George,
Sounds like you had a blast; rain and all. Stalkers are also pull-the-whole-drivetrain-to-fix-it type cars. I installed a new tranny in my car at the beginning of last year only to turn around and pull it back out because of a small leak. Turns out the bearing retainer was not properly sealed (my bad for not checking it before the install). Oh well, I was a bit rusty in the two-engine-pulls-per-year category.