In searching for notable events that occurred on this day, particularly automobile-related, the only one that seems to be listed is that actor James Dean died on this day in 1955 in an automobile accident. I don’t understand the James Dean cult or any cults of personality that surround entertainers.
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Do you remember this photograph?
The person smiling all the way at the back in the center is Padres’ Executive Vice-President Bill Adams. For the last few days I had thought about finding out what had happened to him. His wife died about ten years ago and I assumed that he had died as well.
It turns out that Bill Adams died earlier this month. I cannot tell you how sorry I am that I did not reach out to him sooner. He was a wonderful person who came to baseball after a long and successful career with Coca-Cola. He was almost always smiling and he was always friendly.
Carpe Diem!
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I may or may not take a few days off from posting. I am tapped out at present. However, if anyone has a topic about which they want me to write, please let me know.
#IDon’tCareAboutJamesDean
#BillAdams
#disaffectedmusings
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Disaffected Musings 
Write about the idiocy of car makers designing cars that require $2000 worth of labor to fix/replace a $40 part.
It seems that Audi and BMW are especially egregious in this practice. And it cannot all be blamed on “safety/regulatory requirements.”
But I guess if people continue to buy these monstrosities, why change?
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Unfortunately, sometimes–especially with foreign cars–dealers have a monopoly on the right parts and, obviously, will not just sell you the part. You are at their mercy in terms of labor rates. German-made automobiles do, indeed, have a reputation for very high repair costs at the dealer relative to the price of the car.
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I have never been one to “worship” actors, musicians or sports stars. And now you can add Instagram, Twitter and Youtube “stars.”
One interaction I had with a celebrity actually was enjoyable. In the early 90’s, myself and a friend were at Road Atlanta as spectators for that weekend’s Trans-Am race. First practice on Saturday morning a Mustang pulled off the track where we were camping. Driver got out and climbed over the tire wall.. My friend yelled to him that if he wanted to wait in the shade of our canopy to come on up. He did, then took off his helmet and it was Paul Newman. We offered him something to drink, he got a water bottle, and we just talked about racing for the rest of the practice session. He was gracious enough to take a picture with us before going back to his car when practice ended. I would guess the reason he was gracious was that we weren’t a couple of “star struck” psychos, just racing fans. As I had seen him race at various tracks starting in the 80’s, I knew a fair bit about the cars he had driven and some of his results. He seemed to enjoy the bit of reminiscing.
Later that afternoon we were in the pits and went by his team. He was driving for Tom Gloy that weekend and was paired with Walter Payton. Needless to say there was a LARGE crowd around that pit stall. After a while Mr Newman came out of the team trailer and by chance noticed us standing there. Walked over to us, said hi and how were we doing? At that point all the males nearby were wondering why Paul Newman was greeting a couple of “country bumpkins”, and I think any female nearby would have been ours for the taking.
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Thanks for sharing, DDM. Great story…
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Paul Newman was one of the few Hollywood actors who took up racing and was a successful driver. James Garner and Steve McQueen were two others. Both of them along with Paul Newman were generally considered to be nice guys and not stuck up snobs. McQueen won a silver medal in the International Six Days Trials for motorcycles, which is no mean feat in itself.
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