I lou-ver you!

I've delved into quite a few areas of interest blogging about life with O the cat and S the man, but have never ventured into DIY (do-it-yourself) blogging territory. That changes today.

Last weekend S and I installed louvers on Mustang Sally. What are louvers, you ask? Good question! They are overlapping fins or slats that, in this case, cover S’s back windows. They are a fairly cosmetic modification to S’s vehicle. If we’re cutting straight to the chase, louvers make a Mustang look more like a shark, and that’s cool.

As it turns out, installing louvers is pretty easy and very fun. There’s something about summertime that makes such projects seem apropos, and S and I make a pretty good partnership for such things. After traveling together, paying bills together, and raising a hamster and two (not-so-well-behaved) cats, we have learned the art of teamwork.

For covering a car’s windows, louvers are big, but not too unwieldy. Here are some reference shots, to give you a sense of their proportion:

We felt confident about embarking on this project after learning what we could and could not do to S’s car in the past. For instance, while we failed miserably at installing S’s new exhaust system, S very successfully tinted his own taillights for a darker and more streamlined appearance (S also had his car’s springs modified, but after the exhaust attempt, he let this be a shop job from the very start). We learned that cosmetic changes we could handle well, but performance changes were best left to the pros.

For the louver install, step one involved prepping the louver itself with an adhesive primer, and cleaning the area around the car’s windows with alcohol:

Step two required affixing a two-sided tape around the inner edges of the louver:

Step three was to eyeball the position that the louver would have over the car’s window:

And step four was to affix the louver around the window, ensuring the adherence of the tape to the car’s window frame:

Oh, and then lather, rinse, repeat:

S’s car is a lot of fun, and a great foil to my basic-in-every-way lady friend (Our cars, unlike our cats, are both female). While part of that fun is in the actual experience of driving and riding in the car, the other part is in the car’s upkeep and modification. Like anything practical at its root (a home, an office space, or a wardrobe), a car is a possession not only to be utilized and cared for, but to be personalized and appreciated.

And I have say it – sorry in advance – It gives me joy to see S lou-ver the task of taking care of Sally.