This image was borrowed.

Every Year I see people and how they react to Remembrance day. I watch a local sawmill that doesn’t even pause or take time off to remember what there is to remember. People go on not remembering our veterans or the sacrifices they made.

Why is it important to me? I am a vet. I didn’t really see carnage, I didn’t do anything except be ready for the war that was expected. I served during the cold war. The only war that I know that kept us in fear of total nuclear annihilation for 45 years. For 5 years of that I served in the Canadian Navy. I was proud of my country, proud of my flag.  I am proud of the men and women that have served in all countries.

I am disabled but that didn’t happen during a war. What all the men and women that served during the same time as did, is train and train in case we needed to fight. We did lots of rescue work in the Pacific, even a major drug bust. But we didn’t see action, but we were ready.

Take one minute at 11:00 am on November 11 to remember the ones that died, the ones that survived and like me the ones that were ready to die for our countries.

Here is the story behind the poppies

http://www.greatwar.co.uk/article/remembrance-poppy.htm

I wanted to tell you about a remarkable young woman who inspired me to get working on my 55. I ended up watching all her videos. Thanks Hannah I hope you make it back to do more videos. And thanks to her teacher which I assume is her dad.

I knew I would have to do some sandblasting and I did a search on youtube and found Hannah’s Bug.  A series of videos about a young woman restoring a bug. The first one I watched was about just that.

I liked her video and that got me going so I went online to find the best price on a sandblaster. I found one at my favourite shop KMSTOOLS.  The price was so low that it must have been a mistake.

So I made the trip in bought that last month. Two days after I bought the price jumped up $60 bucks. I guess someone figured out that the price was too low.  Didn’t matter KMS honoured the advertised price and a week later I had it home. Right aways I hooked up my thousand year old 2 horse compressor hooked it all up and actually managed to sandblast one square inch.

I knew that the little compressor wouldn’t be enough to power the sandblaster but it didn’t stop me from trying.

I knew I would need a bigger compressor but I didn’t have the money then money showed up. Today I picked up the compressor, tomorrow I will put gas and oil in it and fire it up and try to do some sandblasting. Due to my injuries I will only last about an hour, so I will make sure the work is all laid out, to be more efficient.

Painful but doable. It is what it is.

I am a little behind schedule. The winter storms will be coming later this week and snow will become a problem. I had to get my blasting done so I could get my donor truck inside for disassemble.

Ignore the long haired kid I am sure he will grow up to be a politician.

Well winter is here we hit -23 c the night before last and -19c last night. It is in the minus whether you are in Fahrenheit or not.

I am out there chopping wood and bringing it in.  Yup I know I am disabled and feel I feel it every swing and really feel it as I push that wheel barrow with 900 lbs of wood up hill into the house. I aint looking for sympathy. I just do what I need to do to survive.

Soon that woods is gonna run out maybe before I get new wood in. I have a promise of a logging truck load to come Dec 1. I will be happy if that is true. It means I wont die in my house freezing to death. The cold part of winter is not here yet.

I am excited about getting a compressor it will be here tomorrow. The Canadian government sent me some money and the Alberta government sent me a small check for climate change. Who knew I would get paid for us destroying the planet.

So I checked online at KMS tools to see if they had the compressor I have been drooling over for a while. It said in stock and on sale. I took the money I got from the governments and all the change I throw into a jar for buying tools, and I make the two hour journey to buy the compressor.

It is gas powered which I need cause I am on solar. I will push enough air to do a little sandblasting which I need. And even fill up the flat tires I have out here which I also need.

So when I get to the tool place someone else had already bought it. The salesman there promises that he will get me another and send it by courier to a town a little closer to me. So I plunk down my cash and make the deal.

I got a call later in the week that didn’t happen. The salesman told me that the cute girl at the store is going home to see her Dad on Sunday meaning tomorrow. So tomorrow if the old van starts, I don’t get hit by lightning, or a winter blizzard hits, or any other major calamity happens, I will have a compressor. Of course I have to lift the thing into and out of my van and bring it in to the warm part of the house, so I can  put oil and gas in it.

Hopefully if I can get a break in the weather, I can blast my truck cab.

Would have been nice to do this in the summer, I am not sure if the sand, or glass will flow in theses cold temperatures. I guess I will find out.

Now I am putting change in the jar for that MillerMatic 211. In another eight months I will have that too.

watch what  happens when Rednecks do rock

UPDATE: I HAVE REVERTED BACK TO USING THE YUKON FRAME WHEN I FOUND OUT iI CAN MAKE THAT VORTEC COMPUTERLESS

Well another trade happened. I traded some stuff left behind by a farmer a hundred years ago on my little acreage for a 1990 Chevy K ext cab 4×4 with a blown motor and tranny. Same tranny   that I had in the original donor the safari van. (no I didnt mean a transgender no disrespect meant), I am talking about a non computerised 700r4 transmission, in the 1992 Safari already slated for a donor for the 55 project. The problem with the Safari transmission was it had a long tailshaft. The pickup had the right one and a transfer case that didnt spin all the time like in the Yukon Frame I had got with my 55 when I made the trade. Best part no fookin computers. And me a computer tech for the last 30.

So I was set , the new frame had a motor, transmission no problem right. Just one little problem the frame was way too long.  If I did my research right about 25 inches had to be removed. So off to the internet. I find two good examples of frame shortening. One was Stacey David, a  tv personality and rodder Host of Gearz. I used to watch him when I had satellite tv. Which I don’t have anymore. I was happy to see he had a few short episodes on u tube. And one below had a frame shortening how to that was similar to one I had already found on the internet.

One uses fishplate and the other uses box plate to strengthen the weld. I plan to use both, since I already know I am gonna drive it like I stole it. I aim to misbehave.

Thanks to Brian at Rattletrap Productions for allowing me to use the following video.

Check this out too
Shortening a frame from 67-72chevytruck.com.

Some pics of my donor truck. It came with free firewood, deer antlers, some old work boots and enough mouse shit to fill a pool. As soon as I finish the sandblasting  I will start the disassembly.

I would like to also thank scottysdetailing on you tube for his videos on disassembling a similar truck.

Will all this be too much for a disabled man to do. As long as I believe I can, I can.