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This weekend was the annual pinewood derby race with the kids for Adventure Guides. Lucky me, I have another car to build for my son for cub scouts in the coming weeks since he insists on doing both. Anyway, this was the third year with Adventure Guides and our cars have been pretty bad in the past two years. I felt bad and now that it’s third year (and his little brother has joined as well), I wanted the boys’ cars to do a little better. Well, after talking to some of the dads who take this stuff pretty seriously and doing some trial and error, we were able to get both cars into the finals! That was a first, so they made about top 12 out of 80 cars. After having crappy cars and decent cars, here are a few tips and tricks to winning the pinewood derby that I can pass on:
Pinewood Derby Car Tips and Tricks
- I’ve found that the wheels matter much more than the aerodynamics of the car. So, if you have to focus time and attention on one over the other, focus on the axles, wheels and whatnot and don’t stress if your car isn’t perfectly sanded or your son wants to put a Lego guy sticking out the top.
- Most of the winning cars end up being very thin and/or wedge-like. They end up stacking on a ton of weights to make up for the wood they’ve chopped out. I’m not sure why this matters, as mass is mass, but I suppose perhaps it’s more rigid that way since the wood is pretty flimsy and the weights are metal.
- I’ve found that winning cars tend to have the weights stuck toward the back of the car, as opposed to the front. Again, I don’t why this matters, but they all swear by it and the winning cars tend to have that pattern.
- The wheels and axles! This is huge.
- And this is a little tidbit you’re not going to get anywhere else! I took a snapshot of all the winner’s circle cars just before the start of the finals. You can get a look at the undersides of all the cars, designs, weight placements and perhaps look really cool in front of your son for coming up with an awesome design! Enjoy!
The Winner's Circle!
Do You Have Any Pinewood Derby Racing Tips?
While the headlines portend doom and gloom in the housing market, the reality is, it might just be the right time for you to buy a home or refinance regardless of whether we see another slight decline in home prices or a flat market for years to come. After all, who’s really buying a home these days for capital appreciation? It just makes sense for people who are very confident that they will not need to move in the near-term and don’t want to keep paying a landlord’s bills for them. Assuming you qualify from both a down payment and credit standpoint, there are many mortgage options out there and it can be confusing figuring out which one is right for you. Very much depends on your personal situation, so using a calculator mortgage t provide you with options and monthly payments, you can make an informed decision.
- 30 Year Fixed – This is still the most common mortgage type in the US. What I like about the 30-year mortgage is that you allow the present value of money to work for you. You’re able to borrow money at an extremely low rate (low 4%) while inflation is around 3%, so you’re virtually borrowing money with no interest in terms of “real” dollars. The only downside is that a lot can happen in 30 years. You may eclipse into retirement or have to start paying for college for the kids, so that’s where the next one might make sense.
- 15 Year Fixed – This is another very common option, and given the shorter term, the interest rate is also lower (banks tend to view longer durations as higher risk, hence the higher interest rate. You’ll always see this in the bond market as well, except for very low probability “inverted yield curve” situations leading into a Recession). You can get a 15-year fixed for 4% or lower these days. Many people like this option because it may coincide with retirement if they’re in their 30s or 40s or college payments.
- 5/1 Adjustable Rate Mortgage – This one’s a bit risky these days in that interest rates don’t have much lower to go – but have plenty of room to rise should inflation take hold. So, you can probably get a very low rate for 5 years, but after that, the contracts are typically structured to allow up to 3 increases of 2% each once per year after the initial 5. So, if you can’t refinance into a conventional loan down the road, you may well end up with a 10% mortgage rate.
Aside from the ones listed above, there are several others, as well as combinations of the above, but these are the primary ones buyers are entering into at the present. Depending on which country you live in, there are other numerous types out there and tools to help, like this buy to let mortgages calculator for UK residents.Thankfully in the US, we’ve very much seen the demise of the “option ARM” mortgage which got so many people in trouble leading up to and during the housing collapse. With those mortgage, people were able to start off with “teaser” payments that then reset into much higher payments (with interest!) after just a few years, causing many people to just walk away from their mortgages when they realized their mortgage amount owed actually INCREASED while their home values declined, leaving them with 6 figures in negative equity.
Well, here we are with another Halloween just around the corner. Last year, my wife came up with the idea of dressing the whole family up in the Wizard of Oz theme. We had a new baby girl, so she was Dorothy. My wife was the witch (totally fitting). I was the scarecrow and my boys were the tin man and lion. It was pretty funny; we definitely have pictures from last year. This year, we’re going with a bit more of a random theme. After having 2 boys donning mummy and gremlin costumes in previous years, now with our girl, (and my wife’s Wizard of Oz dream out of the way) the attire is taking on a whole new direction. My wife started taking inventory of what the other little girls in the neighborhood will be wearing for Halloween. This year, there seems to be a trend toward fancy dress outfits.
Our one friend’s family is doing the retro thing and going with a 70s fancy dress theme for Halloween. Another one is doing the roaring 20s. In our house, we were kinda leaning toward a witch for our daughter, because that’s how she acts sometimes. She’s only 2, but she’s real good at the “hee-hee-hee” expression. So, torn on whether to go with the trend this year on fancy dress outfits or do our own thing – or whether it even matters. The boys always seem so much easier – while even stranger. Out of nowhere, my one son wants to be a warlock, which I’m not even sure if he knows what that means. And even stranger, my other son is insistent on the Swamp Monster. I don’t know what that is really, or where he got the idea, but that’s his dream costume for the year – the Swamp Monster. So, he’ll be green with stuff hanging off him. I think after last year’s getup, I’m off the hook for dressing up. I’m sure by next year my wife will think up a family theme again though; until then, I’ll enjoy a Halloween in normal clothing.
What Are Your Kids Doing for Halloween This Year?
This summer, we finally gave in and let our son get a hermit crab at the shore while on vacation. Each year, we found some excuse to disallow based on his age, his behavior or otherwise. This year, he’s grown more mature and responsible and was a great kid during vacation, so we said fine. It’s turned out well so far – he plays with them every day, feeds them, cleans them and he’s very compassionate toward his little buddies. During casual conversation with some parents of kids in his class, we became aware of a rather bizarre and cruel practice IMO.
Apparently, all kinds of parents do the hermit crab thing each summer, and they do it EACH summer because come spring, there’s no more hermit crab in the house. Where do the little critters go? Well, these parents (and this is more than 1 family, and not in a coordinated fashion, so I don’t know where this bizarre ritual came from) wait until Christmas each year and go and put the crab out in the snow to freeze to death. Aside from the fact that this is cruel and unnecessary, what kind of message is this sending to children? It’s OK to torture a small critter to death? So, it’s also OK to stomp a cat or light a dog on fire? As kids grow up and engage in more reckless behavior, if they don’t have the right baseline on how to treat other people and animals, later in life, the swings in how they behave toward others grow wider and wider. While I did a lot of stupid, risky stuff as a teenager, I never exhibited any form of animal cruelty, I wasn’t raised that way.
Even though they’re “just hermit crabs”, there were a pet. It’s not like killing a spider; these were purchased domesticated pets that children cared for and played with and then were killed for no apparent reason – then purchased again to repeat the cycle.
Can anyone enlighten me on whether this Christmas ritual is an American tradition and where it came from?
And do you think this is acceptable?
