Thursday, July 23, 2015

A busy weekend....


The Friday night cruise at VA BBQ in Fredericksburg, VA would be an iffy deal….the weatherguessers were saying the major rain storms were going to stay south….about 30 miles from the cruise….so that meant it could rain within a thousand miles somewhere!  I checked the radar maps of 5 different sites and felt comfortable that the weatherguessers might be correct this time!   So we loaded the cooler up with water, put a fire in the belly of the farm truck and motored south.

 After we set up our little camp the sky started getting real black and ugly….but it WAS going west to east and it looked like it may stay a little south of us….whew!  As the evening was unfolding more and more cruisers came to visit.  Kandy’s zombie apocalypse response Jeep made an appearance and Kandy gave us a demonstration on how to use the long reach tactical response weapon (air rifle)….I think she enjoys her cars waaay too much!  The green ’37 Chevy Pro Street sedan was very interesting as was the stone stock beige ’62 Ford Falcon.  The TR-6 with the Webers was just too cool then the radically painted & slammed Chevy dually crew cab came in….niice….  John and his drop dead gorgeous, almost black ’37 Chevy coupe met up with the very nicely done black ’39 Chevy coupe….what a photo op!  Then another NY transplant showed up with his gunmetal grey ’52 Chevy PU…. another farm truck!  A lot of new Mopars too….the lime green Challenger with the Shaker hood caught my eye….if I only had a job….hee hee hee  It was a good night at the Q with over 50 special rides joining in on the festivities….oh yeah, we were celebrating something….it was the “Collector Car Appreciation Day”….you did celebrate it too….didn’t you?

I belong to a small group of guys that raise money & awareness to Fisher House Foundation, it’s called Cruisin For Heroes.  We accomplish that by providing a gaggle of special vehicles to business events for a donation to Fisher House Foundation.  We also organize over the road cruises to vehicle centric locations and/or restaurants.  We ask the participants of the cruises to consider Fisher House Foundation when they are doing their yearly charity giving.  We have been working this process for about seven years now and it’s finally starting to roll.  In January this year we made the first contact with Marie at Morais Vineyard and Winery to explore putting on an event in the summer.  After over 300 emails, numerous phone calls, personal invitations and a few visits to the Winery after our first meeting, we accomplished the event on Saturday the 12th.

As with any long range planned event, weather is always a factor.  Planned rain dates are an option but in our experience they don’t work nearly as well as the original date of the event.  Saturday unfolded as a chamber of commerce, postcard perfect day.  High puffy white clouds on a deep blue sky….a gentle breeze and temps in the mid to high 80’s.  Some of the invited people began their journey early in the morning to the event from West Virginia and Maryland as well as Virginia.  The volunteers began arriving around 9AM and the last one was in place around Noon.   We had commitments from 31 people to support us on the 12th….we had 8 people drop out for various reasons and two people ask to join us the day before so we ended up with 25 display vehicles.

The purpose of the display was to generate interest and provide another incentive for potential customers to visit the Winery.  Our display volunteers have agreed to bring their special vehicle to the event to help convince potential customers to visit the Winery and to showcase the Fisher House Foundation.  Our volunteers know it will be a day of interacting with the spectators, answering questions about their vehicles and sharing the Fisher House story with them to raise awareness of what Fisher House does.  It is also hoped that when the spectators know what Fisher House Foundation is, they will feel compelled to donate, either at the event or at some time in the future.  All of the above happens because our volunteers come out and support us.  They believe in the mission of Fisher House and help us share it with others.  We had $375 in our donation barrel at the end of the day!  Morais Winery & Vineyard donated $700 to Fisher House Foundation which was $500 for our fixed fee and another $200 from a percentage of the day’s business!  One of our volunteers, Denny, who makes custom wine bottle stoppers and he donates 100% of his sales to the Fisher House Foundation.  His donation check from Saturday was $450!  The donation from Bad to the Bone food vendor was $100. The donation to Fisher House from Funnel Cake Recess is $41.60.  It was a great day for Fisher House Foundation and Cruisin For Heroes, $1,666.60 of help for our Military Warriors....it really was a win-win day.

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