It’s a crazy November in our house, so much so that I’ve given nary a thought to my 44th birthday, now just days away. Our daughter, the oldest of our three children, is having her bat mitzvah this weekend. The complexity is just short of a wedding. At the same time, even as she organizes the bat mitzvah Gayla has been finishing up on the redesigned site, on track for launch later this month. Meanwhile, I’ve been managing the third quarter Car Reliability Survey. I’m reminded of an overnight yacht race I used to take part in. Boats would go their separate ways during the night, only to suddenly converge from all over Lake Michigan the next morning as they neared the finish. My own boat started this race just a month ago, but the other two got underway nearly a year ago. And they are all finishing this month.

We’ll start talking about the redesigned site more soon–we’ve made some tweaks and additions in the last couple of weeks that we’re very excited about. For now, just the Car Reliability Survey.

For various reasons, among them the need for a redesigned site (as stated above, coming soon) and the need for some mobile apps (hopefully coming not long after–Gayla’s next project), it has become harder and harder to maintain the same level of participation in the Car Reliability Survey. But in the last hour the number of responses this round passed the number of responses the last time around. Now at 22,386, they’ll likely reach the goal of 22,500 before we close the third quarter survey late Thursday or early Friday.

Way back near the beginning, less than 24 hours after the initial email went out on October 3rd, I projected the number of results we’d have this time around. Those projections:

Basic stats, 100+ cars: 24

Odds stats, 35+ cars: 120

Odds stats, 25+ cars: 235

Basic stats, 25+ cars: 590

Basic stats, small N: 1080

The actual numbers, at this moment:

Basic stats, 100+ cars: 25

Odds stats, 35+ cars: 120

Odds stats, 25+ cars: 229

Basic stats, 25+ cars: 590

Basic stats, small N: 1080

My projections are usually pretty close–but never this close. Even a few days ago it looked like a few were going to fall far short. But members really came through in the last few days, and here we are, nearing the finish.