temperature was still a million degrees…. I got that old Arrow soca song Hot Hot Hot in my mind and couldn’t shake it all weekend! The RedRat doesn’t like the heat but as long as we keep moving its ok…. but each long light is very stressful for me. We got hung up on the light where Rt. 28 runs into Rt. 29…. 4 light changes…. I had to shut off the motor the last two times! We finally pulled into the cruise parking lot and there were 7 cars already there and a few more came later. This was to be a portent of things to come this weekend. I’m told the cruise usually has 20-25 cars but tonight only about 12 came out to play….the heat? The aqua/white ’30 Ford with tunnel ram big block 
Ford power was neat but he only stayed for an hour or so? We ate at Buffalo Wild Wings then sat around a while longer in the parking lot. Lou & Arlene talked with us about how to raise kids and as always Tommy & Terry made us feel welcome and the rest of the local people are friendly and helpful too….if you are near Culpeper on a Friday evening stop by and say HI. We stayed till the black clouds started coming over the horizon then we headed for home….no rain please. And I got to race a yellow Smart car on the way back home....they have no respect for real horsepower.Saturday morning and its still Hot Hot Hot! We stopped at the WAWA for fuel and to wait for the rest of the group. After I fueled the Princessmobile it wouldn’t start. It has been touchy for a few weeks now but after I tell the Princess that she has flooded it and we wait a while it will usually finely start….but today it was not going to cooperate. I called Dan incase I couldn’t get it going and after he showed up we determined that no spark was the culprit….Chevy HEI unit. So we decided to change everything and took off in Dan’s ’55 to the Advance Auto Parts nearby. Anyone that has had hot rod trouble knows how much fun it is when you go to an auto parts store…. the first thing they ask is what year/ make/model/ engine/trans/air/4x4/color/ tire make/air freshener type/ blood type of the original owner….. and it goes on and on. So I tried to prevent all that and just told the young man none of that mattered, let’s just look at the pictures of some 70-80’s Chevy distributors and we will pick out the parts I want. I also told the guy it was a hot rod and his chronological parts book would not help….he listened t
o me and didn’t treat me like I was Capt Gorkanon from the planet Luna! He was actually very helpful and they had an Accel coil as well as a Borg Warner cap/rotor/module. We were going to eliminate any electrical distributor component that might be causing the trouble. As a point of interest the cost was below what I thought it would be, just $108 for everything, a pleasant surprise! We got back to WAWA and continued with our parking lot mechanics even though we still had no beer or cinder blocks…. check the pictures! The Princess and Ramona got tired of waiting for us mortals working on the little beast so they set up their chairs on the grass under the trees of the WAWA parking lot so they could better direct our efforts? I hate it when they do that with their pointy finger! We got the little beast making growling noises so we decided it was time to go. That is part of what makes hot rodding great, people helping each other…. Dan said I was making this a habit every week and maybe I should get a smart car or something…. naw I don’t think so.We leaped off on our 87 mile journey to Stephens City, VA and the 21st annual Valley Cruisers show across from Clem’s Garage. Since we got such a late start, I called the Valley Cruiser representative on the way when we were about 60 minutes out to make sure we could still register….they said just keep coming and we would be OK….whew….I didn’t want to have to drive 100 mph to make it on time….grin.
The town park venue is great, rolling grassy hills, large shade trees, good sound system with cool music, GREAT indoor bathrooms, above average food at very reasonable prices provided by the local Boy Scout troop….one thing though….not many cars? I think there were 56 registered cars! This show usually had 300-400 cars in years past but
now the lot was almost vacant….why? Most people said it was the heat keeping people away and it was Hot Hot Hot. I talked to our friend Bill and he said the other two shows he attended that day also had very low attendance….maybe it was the heat….we’ll see when it gets cooler how the attendance is. This is the first event we have attended that was managed by Valley Cruisers of Winchester and it went smoothly. The only awards that were given out were the longest distance and cl
ub participation awards…. Dan & Ramona got the longest distance one because we used their ’55 to go get parts for the Princessmobile earlier in the day…. so they went further than we did…. I have to think about that, Ramona always figures out an angle, I wondered why she kept saying that we should use the ’55 to get parts?! They also had neat dash plaques and gave every participant a cool commemorative matchbox car, this year was a 
yellow ’70 340 six pack Challenger! There were some nice cars like the champagne ’34 Chevy sedan, the black ’49 Ford and many others but my nicest one was the yellow ’71 Ford Torino GT….it was really nice….till I saw the rear license plate frame! The Cruisers called the show at 1:30 because of the heat and most of the people left but we stayed under the trees and just talked and enjoyed the day. Later someone from the Cruisers came over and asked us if we needed the restrooms because they were going to lock them up, a nice thoughtful gesture!We cruised to a local restaurant and ate too much but since it was air conditioned I think we would have eaten tree bark as long as it was inside where it was cool! After we were all swelled up from eating too much we cruised to McCoy’s Dairy Bar a little further down the road to eat more? What is wrong with that picture? The McCoy menu has hamburgers, hot dogs, sandwiches and almost anything made with ice cream….how can you not like this place? McCoy’s has a cruise on Friday & Saturday night and the owner, Jeff McCoy, told us Friday was the best. Sometimes he has over 100 cars! But since it was Hot Hot Hot and it was Saturday he doubted there would be anywhere near that number tonight. We set up in the parking lot and Jeff came out twice to talk to us. He told of the charity events he puts on like the Rolling Thunder bike show he held for a local wounded warrior and many
other things he does in his community. This is what the mainstream media needs to talk about…. normal small businessmen doing what they have always done…. support their local community by helping others while being profitable and employing local people to help provide a product or service that people want to purchase….hello? This is a long way for a Friday night cruise but we may try to make it when it gets cooler, the ice cream is worth it….we’ll see. Be sure to check out his website at; www.mccoysdairybar.comTHEN we left and cruised to the local drive in theater. The Princess and I had spent way too much time at drive-ins ar
ound Riverside, CA when we were much younger and we had been to this theater a few years ago with a car club. We had a good experience then and wanted to share it with others this weekend. But the management had changed the parking around to accommodate two screens and the grade just didn’t work for us. The Pickups, SUVs and Vans were so big that we had to watch what we could between the larger vehicles in front of us. There was suspicious activity with the people next to me and in front of us….as the night droned on their walking between the three cars took on a decidedly comical gait. And people were sitting on their hoods, roofs and any other horizontal surface of their vehicle so I wasn’t too surprised when we left that someone threw something at my car as we drove out during the intermission. I don’t know what it was and it didn’t leave a big mark in the door but suffice it to say we won’t be back. We cruised home and had the hot rods tucked away at 1AM! A very long experience filled day…. Oh yeah did I mention that it was HOT HOT HOT?Be sure to check here for more pictures; http://community.webshots.com/user/33coupe
And click on the pictures in this blog for larger ones! Enjoy
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