T Minus Five Days

Yes, OCD “sufferer”/Numbers Nerd that I am I am counting to my first “damn virus” vaccine. As I write this it’s actually a little less than five days because my appointment is quite early in the morning, earlier than I am writing this today.

I am still quite upset that my wonderful wife does not have an appointment despite much trying by both of us. I know the probability that she will be vaccinated when she accompanies me is not 100%.

While, in all honesty, we have been affected far less by the damn virus than much of the population, the last year has not been great. I would also offer my opinion that life will never go back to exactly the way it was before.

What do you think? How many of you have been partly/fully vaccinated or have an appointment to receive a shot?

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Today, our high temperature here will be in the low 80s. It’s hard to believe that only about six weeks ago, this was a view from our house:

I did enjoy the snow, especially since it melted two hours after it stopped snowing, except in the surrounding mountains.

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Frustratingly, the issues with writing posts in WordPress using the FireFox browser have not completely gone away. About 1-2 days a week, like today, the issues with the disappearing toolbar and the word count not updating in real time appear.

Hey, WordPress! Can you fix this for good?!

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A picture from a place that we will probably never visit again, the AACA Museum in Hershey, Pennsylvania:

Only about 6,600 GTO convertibles were produced in 1964. Of course, that alone was more than the total number of GTOs Pontiac management expected to produce in the debut year of the GTO option.

One thing I have missed during this last year is attending automotive events and venues. As you may recall, we did attend one outdoor auto show during the first weekend after we moved, but were put off by the low proportion of people wearing masks. Oddly, in a supermarket or big box hardware retailer, virtually every customer wears a mask and all of the staff are masked.

Here’s to hoping the light at the end of the tunnel is not an oncoming train.

#TMinusFiveDays

#DesertSnow

#AACAMuseum

#1964PontiacGTO

#somanycarsjustonelife

#disaffectedmusings

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Half A Million

Somewhere in this post (post number 1,010 if you’re counting, or even if you’re not) is the 500,000th word I have written on Disaffected Musings. As I wrote in the 1,000th post, the quest for a million words has become a major motivator for me to keep writing.

Given that I have had three books published, you would think I would know how many words are in an “average” book. I just don’t remember, any more. Let’s say the number is between 80,000 and 120,000 per book; that would mean I have written four to six books worth of words on this blog.

Please keep reading (and tell your friends about the blog, too) and I’ll keep writing.

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This CNBC article is about a study by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on the impact of raising the minimum wage to $15/hour. According to their work, such an increase would lead to a loss of 1.4 million jobs by 2025.

Those on the left love to shout “You’re a denier” to those who oppose their policies. Well, the left is in denial, too, just like all of those who blindly follow any ideology. Contrary to the blathering of the anti-business, anti-consumer culture crowd, businesses do not have infinite revenues and infinite cash flows.

If a person’s labor is worth $10/hour to a business, forcing that business to pay them $15 is going to lead to that person working fewer hours or losing their job. Besides, the minimum wage in Manhattan cannot be the same as the minimum wage in Tunica, Mississippi. Talk about denial…EVERYTHING is a trade-off.

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On this day in 1964 the Beatles made their first appearance on US television. Of course, it was on the Ed Sullivan Show. The best estimate is that 73 million Americans watched the Beatles that night. That’s more than a third of the entire country, a larger share of the population than the proportion that watched the recently played Super Bowl.

“Popular” music was never the same. In this post I compared the quantum (just for you, Bill) change in music of before and after the Beatles to the change in the American car industry pre- and post-1955.

In my demographic I am no doubt near the bottom in terms of Beatles fandom. However, I fully appreciate and acknowledge their impact on music. From NBC News a picture of the Beatles with Ed Sullivan:

See the source image

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Model year 1964 saw the introduction of one of the most significant cars in US history: the GTO option for the Pontiac LeMans. Model number 22, body/style numbers 2227 (two-door coupe), 2237 (two-door hardtop) and 2267 (two-door convertible) marked the beginning of the modern muscle car era, which had a huge influence on the cars produced and purchased by the American car-buying public into the early 1970s.

When John DeLorean “sidestepped” the GM rules about maximum engine size for an A-Body intermediate car by making the GTO an option package and not a distinct model, it was thought the option package might sell about 5,000 units. Of course, 32,450 1964 GTOs were sold. The car had an effect on the US auto industry way above and beyond even that surprising number. From Mecum, a picture of a 1964 GTO offered at their 2017 Kissimmee auction:

See the source image

As everyone reading this should know, my first car was a 1967 GTO. I like the body style of that year better than any other of the first four years. I am also somewhat of a heretic in that I am not a big fan of the A-Body restyle for the 1968 model year.

Has anyone else reading ever owned a GTO?

#HalfAMillion

#EverythingIsATradeOff

#TheBeatles

#1964PontiacGTO

#somanycarsjustonelife

#disaffectedmusings

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Muscle Car Menagerie

Road Runners, Goats…Super Bees, Shelbys

OK, that was bad free form poetry or incomplete haiku. My friend Ben (yes, I have friends) suggested I write about muscle cars so here I am.

Most automotive historians and fans would say the first muscle car was this:

See the source image

From the appropriately named allmusclecars.com a picture of a 1964 Pontiac GTO. In order to skirt GM rules on engine size in new models, Pontiac division president John DeLorean (yes, that John DeLorean) decided to offer Pontiac’s legendary 389 cubic-inch V8 as an option for the mid-size Tempest model. Sales of this option were expected to be about 5,000, but Pontiac sold 32,450. The other American manufacturers took note and soon muscle cars abounded. The GTO became a separate model in 1966; GTO sales had reached 75,352 in 1965.

OK, what is a muscle car? No hard and fast definition exists, but the general idea is an American factory-built car with a large, powerful V8 dropped into a mid-size body to make a car suitable for drag racing. By that definition one can make a case—and some have—that this might be the first muscle car:

See the source image

From Mecum a picture of a car offered for sale at its 2017 Indianpolis auction, a 1949 Oldsmobile Rocket 88. That was the first year that Oldsmobile and Cadillac offered the first modern overhead-valve, “high compression” V8. That engine was available in Oldsmobile’s smaller, lighter 88 model (as opposed to its 98).

Muscle cars were also supposed to affordable for most. The car that might fit that bill best was this:

See the source image

From cruisinclassicsinc.com a picture of a 1968 Plymouth Road Runner. The Road Runner was offered as a less expensive version of the GTX with more basic trim. (The base 1968 Road Runner listed for $2,896 while the base GTX sold for $3,355.) The standard Road Runner engine was a slightly modified version of the Chrysler company’s 383 cubic-inch V8 that produced 5 more HP than the standard as long as the car was ordered without air conditioning. If A/C was ordered, the standard engine was fitted as the high-performance spec did not produce enough vacuum. The Road Runner engine generated 335 HP/425 LB-FT of torque.

Where do the Mustang-based Shelby GT350 and GT500 fit here? That is a matter of debate. The cars were certainly very good performers, but there was more emphasis on braking and handling, sad to say, than most muscle cars and the Shelbys were never inexpensive. The base price for a 1965 GT350 was $4,457 whereas a base 1965 GTO sold for $2,751. In the interest of completeness, from streetmusclemag.com a picture of a 1965 Shelby Mustang GT350:

See the source image

Ford/Shelby produced just 562 of these in 1965, which was the first year of production. That low volume also disqualifies the car from being considered a muscle car in the eyes of many. These cars began as a stock Mustang that was shipped to Shelby American for the conversion. Among the upgrades were front disc brakes and a modified Windsor K-code engine (with a high-rise intake manifold, bigger carburetor and more aggressive cam, headers, etc.) that produced 306 HP/329 LB-FT of torque.

I hope you have enjoyed this brief and idiosyncratic look at muscle cars. Thanks, Ben.

#MuscleCar

#1964PontiacGTO

#1949OldsmobileRocket88

#1968PlymouthRoadRunner

#1965ShelbyGT350

#somanycarsjustonelife

#disaffectedmusings

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Monday Museum Musings

Yesterday, as a delayed Fathers Day gift my wonderful wife and I took her parents to the AACA Museum in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Her father is a big Studebaker fan and the museum is currently hosting a large Studebaker exhibit. Although my wife and I are museum members the nearly 200-mile round trip keeps us from visiting more often than we do.

Perhaps the big highlight for me was seeing the Studebaker Sceptre concept car in person for the first time. The car is on loan to the AACA Museum from the Studebaker museum in South Bend, Indiana. Without further ado:

By the way, showing photos in this blog is why I am glad I still use a desktop computer with a big monitor. I’m sorry, but you just can’t appreciate photos from the screen of a smartphone.

I think Brooks Stevens was a genius. After his death in 1995 the New York Times called him “a major force in industrial design.” Another great Stevens design was the Studebaker Gran Turismo Hawk. In the bottom most of the four photos above you can see the red ’64 in the upper left. Here are some better pictures:

This is probably the finest GT Hawk I’ve ever seen. Stevens redesigned the Hawk, by this time a dated looking car, for a pittance and came up with a car that still looks good today. Tell me why I’ve left the GT Hawk out of both Ultimate Garages…

The AACA Museum is also hosting a small Pontiac exhibit that includes three GTOs. The only one of real interest to me is this one, a 1964 model.

It means nothing to anyone else, but I find something interesting in the fact that the last model year for the Studebaker GT Hawk is the same as the first year for the Pontiac GTO, 1964. I was just a wee lad, but I was alive at that time.

We all had a marvelous time. Kudos to Bill and to Warren, two volunteers at the museum who were so generous with their time and knowledge.

#AACAMuseum

#Studebaker

#StudebakerSceptre

#BrooksStevens

#1964StudebakerGTHawk

#1964PontiacGTO

#somanycarsjustonelife

#disaffectedmusings

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