Blake Noble

I'm glad I could confuse someone. :AH-HA_wink: The '98 Firebird and '98 Firebird Formula were indistinguishable from one another. Basically, the Formula was just the Trans Am's drivetrain stuffed into the regular Firebird body. However, Formula buyers could buy almost any option they wanted from both the Firebird and Trans Am spec sheets. And thank ya. Are you sure about that? I always thought that the hood somewhat overlapping the nostrils gave them the impression of being blacked-out when they really weren't. I do know that some of the excess white you see in the second nighttime shot I posted was caused by the flash on my camera. Thank ya sir. Oh, I have some plans in store for my F4. I want to eventually buy a SLP Ram Air Firehawk hood, a Ram Air induction kit, a 2" lowering kit, a Flowmaster Cat Back exhaust, and eventually a set of Year One's 17" reproduction snowflake rims in black and a ProCharger Supercharger (if I don't swap the engine out). I'm also toying around with the idea of putting a T/A hatch on the car too.

Here are some better daytime photos:

What kind of Pokemon is this again?

The roadster is bootylicious. The four-wheeled equivalent to J-Lo in black spandex. I want to drive to my local Nissan dealer just so I can spank it.

Okay, you wanted 'em and you got 'em. Here are some pics from tonight after I removed the mismatched door badges. Next up is to have all four wheels matching, replace the white passenger side door handle with the black one I have (so that both handles match), and replace the driver's side window motor and the passenger side window switch. After that I'm buying a Flowmaster exhaust system and a Whisper airbox lid and looking for other performance bolt-ons I can pick up for my Firebird. I had a good friend help me out on the door lock keys so I'm back in business there. Better photos are on the way after I smooth out the two other problems with my exterior.

Do you want to know what I see in GM's future? Me not being one of their customers. Logic says that GM will be Chevrolet, BPG, and Cadillac. But reality is playing "For Whom The Bell Tolls" for GM.

Cadillac sucks, GM sucks, farethewell.

There will never be another Firebird, thus there will never be another car from GM I would buy. Not even the Camaro. As for another car to compliment/supplement it? The Mustang is the natural choice and while I would be happy owning one and driving one, a part of me would be slightly pissed off buying one.

I like it and I think Chrysler deserves praise for making the new Grand Cherokee the best yet.

Ok, here are a few examples of fixed headlights on a Firebird that were done correctly: There is a clear difference.

The Beemer sounds like the option I would take.

Or I'm going to murder this asshole: http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3115238

Pics are coming tomorrow for sure guys.

There isn't enough movie butter popcorn in the world to keep me fed while watching this drama unfold. It's time to let GM's chickens come home to roost. It's been such a long time coming and there isn't a thing that anyone outside of GM can do to stop it. There's only one thing we can do: sit back and chant, "I told you so."

I got another dash vent today. Apparently, the way to take one out is to pop off the outer ring then pop the inner assembly out using the mounting tabs and a flathead screwdriver. I also have a cigarette lighter now and my Pioneer receiver is up and running quite nicely. I'm also broke. There isn't any cash left to burn through to spend on the car, so some things are going to have to wait until next week when my next paycheck rolls around. But so far, everything is shaping up quite nice.

What makes the center stack unique is the red backlighting, stolen from a few junkyard Grand Ams.

Although I adore the bitter and sarcastic tone used in the article, it offers nothing in the way of providing any factual information on the new Camaro. Does he make any mention of any driving impressions that he had, such as the way the car handles, accelerates, and brakes? Nope. Nowhere to be found. This particular wad of $h! trying to be passed off as journalism is exactly what I would expect from some thirteen year-old boy who decided that, one day out of the grayest, most overcast sky imaginable, he wanted to write an article on a car that he had only seen in a few photos on the Almighty Internet and attempt to bash it with a few poorly strung together similies and a little red wagon full of broken twigs and pebbles. At least when someone like Jeremy Clarkson rants about a car he at least tells you about some of the specifications and what it's like to drive it. Magic 8 Ball says: Try again Mister Mark Moron, you bloated, crack-addicted journalist you.

I actually tried the pocket knife approach today. Long story short, the blade broke.

Hear that good buddy? It's the song that was playing in my head for two months straight. "Eastbound and down, loaded up and truckin' ..."

I wish I had a photo of this brilliant piece of retarded GM engineering, but the mounting tabs are on the backside of the vent. I will try your idea though Camino, it sounds like the best course of action.

Thanks everyone. No photos yet. The weather hasn't been that great in my neck of the woods and I've been getting off of work at 10. I've fixed a lot of problems with my car today. The instrument panel lighting and taillights are finally functional: the only thing stopping them from actually working was a missing fuse (thanks to the fuse panel cover I got for free out of a junkyard today, I finally know where all of my fuses go). The headlight switch knob (another freebie) is also back on my car, so now I don't have to use the key ring slot on my ignition key to turn them on. Tomorrow, I'm going to plunder through another junkyard again for my ashtray, ashtray cover, window switch, and a missing center stack vent. Speaking of that center stack vent, how can I get one out without it crumbling between my fingers? I pulled one from the driver's side IP cluster cover in the junkyard today but it's too large to fit. I'm also thinking about a new screenname in celebration of my car ...

I'm straddling the fence on the Terrain. I want to like it, in fact I almost like it ... but there's something that's holding me back from liking it. I can't quite put my finger on it. Is it the grille? Could be. I didn't like the dumpy smile the Yukon wore on its face when it first debuted and I still don't care for it now. Is it busy, ten-tons of junk it wears on its ass? Again, that could be the problem. There isn't any detail on the backside of this trucklet that I find particularly in good taste. If GM was going for "polarizing" then mission accomplished. I just can't make heads or tails of it.

The Sonoma is nothing but a memory now. This morning, I traded it and four-hundred dollars to a 1998 Pontiac Firebird with 141,000 miles, t-tops, and (god help me) an automatic trans in white. Oddly enough, I swore up and down that I would never own another white car when I had the Sonoma, but here I am. This Firebird isn't perfect either. It does have its faults. The instrument cluster/center stack lighting has went dead; the taillights have went dead (but I still have brake lights); the foglights have went dead; the power window switches are, of course, dead; I don't have door keys; the headlight motor makes quite a frightening sound after the lights are retracted; I have no headlight knob; the security system has been tripped because the car has been broken into twice. Although my car has the 500-watt Monsoon sound system, I bought the car with a tape deck out of a '96 Chevy Lumina (I bought a Pioneer stereo receiver two nights previous to getting my Firebird, strangely); the steering-wheel mounted radio controls don't work ... or at least didn't work with the Lumina tape deck; I have a driver's side door off of a Trans Am because the moron who owned my poor car before me backed the car up and the door hit a telephone pole (but the color does match; it's just that one side reads "Trans Am" and the other reads "Firebird"); I have no ashtray or ashtray cover. I'm certain there might be one or two wiring issues as well. But the drivetrain is just flawless. Out of the dozen F-Bodies I've driven over the past few months, this one has the best kick, the most git-up-n-go left. The transmission shifts smooth and the engine doesn't hesitate to put down what its got to the pavement. The exterior is in good shape, as is the interior (the dash doesn't have a single crack). The steering is so tight and precise and well weighted. And I just feel so ... right behind of the wheel of it, like I'm finally home and I've finally found somewhere I belong. It's the same feeling I have with the Cutlass. Despite it's flaws, I've fell in love with my 'Bird and I'm going to do what I can to get her flying high at full speed again.

Some oddities I've heard from other sources, all pertaining to one particular subject ... "Rump-stick" and "butt-tater" and "$h! kettle." (It's obvious right?)

Happy belated birthday, Blu.