Cars and Coffee, May 2014....and the Cottonwood Arts Festival, too

My fellow motoring enthusiast friend and good all 'round guy Neil and I met up at 7:30 yesterday to oogle cars, as we do every first Saturday of the month.

It was a perfect Saturday morning to be outside looking at cars.  It was a lousy day to be trying to take photos of them....the sun was too bright and the shadows at that early hour too long.  Oh well, whatcha gonna do?

E-Type Jaguars are cool rain or shine.

Ditto for E-Type roadsters.

I'm not a big Lotus fan....they're rather fragile.  But this one, in this color, just exploded in the morning light.  I like the Tiger stripe effect, too.  (Listen to me, all artsy-fartsy!)

Umm....looks like they left the gate unattended for a few minutes and this snuck in.  ("Sneaked" in?)

Wonder if it belonged to this guy?

"Guy walks up and asks, 'Where'd ya get him?'
 The dog answers, 'Aww....I won him in a raffle.'"  :)

The German Goggomobil from last month was back.  Or maybe it never left?  Here's Neil standing next to it for size comparison.

This late model (2002) Acura NSX was a stand out.  We talked with another fellow we met there who bought one new in 1994 and uses it to this day as his daily driver.  He says it's rock-solid.  Try THAT with a Ferrari!

First you start with an overpriced SLR Mercedes, then you let McLaren have a turn tarting it up....to the tune of a cool $500K!

Pay attention kid.  Mother's Day is coming up and she couldn't be any more obvious with her hint.  Tell dad....or maybe that guy over there.  (Not sure what he's looking at behind those sunglasses.  ;)

Ahh....the Frenchies.  The Citroen SM was so far ahead of its time the rest of the world finally just gave up trying to catch them.  Unfortunately it's been pretty much downhill for Citroen ever since.

We visited with the gentleman in the background who also owns an SM and he shared lots of anecdotal stories about these odd eccentric cars.  Meeting people like him is what makes C&C so much fun.

This chopped custom began life as a 1950 Pontiac Chieftain.

Innit kewl?

My first car was a '65 Mustang, but it didn't look anything this nice!

Just FYI, this is the 50th anniversary of the Ford Mustang.

I'm pretty sure it didn't roll off Ford's assembly line looking like this!

There were only 6 Shelby Daytona's ever built.  This wasn't one of them.  This is a replica (kit), and a darn nice one.

I'm generally not a BMW fan, but I seriously looked at a 2002tii just like this back in 1971 (?).  I didn't buy it.  Now every time I see one I kick myself.  DOH!

It's a classic today.

I also considered a Porsche 911 at one time.  Then I could have afforded it.  Now....no way!  *banging head on wall*

A trivia question for you:  Has anyone ever seen an overflow vent hose (?) on a battery?  It left Neil and I both shaking our heads.

I hope that thing is strapped down tight.  If I ever see it on the freeway I'm gonna stay well back.

All I can say is....

And finally, here's a license plate I think many of these fancy car owners can identify with.

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After C&C I picked up K and we went to the Cottonwood Arts Festival.  This was the absolute best art show I've been to.  It keeps growing and the caliber of the participating artists keeps improving, too.

K was too busy watching the gander that chased his lady out of the little pond and up into the crowd with....umm...."less than honorable intentions" to pose for my picture.

Besides checking out the art I always enjoy the people watching.  And the dog watching, too.

This was taken at the Southlake "Arts on the Square" show last weekend.  Our Tarrant County neighbors can't seem to get that "Old West" thing out of their system.  (Hey, I like cows, too, but I like mine served medium rare on a sizzling plate.)

That's all the art shows on our radar until the Fall.

Hope everyone had a great weekend, too.

S

Auto Show debrief

Yesterday my friend Neil and I had a good time at the Dallas Auto Show.  We rode the light rail to the convention center, avoiding all the traffic and parking hassles....easily worth the few bucks it cost, and we arrived ahead of most of the crowd.  Much to my delight and surprise the show was NOT dominated by Bubba trucks.  I was rather disappointed that there weren't any wild concept cars.  None.

Of course I was immediately drawn to the European exotics:

Like this 2014 Aston Martin Vanquish.

Of course I ordered mine "Well Equipped".

After gawking at this more proletarian Vantage ($150K) for a while I was invited inside the velvet rope and assigned my own personal advisor, Aaron Stephenson IV*. Before long I had one of his high-dollar catalogues and was calling him "Biff" and picking colors and accessories.  He's probably still waiting for me after I excused myself for a rest room visit.

Maserati Gran Cabrio

McLaren MP4-12C

The new, soon-to-be introduced Jaguar F-Type.

I didn't say there weren't ANY Bubba trucks there.  This was some kind of "wrap" treatment you can cover your truck with enabling you to hide from ducks and deer and such.

I'm not a big Range Rover fan, but I must admit the Evoque ($58K) was rather impressive.

There were some vintage oddities stuck over in one corner, like this Datsun 2000.  It was quite a screamer back in its day....

....as was this '71 Datsun 240Z.  As a college student I lusted for one of these.  ('Course, I lusted for all kinds of things back in my college days. ;)  As I didn't have $34 dollars back then, much less $3400, it became another of my lost loves.

Awwww, my little Fiat 500 Abarth.  Innit cute?  One of these days I'm gonna convince K it followed me home.

One thing I took away is that cars are getting ridiculously expensive.  A decent BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Lexus, Infinity, etc, is just more than I want to pay for wheels.  They're for those who want a "look at me" experience.  Or Lottery winners.

What I found was that Subaru and Mazda in particular have some quite good cars at very reasonable prices....mid-upper $20's.  Even Volkswagen's are getting pricey, although the new GTI @ $33K still seemed like a good value.  Chrysler products seemed way behind the curve, and poor GM seems to be in a continued slow decline.  Ford, however, had some good small world-class cars worth looking at.

The Geneva or Frankfurt or New York show it wasn't, but all things considered the Dallas show was worth the effort to attend.  Oh...and the "booth babes"?  Not a disappointment, either.  ;)

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On today's "to-do" list?  I asked K if she wanted to go to the Greenville Avenue St. Patrick's Day Parade and Alcohol Soiree, but she said she'd rather take a bullet to the head.  I guess that's a "no".   At this point I'm just hoping for lunch out.

Have a great weekend everyone.

S

*not his real name