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Date:         Sat, 19 Oct 96 18:44:41 CDT
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Joel Walker <JWALKER@ua1vm.ua.edu>
Subject:      Hippies in the night ... exchaning buses ....

... 0400. for you civilians, that's oh-dark-thirty. a double-cab 71 pickup descended into my driveway, arousing the two worthless neighborhood dogs.

0800. i awoke. woke my worthless non-neighborhood brother, who was spending the night, cause his transmission in his 84 rabbit had croked on him. my nephew and i had gone to the home of said brother (50 miles away) and retreived a "spare" transmission yesterday. today, he was to swap trannies. dogs are still barking. looked outside: HIPPIES!!! :)

after chasing down some parts and oil for my brother, and dropping him off at his workplace, where sat the offending rabbit, and taking the hippos ... er, hippies ... to breakfast at the local Quinceys (yup. breakfast bar. $3.99. all you can gobble), i returned them to the scene of the crime: Rescuing a bus. specifically, Humpback (real name: Quasi-motor, Humpback of Noted Fame), a 1968 Double-cab pickup truck. who had been mistreated by the previous owner ... i.e., the one before me. i'd bought him TWO years ago, it turned out, and had planned on "restoring" him. but things took a turn for the very much worse with my brother and his sudden lack of a job. :( so basically, all my "resto" money was going down the tube keeping a worthless relative from starving and freezing.

note: Relatives were NOT chosen by you. you didn't have ANY choice in the matter. it's not your fault. remember that. it'll help you keep your sanity.

so back at the house, Richard, Sean, and Jennifer, of Northern Carolina, began to see what it would take to get old Humpback on the road and up the highway. surprisingly little. an engine swap, pump up the tires, clean the air cleaner, and off down the highway on a test run. to the junkyard, of course. a minor frightening episode: the strong smell of gasoline, after filling the tank. seems the gas cap didn't seal too well, and Richard put 18 gallons into a 16 gallon tank. going round a curve kinda sloshed a bit outside of the filler neck.;)

junkyard fellow was kinda closed. but his father, the originator of the family business, was there and talked a bit and let the NC folks go wander around in the yard with the buses. they were looking at/for a camper top. it wasn't in as good shape as they remember from the previous visit ... no magic brownies this time?? ;) well, fond memories have a way of not being exactly right. anyway, back the 20 miles to the house and a conclusion to a successful test run. minor glitches appeared: interior light didn't work, dash lights don't work, high beams on only one headlight, no wiper blades at all (well, there WAS rubber on there, but it was flat/flat/flat!). nothing major or life-threatening or even cop-attracting. :)

so we fiddle and fart around on little stuff, me doing my best imitation of a redneck uncle. :) then my brother shows up and we all go to the nearby mexican restaurant for unpronouncible gastronomic delights (or disasters ... kinda depending on the peppers!). had a waiter from Chile.

back to the house, load up the old engine, bits and pieces stowed away in the rear seat, check things again, and off they go. they'll make it to Dave Easterwood's house by about 2230 or 2245 tonight (EST), god-willing- and-the-creek-don't-rise. all the cops are at the local college football game, so they should have clear sailing until past Birmingham ... when all the drunken football fanatics will have caught up with them. maybe they'll get lucky and make it all the way before the DFF's caught up.

so here i sit, wallowing in post-partum depression. it's not much fun to sell a bus. even less enjoyable to see it drive off. it was really strange to see TWO double-cab pickups driving off down the street. kinda neat. but for me, kinda sad. like watching your favorite grandma leave after christmas. money isn't much of a comforter for those kinds of days. especially since i'll likely have to buy a clutch for my brother's rabbit. :(

i guess the only thing to cheer me up would be a double-cab vanagon pickup. ;) sigh. life can be so cruel sometimes.

unca joel


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