I'm new at this. What is an ECU tune? Quicker acceleration? More horsepower? Better gas mileage? Better top end? My XFire currently has 6400 miles on it. Would it be a good candidate for this ECU tune? Would it be a very noticeable $315 tune? Does it take long to do?

Back to the Newport Cruise: The bride and I took a ride to Newport Grand today. We played some poker machines and slots and made the usual donation. We had dinner and I ask our waiter if they served breakfast there. He told me they do not. I also found out that the place opens at 0900 hours on Sundays, but the restaurant doesn't open until 1100.

Now I left there at approximately 1800 hours (6:00 PM), and they had a good crowd in attendance but only about 20% of the parking area was occupied. My estimates on parking spaces unoccupied would be roughly 3000-3500 spaces at that time, if not more. Everyone likes to park near the building or use the valet, so the more distant part of the lot is always vacant. I imagine there are a lot less cars there on Sunday mornings so we could place our XFires pretty much in any configuration for photos with no problems at all.

When you leave the Newport Grand lot and go left on to rte 138W, you would take your left at the sign that says, "Newport, Goat Island", and you would be in the downtown area in under 5 minutes. I think this may be the best place to meet because we will be able to park all our cars together without getting other vehicle between us and it's such a short ride to begin our routes of travel. There are rest rooms inside so that's another plus.

By the way, it was about a 100 round trip for me from home to Newport and back to home. I didn't see a single XFire during my journey. I did see 3 Mini Coopers which are kind of rare, but apparently not as rare as our XFires.

Bob M.