Saturday was a rare "double your fun" kind of day

Yesterday was both the first Saturday Cars and Coffee AND the 10th Annual Italian Car Club of North Texas car show.  Cars in the morning, football in the evening.  Doesn't get any better!

It was another miserably hot summer Texas day, but at least there were some clouds around that gave us a little respite.  I met my friend Neil around 7:30 and we promptly began comparing notes on how we would spend our lottery winnings.

We both agreed dropping a few coins on this custom Porsche would be a fun investment.

This BMW Z3 M Coupe is just odd enough to be interesting.  And I like the color, too.

The Audi TT seems to have lost some of it uniqueness, but I'd still like to have one.  This TT RS was slick!

I've never been a big fan of the Chevrolet "fiberglass coffin", but if the Lottery Commission said it was mandatory that all winners must buy one, I'd go for an older model like this.

My very first car was a 1965 Mustang.  Unfortunately it didn't look anything even remotely this good.

Next we went to "Something-or-Other Farms", a pleasant park-like setting in Grapevine,  just north of DFW airport. 

First car inside the gate....BAM....I'm met by a gorgeous classic Ferrari Daytona.

One of my two favorite Cars of the Day (it was truly a toss-up) was this 1967 Ferrari 330 GT 2+2, owned by McKinney, TX car dealer Pat Lobb.

It was pristine inside and out.  And the aroma of that fine cream-colored leather is still with me today.  So nice!

One of the Italian Car Club gate monitors must have been geographically challenged....he let in two British Triumphs.  :)

Interesting story of the day:  The owner of this beautiful 1985 (?) Alfa Romeo GTV6 bought it new from the Alfa dealer in San Francisco, trading in an old Toyota Celica on it (he got $3K for it).  The window sticker on the Alfa said $17,503, a pretty hefty chunk of change back in '85.  I'd say he was smart to hold on to it all these years.

This Alfa Romeo Guilia GTV was Neil's favorite of the day.  I must admit it was pretty special. :)

One of the most unusual cars there, a model that I'd never seen "in the flesh" before, was this '60 vintage Lamborghini Espada.  It was "different".  OK, who are we kidding....the proportions were just odd.  (Sorry Mr. Espada owner.)

One of the local Maserati dealers was there showing off the new, redesigned Quattroporte.  List price was $167K, and it was noticeably bigger than the old Quattroporte.  Too big IMO.

Here is my other personal "Co-Car of the Day"....a 1930's vintage Alfa Romeo 1600.  It was owned by a retired Coast Guard Commander who spends his summers in Seattle and his winters here, coming back early for just this event.  Thanks, Commander!

*OK...deep breath*   Today I'm prepared to "come out of the closet" and admit it:  I'm not really a car "petrolhead".  Instead, I'm an automotive "esthete" (noun:  esthete 1. a person who has or affects to have a special appreciation of beauty).  

I realized this when I kept seeing guys gathered around the open hoods of cars talking about camshafts and compression ratios and dry sumps and such, while I kept thinking, "I wish they'd close the hoods and boot lids so I can get some pictures of the fine lines on these beautiful cars."  ;)

Finally, my favorite window sticker of the day:

Hope you're enjoying your weekend.  Stay cool.  :)

S

Someone....STOP THE MADNESS!

Where will this all end?  Technology is running rampant.  I guess that isn't exactly a "stop the presses"*  news story, but things get more and more outlandish by the day.  Have you heard about this one....Galaxy Gear?

Earlier this week Samsung introduced their smart watch, in reality a computer with a 1.63" touchscreen, a camera, runs 70 different apps, and who knows what else.  Sony has one, too, and it's rumored Apple will have one out shortly also.  Shades of Dick Tracy!*

This thing wouldn't work for me.  First of all, clumsy as I am, I'd trip over the extension cord.  Second, can you imagine how tiny the keyboard is?  With my fat fingers the keyboard on an iPhone is barely manageable.  A 1.63" screen....no way!

I hadn't noticed, frankly, but according to the article I read many / most kids today don't even own a watch.  You walk up to a kid on a college campus and tap on your wrist, the universal symbol for "what time is it?", and the kid will just give you a blank stare.  Now you'll be able to tap on your wrist, and they can Google "what time is it?" for you.  I suppose that's progress.  :)

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Some watch trivia for you:  One of the Queens Elizabeth from centuries ago was once seen wearing a watch on her wrist.   Fashion conscious women mimicked her, but not men.  Men preferred to carry pocket watches on chains.

One of the early European aviation pioneers, Alberto Santos Dumont, changed all that.  Back in the early 20th Century successful aviation flights were measured in seconds or minutes.  It was difficult for an early aviator, with all hands and feet working rudders and throttles and sticks, to fly his machine and still be able to reach into a pocket and pull out a watch. 

Being the most daring, dashing man in all of Paris at the time, welcomed in all the most fashionable places, Alberto's friend Louis Cartier specially designed for him a watch that could be worn on the wrist with a leather strap, making it easier for him to record the duration of his flights and still keep his "hands on the wheel".  Before long everyone wanted one, and the wrist watch became the norm for all well-dressed men.  Until now, apparently.

If you enjoy aviation history, I suggest you read Wings of Madness: Alberto Santos Dumont and the Invention of Flight.

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Guess what day it is?  Guess...what...day...it...is?  Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike....guess what day it is?  IT'S FRIDAY!  :)

S

* Does anyone even remember what "stop the presses" means, or who Dick Tracy was?

The art of logos

In my humble opinion, the biggest con man (men) alive today are the ones who design corporate logos.  They'll tell you they're trying to define the essence of a company by just one word or one symbol.  OK, fair enough, but why does it take a whole team of $500-an-hour graphic designers months to come up with a winning design?  Are they the ultimate control freaks or just high-class pickpockets?

A story in this morning's news told of how new Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer (who makes considerably more than $500 an hour) spent an entire weekend with her "logo design team" putting the finishing touches on a new symbol that had taken months (and probably cost millions) to get to that point. 

Some logos make sense, having a story behind them:

Ford's logo says....well....FORD, as in "Henry Ford".  The epitome of simple.

Audi's four interlocking rings represent the German companies Horch, Auto Union, DKW, and Wanderer that joined together to form Audi in 1932.

BMW used to make airplane engines, and the blue and white circle in the middle of their logo represents a spinning propeller.

I'm guessing their logo "design teams" knocked those out in an afternoon, probably drawn on a cocktail napkin after a few beers down at the corner tavern.  But nowadays we tend to over-think everything.  We have to hear from (pay) graphic designers, consultants, psychologists, focus groups, etc, before we can come up with a winning design.

The stock brokerage firm Merrill Lynch's logo is a bull, as in "Bull Market".  Get it?  I wonder how many million dollars it cost to design that stylized bull?

But back to Yahoo.  Here was their old logo:

Here is their new logo:

They wanted something that would look "sophisticated, yet whimsical".

Here are the doodles that it took to get there:

I have visions of the mail room boy pushing his cart down the hall when he stumbled across the logo team hard at work.  "Why don't you just straighten out the letters, and make that last O a bit bigger and tilt the exclamation point?  That would be sorta whimsical."

DOH!

But what do I know.  I designed ours on the back of a cocktail napkin after a couple of beers down at the corner tavern.

To me it says "Sophisticated, yet too cheap to hire a design team".  ;)

S

Just stuff cluttering my odd little mind today

Isn't this eerie?  It's a picture from the NYT showing life today in the no-man's-land around the old Fukushima nuclear power plant after its triple-meltdown in 2011.  Doesn't it remind you of that National Geographic Channel show Aftermath: Population Zero about how nature will take back over after humans become extinct?

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Now this is just downright evil:  It seems there are pregnant women doing a booming business selling "positive" home pregnancy test kit results on Craig's List. *

The visual ones selling for $25....

The digital ones going for $50.

I can only think of 2 reasons women would want to buy these.  One, they want to trick their boyfriends into marrying them; or two, even more dastardly, they want him to cough up money for an abortion.

OK guys, two can play this game.  I'm announcing my new venture....home vasectomy test kits that show negative results. **

Here's how it works:  For $50 I'll send you my home vasectomy test kit with a negative readout proving you're shooting blanks.  You just stick it in your ear (which everyone knows is where sperm hang out when on they're on standby) and in seconds you can show her the results, "98.6" being the code for "all play, no work".  Even a couple of degrees higher should still give you time to make the airport.  ;)

   * This part is real.

  **This part isn't.

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Have you ordered yours yet....your "anti-surveillance" clothing?  A guy named Adam Harvey has introduced his line of clothing made with some sort of metallic-cloth blend material that supposedly hides your body heat signature from drones flying overhead.

"Top Gun 3 to base....ahh, yes, my screen is showing a couple of unattached arms walking down the sidewalk without a body....I think we've found our guy....over...."

He's also offering a cell phone case made from a similar material that prohibits your cell phone from emitting signals that can be tracked.  "No electronic signal can get out" (or in, I presume), Adam proudly announced at the unveiling of his "Stealth Wear" line. 

Umm....Adam....haven't you just turned your smart phone into a dumb rock?

I think Adam needs to keep his day job on the loading dock.

Hump Day.  Yea!

S  

State Fair time

I'm a hot / cold fan of the State Fair of Texas.  This year I'm cold.  First, it's a hassle to get there and park.  Second, it's full of relatively unsupervised little urchins.  And third, it's expensive, and everything you buy requires "tickets", which means you have to stand in 2 lines.

The Fair's big draw is always that year's Prize Winning new fried food concoction.  This morning it was announced that the winners included deep-fried Nutella and deep-fried Thanksgiving dinner.

"Please pass the Thanksgiving dinner balls."

 "....fried Thanksgiving dinner....is the stuffing and diced turkey rolled into a ball, mush that together there. Then we'll be dipping it into Southern-style cream corn. We're gonna roll it into a seasoned cornmeal, this gives us the texture we're lookin' for when we fry it."

 Well, at least it's efficient.  Wham, bam...5 minutes...dinner's done.

I rarely eat fried foods of any kind, but one I do enjoy is an Original Fletcher's Corny Dog sold only at the Texas State Fair.  It seems old-man Fletcher invented them back in the 1930's, and his family keeps his creation alive by selling a boat-load of them over the 3-week yearly run of the Fair.  I think I read somewhere that the family works those 3 weeks, plus probably another couple of months preparing, and they net $400,000. 

The only thing my old-man ever "invented" was updating an old-wives-tale remedy for an ear ache, which actually made my ears worse when I was his guinea pig as a kid.  The doctor had to dig the stuff out of my ears, and told dad not to ever do it again.  He might have made a good traveling snake-oil salesman, but I don't think it would have been wise for him to ever go back to the same place twice.

Maybe I'll just stick to being a semi-retired, almost legendary king of consulting / CEO for rent.  Besides, that 3-week stint at the Fair probably would require I get up way too early.  :)

S

Let the fun begin

I wonder which is worse?  This, or packing, moving, and then unpacking 10,000 boxes? 

We're moving in 10 days.  Fortunately it's just to the other side of our building, one floor higher.  Why?  Because it has a terrace with a view, "view" being a relative term.  It's also 150 sq ft +/- larger, but that's just incidental, and of course it costs more, but the wife wants a terrace, so.....  The good news is we can just load stuff on furniture dolly's and roll it, no boxing required.  

My final remaining life torment is going away today:  I have a HUGE Ethan Allen entertainment center that has found a new home as of this afternoon.  I'm convinced moving this monster last year is what gave me a herniated disc in my back.  Now it will be somebody else's problem pride and joy.  

It was beautiful in our previous home (with the 24' x 36' Great Room), and the gigantic old tube-type TV fit perfectly, but with flat screen TVs these days and the trend, at least for us, to downsize, it's become a dinosaur.  Prior to my last move my dread was what to do with my old, monster desk?  Fortunately at the 11th hour a fine gentleman with exquisite taste (or did he just have a screw loose?) stepped forward and bought it.  *whew*

We're slowly-but-surely getting back into fighting trim.  Excess stuff accumulated over the past several years has been disposed of, which should once again make our modest abode quite comfortable.  If I can just stand the clutter for the next 10 days.

Oh....and a Happy Labor Day to you all.  :)

S

Tell me again why I should be sad about summer's passing?

Well, here it is the first day of September, the first day of the month many people equate with fall.  In many places trees are turning vibrant colors, a few leaves will already be falling (is that where the term "fall" comes from?), and being outside actually becomes pleasant again.

But I'm in Texas, and to a Texan September just means more of the same.  Today's high temperature is forecast to be 103.  I've been reading blogs and Facebook posts where the authors are lamenting the passing of summer.  I say "bring it".  Good riddance.  I long to be able to go outside for a few hours and NOT come back dripping wet, sticky, and smelly.

I always get a chuckle watching TV commercials during football games this time of year where the Budweiser  Clydesdale's are pulling their wagon through scenery that looks something like this:

*Sigh*

It will be at least another 6 weeks, maybe longer, before I'll see anything like that around here.  When it finally does find us it will be intense, but brief.  One morning we'll just wake up to find one giant leaf dump, and that's it.  Hello winter.

But even that isn't so bad, at least here in Texas.  Jeans and a light jacket will usually suffice.  Shovel snow?  I've heard Yankees complain of it, but never understood the point of shoveling the meager 4" of snow that might collect on my sidewalk after the "epic storm" our weatherguessers had been warning us about for a week finally arrives.  And besides, in 3 days it will be back in the 60's (70's?) and the snow will take care of itself.  Shovel snow?  Pfffftttttt.

But all that is months away.  On this September 1st I'll just spend my time mostly indoors, the air conditioning running full blast, sipping my iced beverage, dreading my trips outside with the dog, wondering why he can't just "hold it" until fall.  :)

Stay cool friends.

S