This is Gordon E. Jones ,

and he's a Pearl Harbor survivor . He came into the shop a few weeks ago with his daughter to sit with her while she got a tattoo .

His handshake was strong and you could tell he was a tough old dude . He looked you right in the eye when he was talking to you and had a quick and easy smile , probably born from carrying the memory of that day with him throughout his life . We chatted for a while about stuff , told him how my dad was on a carrier during the Korean war , etc . He was pretty interesting to say the least .

He was quick as a whip and was really interesting to talk to . I'm glad I got to meet him and shake his hand . He's part of a generation that's disappearing quickly , and It was an honor to make his acquaintance .

If you drive a Dodge Magnum , Chrysler 300 or a Challenger , and suddenly for no apparent reason you are stuck in park and can't get out , here's what you do .

Your shift interlock has a broken spring tab and this is how you fix it .

First get a little screw driver , like a normal sized flathead . You'll need to pop off the trim ring around the shifter to get to the interlock release cable . Push it down in-between the cable and the housing and slide it over to the left a little . this will disengage the shifter and let you get home do fix it with real tools , in your garage or driveway , rather than in a gas station parking lot or on the side of the road .

It looks pretty ghetto but totally works . If you want you could probably just leave it at that and not worry about actually fixing it for real . I'll bet you could roll like this for some time and not have any troubles . If you ever see anyone driving around like this you know what they've got going on .

I busted out the iPad and found some how to shit on YouTube that helped a lot for getting into this thing without busting everything I touched . I usually fuck around with old stuff so this was new to me and ended up being pretty fun . Anyhow once you take all the junk off from around the shift unit , you need to unhook the shift interlock solenoid ( the white thing with the cable poking out of it ) and then the shift arm ( the black rod looking thing attached to the shift unit ) . It helps if you pull the ashtray out first so you can get to these guys .

Then there are a couple electrical connections you have to undo , and 4 10mm nuts that hold the shift unit in place . Our car is a Magnum with a center console that has a hidden drink holder thingie . If you have a regular drink holder you won't have to undo the center console . . . I was not so lucky . It turned out no big deal though , 2 philips head screws in the dash and 3 8mm bolts under the plastic tray in the console . just scootch it back an inch or so and the shift unit pops right out . Here it is in all it's glory .

And this is the little fucker that stranded you . You can see the ridiculous little tab that broke off and this is where you start wondering , what the fuck . . .

OE part # 4578029AC, AE; 4578087AA, AD, AE, AG depending on application . I went to O'Riley's and got a Dorman's replacement part # 924-706 which is oddly enough made out of metal .

Go figure .

Why doesn't Dodge make these things out of metal ? Well because when you need to get this problem fixed at a dealership they have to replace the whole shift unit ( $200 ish ) and charge you $200 in labor . The replacement part cost $39 . I saved $360 , give or take doing this job myself .

Planned obsolescence can go fuck itself as far as I'm concerned .

Here's the new linkage in place , after a few dabs of lithium grease to ensure smooth moves in the future . Looks like it will outlast the car now .

Problem solved , crisis averted . Money saved and male ego fully in tact , till next time something breaks and I get the opportunity to test Amy's patience with desire to do this kind of shit myself all the time .

All buttoned up and ready to go .

oh how I miss you , Star Trek Experience at the Las Vegas Hilton . . .

And oh how I miss you Warp Core Breach , at Quark's bar , at the Star Trek Experience . . . at the Las Vegas Hilton

I found this old picture of my friend Rob's bike from a long time ago .

Lots of neat little weird things done to this bike that make it very cool . I guess it lives in Japan now , as do many of the old choppers from the west coast these days .

We went to the Natural History Museum last weekend and got to check out some junk

This was an iron meteorite that was cut in half and just chilling . It was super weird to touch it and think that you were touching something that was literally millions of years old and came from the deepest depths of outer space . No telling where this old rock came from or how long it took to get here . It was kind of trippy .

The Kuttty truck

I remember when this thing hit the scene for the first time and everyone lost their minds . It was an instant hit wherever he drove it and people couldn't figure out all the crazy shit he & Merc John had done to it . It was a little go-kart to ride in and it did burnouts 1/2 way down the block . Still looks insane today , many years after the fact .

If you learn one thing today let it be this...