LONO100
Explorer Addict
- Joined
- March 23, 2011
- Messages
- 2,911
- Reaction score
- 26
- City, State
- Bay Area CA
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 03 sport trac XLT
hi all, ive been a long time member of this forum but after a very tumultuous last year and a half, im glad to be back on and doing the things i love to do, one of which is taking my sport trac around the trails of california.
i hope some of my old forum buddies are still on this site sharing knowledge, my trac has pretty much been sitting idle and not getting into many adventures the last year and a half b/c life outside of my hobbies has been super eventful to say the least. just a brief catch up on where ive been:
at the end of 2014 i finally married my beautiful and supportive wife, and also spent all of 2014 trying to become a kidney donor to my mom who contracted kidney disease i year prior. i wasnt a match but they now do a donor swap program, where they match pairs of donors/recipients with others to create chains of matches. early on in 2015 i got the call that my mother and i would be involved in a 7 person kidney swap, the largest donor/recipient match ever performed in north america! so essentially, i would be donating not directly to my mom, but to someone elses' loved one, who would in turn be donating to another person, and again and again and then my mom would be receiving a kidney from another donor as well. the swap took place at UCSF medical center. the procedure actually made the news! the same day i was informed that this would happen, and that a match would be found for us, i also found out that my wife was pregnant with our first child!
so in early march, the swap happened, and while there was a long road to recovery, we made it home. sadly however, just a few days before easter, my mom passed away of causes unrelated to the surgery while buying groceries for easter dinner. her unexpected death crushed me so hard, i could not believe we had went through so much, made it out, only to lose her. dealing with extreme highs, and extreme lows takes a toll on your mind and heart like no other. it was rough, and at the same time my wife who stood by me through it all was carrying around our baby. on october 6th, our son was finally born (over a week late!). he was so big, and my wife so tiny he was delivered via c section but im happy to say that he is now 3 months old and very fat and healthy, he also has a strong resemblance to my mom, which i am very thankful for.
anyway, that's where ive been for the past year and a half, and im hoping to make 2016 a year that i can get back to wheeling, working on car and trucks, fishing, camping, biking, basketball and all that good stuff.
my white sport trac is still going strong, although i do need to finish some projects such as disabling the "identity personal recognition" anti-theft device that has started to crap out on me. i also noticed that my front right shock came undone at the shock tower, somehow the nut had threaded off and i lost the hardware. i called rancho and they gave me part numbers to replace the hardware so i can re-attach the shock. i also need to redo some paint that chipped off the roof, and i plan to slap on some add a leafs since my springs are finally starting to sag a bit. would it be advisable to install the add a leafs while the warrior shackles are still on? or do i need to go back to the stock shackles before adding the add a leafs? any way, here are a few pics ocf my trac and how shes looking today, still pretty much the same, and ready to get back out there.
here are a few pics from some quick trips i was able to make recently before the el nino rains came. i hope to do some extended outlanding this summer.
eastern sierra mountains
hauling my 29er
fishing the legendary california delta for stripers (me on the left) . the trac gets the boat there in style!
im hoping to post more how to's and projects this winter, im also now on instagram, my handle is just my name (kenpulido) if anyone wants to add me to theirs. glad to be back!
i hope some of my old forum buddies are still on this site sharing knowledge, my trac has pretty much been sitting idle and not getting into many adventures the last year and a half b/c life outside of my hobbies has been super eventful to say the least. just a brief catch up on where ive been:
at the end of 2014 i finally married my beautiful and supportive wife, and also spent all of 2014 trying to become a kidney donor to my mom who contracted kidney disease i year prior. i wasnt a match but they now do a donor swap program, where they match pairs of donors/recipients with others to create chains of matches. early on in 2015 i got the call that my mother and i would be involved in a 7 person kidney swap, the largest donor/recipient match ever performed in north america! so essentially, i would be donating not directly to my mom, but to someone elses' loved one, who would in turn be donating to another person, and again and again and then my mom would be receiving a kidney from another donor as well. the swap took place at UCSF medical center. the procedure actually made the news! the same day i was informed that this would happen, and that a match would be found for us, i also found out that my wife was pregnant with our first child!
so in early march, the swap happened, and while there was a long road to recovery, we made it home. sadly however, just a few days before easter, my mom passed away of causes unrelated to the surgery while buying groceries for easter dinner. her unexpected death crushed me so hard, i could not believe we had went through so much, made it out, only to lose her. dealing with extreme highs, and extreme lows takes a toll on your mind and heart like no other. it was rough, and at the same time my wife who stood by me through it all was carrying around our baby. on october 6th, our son was finally born (over a week late!). he was so big, and my wife so tiny he was delivered via c section but im happy to say that he is now 3 months old and very fat and healthy, he also has a strong resemblance to my mom, which i am very thankful for.
anyway, that's where ive been for the past year and a half, and im hoping to make 2016 a year that i can get back to wheeling, working on car and trucks, fishing, camping, biking, basketball and all that good stuff.
my white sport trac is still going strong, although i do need to finish some projects such as disabling the "identity personal recognition" anti-theft device that has started to crap out on me. i also noticed that my front right shock came undone at the shock tower, somehow the nut had threaded off and i lost the hardware. i called rancho and they gave me part numbers to replace the hardware so i can re-attach the shock. i also need to redo some paint that chipped off the roof, and i plan to slap on some add a leafs since my springs are finally starting to sag a bit. would it be advisable to install the add a leafs while the warrior shackles are still on? or do i need to go back to the stock shackles before adding the add a leafs? any way, here are a few pics ocf my trac and how shes looking today, still pretty much the same, and ready to get back out there.
here are a few pics from some quick trips i was able to make recently before the el nino rains came. i hope to do some extended outlanding this summer.
eastern sierra mountains
hauling my 29er
fishing the legendary california delta for stripers (me on the left) . the trac gets the boat there in style!
im hoping to post more how to's and projects this winter, im also now on instagram, my handle is just my name (kenpulido) if anyone wants to add me to theirs. glad to be back!
