Subie Scoop - December 29

Hello, everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Subi Scoop.

This is the last one for 2025.

This is the last Subi Scoop for this year.

I can't believe we're going into 2026.

I hope everybody had a great Christmas, great holiday so far, and we've got one more coming

up.

New Year's Eve, and I don't know if anybody has any big plans, but I'm supposed to be going

over to a friend's house to hang out and just bring in the new year, which that'll be nice.

But as we close out 2025, I want to say thank you to everybody for continuing to listen

to the podcast, for sharing it, and I appreciate everybody.

I appreciate everybody's support, and for those of you that have been hanging around

from the beginning, I really, really appreciate you.

Thank you so much.

There's not a whole lot to report with this edition.

I mean, I'm just still enjoying some time off and trying to find something else to get

back into for full-time work.

I am doing some work, which is good, but I'm trying to find something permanent,

and hopefully, I'm thinking that maybe companies just aren't hiring at the end

of the year around the holidays, so hopefully 2026, the beginning of 2026 in January, will

bring some more light into finding something more permanent.

But I hope that 2026 is going to be good for everybody.

I know 2025 was really good to a lot of people, and 2025 maybe wasn't so great to

others.

So hopefully 2026 will continue to be good if 2025 was really good.

And for those that didn't have the best 2025, hopefully 2026 will be better.

Well, it's been nice having Pearlback, of course I had Pearlback for a while, but it's

nice to be driving my own car again, and I still need to get my axle seal replaced.

I'm planning to do that next Monday, and taking it to a shop to get it replaced.

Because again, I could do it myself, but I just don't trust myself with the axle

seal.

How it's supposed to go in, I think like if I had seen somebody do it, and I was like,

had somebody who'd done it before to help me out, and like really fine tune getting

it placed in there just right, because apparently it's kind of finicky, then I would feel more

comfortable doing it.

But I think for me it's just better to have a shop do it, because I'm taking it

to the same shop that replaced the axle seal on the passenger side, and it's

been fine.

It's been leaking, so I trust them to replace the one on the driver side and get it done

right, and get it done by people that know what they're doing.

So I mean, of course there are certain things that I've been able to do myself, and I trusted

myself to do them, but I'm not sure about this, I just don't want to do it.

But for 2026 is, you know, thinking about I haven't done any mods on Pearl in a

really long time, and I think when I have the opportunity, I think the next thing I'm

going to do is the Ultimate Nine pedal throttle controller, because I really want to get one

of those.

When I was in Virginia for Overland Expo out there, and I was hanging out with Milton

a lot, we were talking about that, and he said that the Ultimate Nine is really

good, and I know a couple of people that have it on their manual cross track, and they

really like it, so I think that's something that I want to shoot for when I get a chance

to do it.

But other than that, I don't know what else I would get, I don't know what else I would

do.

I do need to replace the easy flares on my back wheel wells, because when I had

the accident, it popped the bumper, the sides of the bumper out, like they go around

the side of the car, and it split the easy flares.

So now I'm driving with like two thirds or three fourths of an easy flare, and then there's

like a piece that's missing, so it doesn't really bother me, but I'll need to get another

set of easy flares to replace that one, so that it looks right again, because now

it just doesn't look right, but again, it just doesn't bother me too much.

And I'm just glad that Pearl's fixed and that I'm able to drive around again.

I'm also only about 700 miles from hitting 140,000 miles on Pearl, and like I'm excited

to get to more miles, like I'm going to be excited to get to 150,000, because that's

kind of a big deal, you know, that's a pretty big number of, or quite a bit of

miles to get on your car.

And I'm just glad that I have a Subaru, because none of my other cars have been able

to get this as many miles as I have on mine.

I think I had a Ford Ranger that I got to about 120,000 miles before it was having

engine trouble, and I needed to get a new car anyway, because we were having our first

child, and I needed something that was more of a sedan, because my single cab

truck just wasn't going to work out well for that.

And then the car that I had right before Pearl, I think I got that car to 121 or 122,

and it was having issues also, but I'm just, I'm so glad I bought a Subaru.

I know that people can drive them for a really long time, and that's what I'm

hoping to do with Pearl.

I mean, so far, she's been doing great.

Again, the only thing that, you know, of course I had to replace the brake

pads and the rotors, but I mean, that's, you know, that's going to wear anyway on

any car.

But like the viscous coupling is the only thing I've really had to replace that

needed to be replaced, and that was my doing.

So I probably wouldn't even have to replace it now if I wasn't going off

road in the mud really hard.

But I'm looking forward to new episodes in 2026.

Of course, I'm going to have new guests on.

I'm going to have some new brands on.

And then I'm looking forward to continuing to work with Subaru for Subaru Gear.

If you haven't checked out Subaru Gear, go check it out.

They have new items that they've added.

Subaru Gear has so many great products that you can choose from.

From drinkware to clothing to your car to home to your kids.

I mean, they have so many different products and you can use the code

SUBIENU2026 starting in January for 20% off.

And then of course, if your total is over $50 after the 20% discount,

you automatically get free shipping, which is really nice.

So thank you so much, Subaru Gear for that.

But if you saw my reels that I did with the two coffee mugs,

especially the second one, because the second one, I put some music to it

and I felt like that worked out a little bit better.

I want to try to get more creative with some of the videos and reels that I do.

Because I've been doing them the same way for really a long time.

So I'm hoping that maybe some more stuff can come together with Subaru Gear

this next year and doing some more items and just doing it differently

and maybe getting some more exposure out there.

So it's been great working with Subaru Gear and Subaru in general.

Of course, I went to Overland Expo last year.

I'm looking forward to going to Overland Expo in 2026.

And maybe some other things will come about, too.

So we'll just have to wait and see what comes about.

And hopefully I can get out to some more events

and get a chance to meet more people in person, because of course,

that is always fun.

But yeah, we'll see what 2026 brings.

I hope 2026 is good to everybody, everybody else.

And I'm sure that there's just going to be some new things coming about.

It's fun, too, to see when there's somebody new coming into the community

because you'll see you'll get a follow from somebody that has like one photo

and it says new. That's always exciting.

I always get excited when I get a new follow by from somebody

that's like just getting started in the community,

especially if it's somebody where it's their first Subaru,

like me and many others, you know,

you get your Subaru, you find out about the community,

you start to start an Instagram page and then start going crazy.

But it's been a fun journey.

It's been a great five years and I appreciate everybody.

I'm looking forward to what comes next.

And I just hope everybody has a happy new year

and just enjoy the evening, be safe.

Don't go out there and do anything crazy.

Please hope everybody just has a safe time and has a good time.

And we will see you for the first episode of 2026 next week.

It'll be it's a guess that people know about.

And that's all I'm going to say, but it's going to be a good episode.

And it's a lot of fun recording with this person.

And I'm looking forward to putting it out there and sharing it with everybody.

So have a great week.

Have a great new year.

Much to be love.

Raph.

Ford Ranger

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