SW17LS

I get around 25 on the highway with my 15 AWD.

Oliver Enterprises

RWD Long wheelbase. I.E., the below:

drgrant

Nice!

BTW nice exhaust mod in your links there... sounds good!

Oliver Enterprises

Thanks! And, it sounds much better in person. I'm going to try to do one more video. If I can find a way to get the sound of the exhaust while driving from outside, with no air rushing by sound, that's what I want to do.


Jason

roadfrog

A little side track regarding the exhaust vents: I was going through the Customs booth back into Canada and the Officer tilted his head towards my car, smiled and said, "nice little rumble you got there".

Oliver Enterprises

I had a guy at the car wash say, "That's a V8?" (Me = Yes) "From the factory?" (Me = Yes) "Wow ... never noticed those cars before. It's an LS, right?" That was like several compliments rolled into one.

I still haven't made up my mind which car to take on the 655 mile one way road trip. Ahhhh, just realized, that's the sort of issues I like to have ... which car to take. There are pro's and con's. Over the weekend the Check Engine light come on in the Camry. Front O2 sensor was my guess, and I was right. No big deal. Already Amazon'd the replacement and it will go in tomorrow. With a healthy O2 sensor, I'd like to see if I could achieve 35 mpg, fully loaded, running the A/C (works great in the Camry) and running like 75 mph the whole way. That would be amazing for a car with 140k+ miles. My guess is, all things being equal, the LS would probably achieve somewhere between 27 mpg and 28.5 mpg. Can watch movies in the LS, not so in the Camry. Hmmmmmmm.

drgrant

At like 253,000 miles in my 2010 Camry, my Bank 2 Sensor 2 went out. Depending on the location of the sensor it might not do a damned thing for your fuel economy, although you said "front" so if it is closer to the engine it might actually matter. I know in my case it basically did absolutely nothing to the fuel economy, I drove down to PA and had the light on nearly the entire time, and still got right around 29-30mpg for my V6. It probably would have been higher if not for 10 minute backup at the GW bridge. My best record for this car was actually 32MPG back in 2011 going to NYC and back, on one tank of gas. I think the main reason I was able to get 32 was because of the lack of idling. I basically drove down to Laguardia, Parked, did my thing (was meeting someone) and then drove back later on only making a couple of short pit stops. Very few stoplights on entire route, too.

-Mike

FatherTo1

Having a similar dilemma with whether or not to take the LS and put it in long-term airport parking later this year. Have done it with the Sienna and Tundra, both covered and uncovered and no issues, but I'm so paranoid about the LS. Of course we won't leave any valuables in the car but just worried about coming home to new dings on the door or something. Granted, the driver of the car next to us will probably only open their door once or twice the whole time cars are parked in long-term zone, not the same as parking at a shopping center but it still concerns me enough that I'm looking into Uber or SuperShuttle for our short 30 minute commute to the airport, different than your day-long drive. It is tough having a nice car. You spend as much time worrying about it as you do enjoying it.

Which cruise are you taking? We did the Disney Cruise last year out of Miami (sorry, we took a taxi so I don't recall seeing parking garages but others have confirmed they are there). Have to say the Disney Cruise was my least favorite out of our cruises to Western Caribbean, Alaska, and Hawaii. Disney Cruise is very overrated. 2-3x the price for an older ship and there wasn't even much "Disneyness" to make up for it. We still had fun and good memories as a family trip but there are no plans to go on another Disney Cruise. I suppose good to have experienced it once and wish you a fun-filled cruise vacation. Pace yourself at the buffets.

Oliver Enterprises

You very last sentence is the one I should heed the most. I've down 70 lbs from a year ago. I've been telling myself I'm going to drop as much as I can from now till the cruise and then go HAWG WILD on the buffets. It's Carnival. As I understand an older ship. 5 days. It was a last minute decision. Because if I wait on my wife to plan, or help me plan, there will be no vacation. She's just not a planner. And gets aggravated when I start asking about making plans. So, I knew if I didn't just do something, summer would be gone and the boys would be back in school. It is the 5 days preceding the beginning of school.

If I had a buddy in the Miami area, I would rather my vehicle be at his house for 5 days, and I would Uber to the dock and back. Oh well. It will be fine, if I take the Camry ... it is a pre-scratched & dented workhorse.

SW17LS

Which ship did you sail on? Out of Miami my guess is the Wonder?

We did the Dream (bigger and newer) out of Port Canaveral and it was great. Other lines are great too though. I'd say with kids older than say, 12 Disney isn't worth it.

Great thing about the Disney cruise is the kids club.

FatherTo1

Congrats on the massive weight loss and health gains, Oliver! That is about 1.5 lbs every week of the year. Impressive. Can you share some advice and tips, please? I lost 12 pounds the first few months of the year but have gained almost all of it back? Did you pair diet plus exercise? My weight loss was all diet but food is my Achilles, hence the risky temptations on cruise ships.

Great job planning your family cruise. I'm sure you all will have a wonderful time. The staff on cruise ships do work very hard to make sure you're comfortable and well taken care of. Post back your experience please after you return.

FatherTo1

We were on the Disney Magic sister ship to the Wonder. I did read good things about the Dream. I want to experience Oasis of the Seas by Royal. I believe the Wonder was dry docked at the time for renovations. Our cruise was right after hurricane Matthew hit. Felt bad for the cruise passengers on the previous trip that suffered the hurricane, especially the staff that had to take care of everyone and then turn the ship over for our group. You can tell the staff was weary and tired from the previous week.

We were disappointed that the kids club kicks parents out. Our 5-year-old daughter wasn't comfortable staying in the kid zone by herself so we didn't utilize it as extensively as we could have.

Oliver Enterprises

So as not to completely take over the thread I'll try to summarize how best I can, how I worked my diet. Pretend you are alive in 999 a.d. In those times, in order to eat, someone had to whomp an animal and then throw it over Kingsford brand charcoal. And, green vegetables grew and could be eaten. And yes, my warped sense of humor is trying to be a funny (i.e. Kingsford brand in 999 a.d.). You can imagine the kinds of foods people had back then. I'm betting they could bake breads, and various other similar type stuff that we have today. But what they didn't have was ... soda, M&M's, snack cakes, skittles, tater chips, anything with high fructose corn syrup. And what sweets they did have (were based on simple sugar) were few and far between would be my guess.

I stopped with all sugary foods, and went into ketosis. I bet people back in those times lived in ketosis half their lives. Ketosis is where the body has no quick and easy sugar (carbs) for the body to digest and live on. So, in order to remain alive, it needs energy. So it will take energy from wherever it can get it. It will burn protein and fat. And if a person stays off sugary food, their body will tap their fat stores for energy. When I started this diet, I could barely make a lap on this little track that from time to time I (tried to) jog on, prior to the diet. After starting the diet, and started seeing some weight loss, I decided to not exercise until I got below 250 lbs because ... it hurt. Hurt my feet, shins, knees, and probably scared anybody around to see a man's breastuhsis get thrown around like that. And I didn't want to cause permanent knee damage. I'm no spring chicken, conversely, I hope to use my knees for another 35 years. In summary, I ate like a caveman. I would still go eat with the BMX group, but I would order a big ole steak, and vegetables. Put butter on my steak (heck, I put butter on a lot of stuff on this diet), and STILL stayed in ketosis. You can't eat 10 steaks a day and lose weight, steaks still have calories. But a steak has less calories than the same volume of (enter something sugary here).

The biggest bonus to the diet was, the horrible headaches I would get 2 to 4 times a week VANISHED. Which opened my eyes to the fact the headaches were due to radical changes in blood sugar. Not sure if it was increases, decreases, or both that triggered the headaches. But that's what it had to be. And then they were gone. And after the ketosis flue (look it up) which was easy, my energy levels immediately increased. My quality of life increased just from those 2 aspects.

My last employer had yearly blood draws, and the last one I did before I left the company was just after I was in ketosis, and my blood sugar was down. Under the normal zone, but not in a dangerous zone. I see commercials now about drugs that can lower blood sugar. And then they go through the side-effects. Oh my Lord, why would people take such crap? To lower blood sugar, just say goodbye to sodas and candy. However, I'm sure there are people that have some kind of condition that makes those drugs necessary. I also said goodbye to rice, pasta, bread, tater chips, and various other things that are high in carbs. I've learned so much about sugar ... I wish I had known this 15 years ago. I still want to lose another 50 pounds. So, I'm trying to hit 220 before the cruise. But I don't think I'm going to make that.

Last thing, this got too long. This caveman diet is not well balanced. And overall not the healthiest way to eat. But what is more healthy? For me to continue to live as a major lardass for the next 35 years (I hope), or to live a couple years eating high protein and fat diet and drop 120 pounds, followed by 33 years of eating a balanced diet? Anyone that tells me what I eat is not healthy, I would like insult them creatively (but I'm not that clever), so I just ignore them.

yardie876

Oliver, your post inspired me, but made me laugh so hard lol. Your weight loss journey is awesome. I live near Miami but am more than 30
minutes away from the port so it would be a bit far and costly for an Uber. You can however consider parking at the airport if the cruise parking is an open parking lot. It’s a multi story garage that isn’t expensive and safe.

FatherTo1

Ditto. Thank you for sharing a great story, Oliver, and inspiring me too. The low-carb diet helped me lose weight too but I lapsed and started rewarding myself after two months and that led to disaster. I will remember your story each time I feel temptation and weakness for something sweet. Sugar really is as addicting as drugs. I never smoked, and haven't tried illicit drugs, and I don't drink. None of those things appeal to me so it's quite easy not to be tempted, but when it comes to food and desserts...oh man, I have no will power there. Keep it up, Oliver, we're all rooting for you!