk with the lady who runs it but she wasn't there. It looked like the place was overcrowded and the thought of sending him there kills me. So David, how do you do it?

JonMichael is supposed to be taking a nap right now but he won't go to sleep. I just went in to give him the usual threats but this time I thought I had a little extra leverage. We're having a bonfire on the beach tonight and Audra was going to bring the kids out for a little while. I thought if I held that against him that he'd straighten right up.

"Do you want to go to the beach tonight?"

"No sir."

"Oh, uh, well that's good because you're not going if you don't take a nap."

I went to the dentist this morning for a cleaning, always a good time. The lady only asked me a question while shoving her fingers in my mouth one time, and that's pretty good for her. I'm serious about brushing, not so serious about flossing. Everytime I get my teeth cleaned I always make up my mind to start flossing. This time, I'm really going to try to make it past a week.

We're not trading spaces, we're making it, or at least giving the illusion that we are anyway. The main room that we do our student worship services in has been in desparate need of remodeling since I got here. We tried moving stuff around and changing the layout, adding some stuff, little things like that. No matter what we did it just looked like a cobbled together youth room. The kids never seemed to mind but it was driving me crazy. Finally I realized we weren't getting the look we wanted because we weren't thinking big enough. We had to get outside the box, almost literally.

Our room is on the top floor of the church and has one of those dropped ceilings with the tiles. Pretty standard. I got the idea that I wanted to rip that thing out and leave the rafters and ventilation exposed. I spoke with different people to figure out what all we needed and last Thursday since the kids were on spring break I took 4 guys and we ripped that baby out. I always forget to take before pictures but it made the room look huge!

The walls ended just above the tiles so now I've got builders coming in to finish the wall up to the ceiling to keep the sound in. I've also got people who will trim up the ventilation and make it look nice as well as an electricion who will install bucket lighting and more power outlets around the room. Then come the people who will spray in black acoustic insulation. After that we paint, and add some other finishing touches and she'll be done. It's a lot of work but we're excited and even with everything unfinished it looks a whole lot better than it did.

My bro is home from Iraq for 2 weeks so we all met up at my parent's house this weekend. I took Sunday off so we could go to church with the family, it was great. I know I'm biased, but my dad is such a good worship leader. It's been neat to watch him change and grow in what he does. When we left GA he was pretty traditional because he had to be. Almost immediately when we got to FL he started moving in a different direction and hasn't looked back.

My brother is doing great. He takes command of a new company when he gets back, one which is in pretty bad shape at the time being because of poor leadership. It's a medical company that operates a clinic but he says there is a larger hospital on their base that gets all the business so the guys are extremely bored, which leads to trouble. He'll get them whipped into shape, I have no doubts about that, and apparantly neither do his superiors because they gave this job to him because he gets results.

His tour is supposed to end in late July but he says they all think they'll be there till at least November. He will get a month off when he returns so right now he is making plans to take an epic trip. Depending on what month it is and what the weather's doing, he'll either travel through Chile or Peru. Peru is his destination of choice, hiking Machu Picchu while he's there.

I just pulled an all-nighter to get a paper done for my philosophy class. Now I feel somewhat sick to my stomach, my head feels disconnected from my body, and I just feel yucky all over. Yep, just like the good old days.

Here on the Gulf Coast of FL our offroading opportunities are pretty much limited to mud. We don't have the rocks or steep trails and such that you guys have further north. This weekend we went to Crestview to have a birthday party for JonMichael with our family. My bro-in-law recently got a Cherokee, lifted it and put 31's under it. I hadn't had the opportunity to ride in it until this weekend and we had a blast. There is a clay pit just a minute down the road from them and he took me out there. It wasn't exactly extreme wheeling but we did get to do some climbing and got in some pretty steep situations. He let me drive around and I was hooked. His swaybars are still connected so it couldn't flex that well and at one point when I was coming off a ledge the right front and left rear were in the air and we were doing a little slow motion teeter-totter thing. It was only a few inches but it was a pretty crazy feeling!

I've never really been too crazy about mudding, I mean it can be fun but a lot of times it just comes down to who's got the biggest tires because they're the one's making the ruts that everyone else gets stuck in. But now mudding seems almost boring.

JM has gotten all into Dora the Explorer lately. I actually think it's a good little show, and it was pretty impressive when he walked into Jolenn's room recently and said to her "Hola!". He loves to help Audra in the kitchen and one thing they have been making lately is monkey bread. No big surprise that it's no longer monkey bread in our house, it's Boots Bread!

Yes folks, this is the 684th post on The Drivetrain!

I went to the beach today for the first time this year and it was great. The kids had the day off from school so we met several of them and played some pretty nice volleyball. I just walked in to the office a little while ago in my board shorts with sand all over my feet and no one thought anything of it, it was nothing out of the ordinary. I love living here.

Friday was #5 for us. The kids were gone to the in-laws, it was to be a glorious day of relaxation followed up with a hot date that night. The day went fine, we just lounged around watching movies and finishing up Season 3 of 24, which was fantastic. So we head out that evening for dinner and a movie. Get settled in at the restaurant, order our food, take a bite of my roll and the phone rings. We almost didn't answer it but it was a friend and we figured she was calling to wish us a happy anniversary.

Nope, that wasn't it. She was hysterical because her dad was being taken to the ER. We cancelled our order and tried to pay for the rolls and soup but they told us to get to the hospital and not worry about paying, so kudos to the O'Charley's people. We take off and a couple of minutes later our friend calls, completely calm now, and says he hasn't even left St. Joe yet, which is about a half hour away by ambulance. I grab a chalupa from Taco Bell and we head to the ER to wait. We waited for all the family to get there and get them settled in to the waiting room. By the time we got away we just barely missed the start time for our movie.

So let's recap our hot anniversary date. Get to restaurant, get call, leave (food) way too early, play valet parking man for family at ER, miss movie, go home. Next time, we'll call back after we eat.

Why? Because Jeepers are the coolest guys in the world, that's why.

I need to beef up my rear suspension a little since a couple of guys plus coolers and camping gear nearly puts my flares on the tires. My bro-in-law lifted his XJ as soon as he got it so he gave me his stock rear leafs which are still in great shape. I'll take them apart and add the top 2 leaves to mine, which will not only make it stronger, but I'll get between 1-2" of lift out of it. Since it's the same spring rate it'll have a pretty decent ride as well.

My Cherokee sits perfectly level right now and I don't want the rear to be much higher than the front so I had to do some thinking. I knew that I could install the coils from a V8 powered Grand Cherokee and it would ride about like stock but would also give me between 1-1.5" lift. I didn't know much about those springs so I got on the GC forum at Jeeps Unlimited to ask a few questions about them. I just wanted to get some info so that I could start looking online and at junkyards. Then out of nowhere this guy sends me a private message saying he was about to lift his ZJ and that I could have his stock springs for free if I would pay the shipping! I figured it was too good to be true, but sure enough he shipped them out today!

Thanks to the kindness of family and a new friend from New Jersey, once I add my budget boost of 2" spacers and 1.5" shackle I'll have a really nice riding lift of about 3.5" for only the cost of the boost. I'll still have to address driveline angles, steering, and shocks, but in the end I'll still be way ahead.

I blasted 13 of the rodents this morning. A friend took me on his boat out to a swampy lake and we trolled along a small creek, popping squirrels left and right. They would drop from the tree and we'd pull up to shore and go retrieve them. Great fun, I highly recommend it. Anyone coming to dinner Tuesday night? Cause I can already tell you what's on the menu...

Looky looky under the pic in my sidebar...almost at 20,000 hits! A free burrito to the lucky visitor!

(Certain rules and regs apply, you aren't allowed to sue me, void where prohibited.)

we have [not] crossed the rubicon...

...but our ankles are a little wet.

I wonder who will remember where this came from and what it might mean.