A frustrating weekend

The weekend looks ominous, weather wise but Friday evening at VA BBQ is what we need to get our hot rod fix….the Princess and I love to drive the hot rods so when they are parked, some of the fun stops for us. Most of the 40-45 cars that came through were the usual suspects but I liked the pink & black ’55 Ford convertible. It has a factory built sensing device that detects rain and will raise the top by itself, if the vehicle was stationary…. remember this was in 1955! I also liked the two tone green ’59 Ford convertible, a classy ride.

Those of you who know me also know I have some friends that are….a little out there….it might be you! Anyway as I was getting up to take pictures Fred came over and sheepishly said he had something to show me in his car? Fred drives a green & silver ’66
Plymouth Barracuda, not that his choice in cars has anything to do with he showed me….grin. You will have to ask Fred what it was that he showed then gave me….I will never look at a frog the same, ever again….I now have a terminal case of eye trauma and the doctor says the flashbacks should lessen over time if I stay on the meds….we’ll see.

Saturday the weather guessers say the rain is north and we won’t get any till evening….I checked the radar and saw rain all around us but nothing hitting the ground so we took the hot rods to breakfast. We arrived at Bob Evans for breakfast was planning on organizing the cars to go to the show in Thornburg with us. We were about half way through breakfast when we began to watch it rain on the hot rods….not a lot, just enough to make a mess. Since no one else had showed up, we finished eating and slowly drove home to garage the cars and dry them off…. Since it seemed like it was not going to quit raining the rest of the day we decided to stay home and watch a movie.

The weather guessers said that Sunday would be worse? We would have severe thunderstorms, large hail, lightning, wind, tsunami, hurricanes, tornadoes and the four horsemen of the apocalypse descending on our little part of the planet. So we planned on doing something else with the hot rods….like waxing them in the garage! Finally Sunday morning and with the dawn came a light sprinkle that quickly stopped. I re-checked the house generator, filled the bathtubs with water and secured all the porch furniture so the storm wouldn’t blow the furniture to Bermuda! And we waited for the impending deluge….the sky started turning blue? Little white puffy clouds started appearing? The wind stopped? Were we in the eye of the cataclysmic event that was to befall us? No….the weather guessers were wrong….again! We thought maybe their forecast was just a little late but the nice weather stayed till after dark! So we didn’t go to Crabby Oyster because of the storm that never came! So I’ll never understand why everyone believes what those bozos say about climate change for years down the road when they haven’t been able to predict the weather 24 hours out! Maybe it’s just me but when I worked, had I been wrong so often like they are I would have been unemployed long long ago!
Anyway….a very frustrating weekend for all the car people around here, I guess we should find solace in not having to deal with the weather that Mississippi and Alabama got. Next weekend we have three shows and one cruise scheduled….let’s see what the weather guessers can cook up.

Best laid plains....

The Princess got sick Monday and was off work and dealing with pain in her back all week so we cancelled all our hot rod plans for the weekend. Saturday she thought she was getting better so I took her in the RedRat to BK in Manassas, VA. We arrived a little early but the wind was blowing and it was cold so we sat in the car for about an hour before we decided to leave.

We decided to attend the Bruster's cruise in Stafford, VA and see how her pain did.... She started getting cold after we were there a couple hours and I could tell she was uncomfortable so we left early from there too.

I don't know if she is really sick or she just likes to ring that little bell she uses to get my attention! grin We will see how she mends this week and that will determine what we do next weekend.

Nothing but cruisin

Friday evening and we try to get to the first cruise of the year at VA BBQ in Fredericksburg, VA. I say “try” because it’s 16 miles from home but sometimes it takes a while to get there because of Friday night traffic on Interstate 95. Some of that traffic boils over onto Rt. 1 then gridlocks the traffic everywhere. It was worse than usual tonight because of the Easter weekend and people are traveling. The Princess didn’t get home till 5:30 so we got a late start. In spite of that we slithered out of Stafford to travel about 25 miles on meandering less traveled back roads and arrived at the cruise about 6:30. Some friends told us of taking over 3 hours to make the trip on the main roads….

As the night unfolded it was becoming obvious that we were going to have overflow attendance tonight! There were about 90+ cars visiting throughout the evening. The youngest visitor was in a purple car of unknown manufacture with a questionable roll bar….she looked a little distracted but was nevertheless enjoying her cruise. There was a nice blue ’49 Chevy panel truck with a nifty graphic on the rear door and Allen brought his green Corvair convertible with the old California tag to share with us. Larry drove his Ford Model T tub with the Model T 4 cyl engine that has been hot rodded! Check out the pictures of this, I will be doing an individual article on this car sometime soon so look for it on my blog; http://autoessentials.blogspot.com/ I also liked the black ’38 Chevy flat bed truck and the green ’69 Roadrunner but my favorite was the green ’52 Hudson Commodore. It was the last year for the big luxurious Hudsons….after that they just built the Hornet, Wasp and Jet. We cruised home around the traffic that was still gridlocked at 9:30; I hope this is not a portent of things to come with the traffic on Friday.

Saturday we left the Stafford WAWA at 2PM sharp and headed to Manassas, VA and the cruise at BK on Rt. 28 by the airport. We arrived about 2:45 and the place was filling up! A year ago at the same time there might be 10 cars there, now people start coming earlier and earlier….if this trend keeps up it may turn into an all day deal?! The parking filled up and overflowed to the grass behind the parking lot on two sides! I have seen more cars there but I estimate when we left there were at least 160 cars, and we left at 5:30! I guess the warm weather brings everyone out.

There was a very nice blue & white ’55 Chevy big block, just neat as a pin along with the green & white ‘52 Buick that looked just right. There were three Willys, Bill’s Orange one with the blown early Hemi, Jason’s brown one with the blown Chevy big block and the green one with the 2-4V Chevy big block. I also liked the red ’41 Chevy PU, it too was near perfect….but the coolest car for me was the red ’69 Camaro with the dark blue flames….the big block & engine bay was very trick, you have to check it out!

We left BK about 5:30 with Steve, Jimmy, Dan, Dale, The Princess & me and headed back to Stafford for the weekly Bruster’s cruise in progress. When we arrived there were about 60-70 cars parked with Gary announcing and playing music. We unpacked and set up under the awning of the emergency care place (closed) and settled in to complete our evening of fun with hot rods….but Steve was hungry! Now Steve is usually a nice guy but since he has been on that tofu, bean sprout and cooked yard bird diet he sometimes gets a little cranky when it’s time for him to eat! So Jimmy and I thought it would be better for all the people attending the event if we just took Steve to Sam’s for dinner….real quick….we had to quell the demons in Steve’s tummy. After we ate Steve was a happy camper again and the world was once again in balance. I didn’t begin taking pictures till it was almost too late….so I only got about ½ of the cars recorded….next time bring the flash & monopod!

There was the black ’59 Ford retractable from Colonial Beach and JV, our friend who drives a car with no doors, T-Bucket! Al drove his black ’62 409 post to remind us what SS cars looked and sounded like back in the day. The red ’54 Ford with the 5.4 motor was really special but my favorite was the two tone green ’64 Plymouth….one of the cars I wouldn’t mind cruising in!

Gary Sullivan recognized Ron Phillips for his hard work and dedication to this cruise for the last many years. Ron is the reason the cruise enjoys the success that it does and attracts people from miles around. He is diligent every week ensuring sponsorship and setup for the event. Thanks Ron, for providing a place for vehicle enthusiasts around Stafford to hang out and enjoy our cars. The event closed down around 9:30 but a few of us hung around and talked till 11:30! It’s what we old people do since we have no life and we are not supervised well enough! Hehehehe -3=93