Monday, May 12, 2008

How fast can the RedRat go on ice?

Saturday the the 10th....we were scheduled to go to Peggy's. HS show in Falls Church but when we got up at 4AM it was raining....at 6AM it was raining....at 8AM it was raining....at 10AM it was raining....I think I see a trend here. So we waited and the rain stopped before noon but it was too late to go to Peggy's show....so we waited to see if it would dry up so we could go to the Bruster's cruise that night. We decided around 4Pm that it was dry enough to bring the cars out and we ventured to Bruster's. The sky was partly sunny till we got everything set up at Bruster's then the sky turned black. We all sat and tried to decide whether to stay or leave and beat the rain....we stayed. The clouds left quickly and it was so sunny we started to look for the sun block. A lot of people stayed away because of the threat of rain but we still had over 30 cars! Ramona the 'professional trainer' and the Princess was instructing Ron how to park his 28 Dodge....I thought it was going to get ugly....but Ron finally managed to get it right! Check the pics! Marshall brought out his 64 Rambler with the TPI small block....it's kinda special. Allen drove his Tin Indian Grand Prix Super Stocker, 421, 2x4bbls, a real throwback to the SS wars in the 60's. He has a 'spool' in the rear end so when he turns a corner the suspension loads up unevenly and it lifts the rear of the car up crooked, kinda weird but Allen says it's normal? I bet it's a lot of fun on ice and snow! Then a blown blue 60 Chevy came rumbling in....it was a car I had not seen around, it's nice and you don't see a lot of 60 Chevys. The motor made it special....Ron called the cruise around 9PM and some of us went to Sam's for dinner, a good end to a good evening.

Sunday the weather reports ALL say the rain will hold off till 6PM so we go to breakfast at Bob Evans and meet the other club members. After breakfast we journeyed to the show in Fredericksburg. We were a little early so we got to choose our parking area, I think we chose wrong. This show always amazes me with the number of cars that attend that I have never seen before. And the quality of the cars would make the judging very difficult too. There was an especially nice purple pro-street 49 Chevy PU, you have to see this car. The yellow pro-street S-10 was different too. After meeting some old friends and making some new ones the sky started to cloud up. It started to sprinkle around 1PM and the host club began counting the ballots early. The rain started in earnest around 1:30 or so and the awards were given out shortly after that. The FC&MCC got club attendance award(Stafford Classics please re-read the first part of this sentence, grin). Ed and his orange 39 Ford got top 25 and the best Ford award....with his secret new ford engine....The Musselman family got top 25 with their Nova and Nomad. Al got a top 25 with his very nice 32 Hi-Boy with a real Ford engine, take note Ed....Dan & Ramona got a top 25 award, as usual and AND the Princess got a trophy....life is good....she said she may start cooking dinner again now....she says the trophies give her energy....I said she could stick her finger in an electric outlet and get energy....I thought it was funny....I really do like to eat at restaurants....

The Fredericksburg Street Rods car club work very hard, all year to put on this show....Of the last 3 years we have gone it was cut short twice because of rain! The depth and leadership of their organization rises to the top when adversity such as rain hits....and this club just adapts and rolls with what it is given and turns lemons into lemonade! It is a pleasure to attend their function.... Well done!

Then I had to get the....(Don, quit reading this now).... very wet, RedRat home! The car has never been wet, it has very large M/T tires and no windshield wiper (it is in Falls Church)! Everything anyone has told me about the twitchieness of the M/T tires in the wet was true. Not only are they bad for acceleration they are bad for stopping too. It was like driving on black ice....plus what normally happens around here whenever it rains, all the pushy inexperienced drivers crash, so there were crashes everywhere. We took the less traveled back way home and made it OK. Now it will take about 25 hrs per car to clean them! Oh well what else do I have to do while the Princess is at work, making money for car parts?

Till next weekend I'll be rubbing on them cars....


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