I meant "Joel"!!!

Steve Schwenk wrote:
>
> Joe, my most humble apologies!  I should not have made
> assumptions or cast you as a novice/green.  And I sure
> did not intend to connote anything negative about being
> a new owner of a vehicle about which you know little,
> if that had been the case.  But i could not miss seeing
> in the brief words of your post the image of a new
> owner of a new van, new to the list, posting one of
> those first basic questions all new owners face, how do
> i fold down the bed.  It is like the first step on a
> journey to...well, you know from your history....or
> just read the list for a while and you'll see.  So, it
> was that image i was responding to.  Sorry if you felt
> i cast you in a negative light.  I sure did not mean to
> and did not see the question as being dumb.
> steve
>
> Joel Sell wrote:
> >
> > Volks,
> >         where do I begin...
> >          In '97 I bought my first car, a '71 Westy. I knew NOTHING about auto
> > mechanics and even less about VWs. Turned out that bus had cracks in both
> > heads. Compression was down in the 40s. With the help of a new friend (who
> > had worked at a VW shop for years) we rebuilt that engine and bus in his
> > garage. Then I moved to Chile (South America), where I went to Auto
> > Mechanic's School and worked at a VW garage there. I only saw aircooled
> > stuff, and even stuff we don't have here (see that "Brasilia" in VWT last
> > month? I worked on a few. 411s? 412s? Those, too. Mexican beetles and
> > buses? yup. Even drove a '98 Mexican Beetle off the showroom floor for a
> > test drive and almost got clobbered by a public transportation bus. You
> > should have seen how white the salesman's face was!) Came back to the
> > states, sold the '71. Bought a '74 Westy and totally restored it. Put 8k
> > miles on it, driving all over the East Coast with my wife and little boy.
> > Sold it a month ago. During that time I restored a friend's bus, a
> > neighbor's bus and my sister-in-law's bug. My wife wanted something more
> > "modern" and comfortable,so we stepped up to a Vanagon this past weekend.
> >         I am a Teacher in the Philadelphia Public School System. My wife stays
> > home with our child, expecting our 2nd one in March. I live in a row home.
> > That right there should explain why I don't have more than one VW at a time
> > ;-)
> >         Now, why do I ask "dumb" questions- Well, I've already made hundreds of
> > dollars'  (maybe thousands) worth of "dumb" mistakes that I could have
> > avoided if I had just done my research first. Looking it up in the manual,
> > asking a friend, or asking the lists. I saw this problem with the bed a
> > potential expensive mistake. I couldn't find the owner's manual in the
> > Vanagon, so I figured I would ask the list. Thank you to those who
> > responded. I now know how to make my bed (and sleep in it).
> > To Tim in SJ- what the heck are you talking about? (that damned silver
> > thing next to the steering column)
> > My ignorance shines again.
> > See you guys on the road,
> > Joel