Flemington BID hosts another summer of classic cars

From NJ.com:  Flemington BID hosts another summer of classic cars
For over ten years, Flemington has hosted outstanding summer Car Shows on historic Main Street, and last year added the Hunterdon Shopping Center on Intersection of Route 202 and Reaville Ave. location. "This is a great family event that lasts all summer, where folks can see all types of classic cars in a beautiful historic town", said Ron Van Horn, Car Show Chairman. We are excited to team up Fred Bean Toyota-Kia of Flemington fredbeans.com who is this year’s Main Sponsor, and who is bringing some fresh ideas on supporting the event. "We have Kroozin' Productions back with us, who are experts on car shows, and will be assisting us with managing the event," he added. You can expect over 100 specialty, classic, and antique car owners bringing their cars to Flemington to show them off and celebrate Flemington's great place in American history. The Flemington Business Improvement District flemingtonbid.com host the shows, and every night of the car show is a fun event with music, prizes, trophies, kid’s activities, and sidewalk cafes ... and incredible cars.
Main Street in Flemington, one of Hunterdon County's greatest downtowns, gives people of all ages, sizes, and genders, a place to come, be seen, and catch some great classic cars cruising around town. You can catch the car show on Main Street from 5:30 - 8:30 p.m.: (Saturdays): June 1, June 15, June 29, July 13, July 27, Aug. 10, Aug. 24, & Sept. 7 (registration starts at 5 p.m.). And, at the Hunterdon Shopping Center from 6 - 8 p.m. on: (Thursdays): June 20, July 18, Aug. 15, & Sept. 19 (registration starts 5:30 p.m.).
Flemington is a great experience and a shopping mecca with six distinct shopping areas: Historic Downtown Main Street, Hunterdon Shopping Center, Liberty Village Premium Outlets, Turntable Junction, The Shoppes of Flemington, and the Rt. 31/ Church Street Centers. Located at the key junction with Rt. 31/ 202 and Rt. 12, Flemington is a gateway to Hunterdon and Upper Bucks Counties with its rich sense of Americana, unique turn 19th century Inns, agriculture, picturesque towns and villages, the Delaware River, the Sourland Mountain, and towns that are charming with specialty shops and dining. More and more people are rediscovering the beauty, environment, ease, and charm of the area and cruising into Flemington to see the Car Shows, go shopping, eat a great meal and hang out with friends.
Additional co-sponsors are : Flemington Furs, Van Horn Financial of Flemington, Teaberry’s Tea Room, Printech, Stangl Factory Farmer's Market, Matt's Red Rooster Grill, Lee Roth Law, Village Montessori School, Edward Jones Investments, DJ Wright, Crown Trophy of Flemington, Kries Jeweler, Black Lab Studio, CenturyLink, Cooperative Professional Services, ShopRite of Flemington, SDG Alarmtronics, Saunders Jewelry.
All makes and models are welcome. Car Show Assistance provided by Kroozin Productions kroozinproductions.com and for more information or to Pre-Register contact: Classic Car Show Chairman, Ron Van Horn at Van Horn Financial 908-806-6041 or email vanhornron@gmail.com.

 

Take your blood pressure medication!

Spent most of yesterday in the hospital, where my mother was admitted. Her doctor had changed her blood pressure medication a couple of weeks ago, it wasn't doing the job. Unfortunately her doctor was out of town and a home therapist said we should take her to the Emergency Room.

Bad idea, as far as I'm concerned. Put her back on her old medication which was working, just causing her to cough.

Instead we brought her to the emergency room, and since she's old and deaf, this got her more stressed out and scared than ever, because they were all gathered around her shouting questions and wanting to run tests and I'm sure she thought she was dying or something, which sent her blood pressure even higher.

She spent the night there, and is still in today for more tests, which I don't think she needs but I guess since they've got her in there they want to get their money's worth out of our insurance...  she's in a private room which must be costing a fortune....

The reason for my headline... she was about 40 when she was first diagnosed with high blood pressure...took pills for a couple of days but didn't like how they made her feel....so she stopped taking them and tried to do the "natural remedy" thing.

Result, 20 years later she had congestive heart failure, and now instead of taking 1 pill a day she has to take 4. And has to go into the hospital periodically on occasions like these.

Moral of the story - go get your blood pressure checked, and if you have high blood pressure make sure you take your meds, otherwise believe me you'll wish you had, when it is too late...

Never get involved in a land war in Asia

and never agree to transcribe 20 hours of meetings from an Australian business meeting.

That's what I've been doing for the last 4 days...utter nightmare. Could NOT understand their accents. Making it worse were the bad audio levels and the fact that a lot of the people preesnt insisted on talking over each other from all around the room except in front of the microphone... I will never transcribe ANYTHING every again.

Anyway, so sorry to be MIA from my blogs.

2013 Toronto Auto Show: Classic cars, hot rods, and luxury abound

From Wheels.ca: 2013 Toronto Auto Show: Classic cars, hot rods, and luxury abound

Classic cars. Hot rods. Souped-up street racers. Exotic rides of the rich and famous.
When car enthusiasts enter the doors of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre for the 40th year of the Canadian International AutoShow, the selection of special exhibits will draw them in five different directions.
There’s a lot to see and do in the 600,000 sq. ft. show crammed with over 1,000 cars and hundreds of manufacturers, exhibits and vendors.
More: How to make the most of your visit to the auto show
And this year, said show exhibit sales co-ordinator Jon Rosenthall, they’re taking it up a notch with the first-ever Canadian Hot Rod Builders showcase.
It didn’t start out an exclusively Canadian event, Rosenthall said. During a trip to the United States for a number of hot rod shows, Rosenthall said the light bulb went on.
“We wanted to show the history of hot rods and the talent of builders designing these cars,” Rosenthall said. “We saw the Canadians’ cars and we decided to do that.”
Self-proclaimed car nut and show general manager Tom Tonks said blowing away show attendees is the ultimate goal: Bringing ticket holders something that will really knock their socks off and showcase the complete hot rod package.
“Chrome, paint jobs, fine quality coach work and interiors, all that sort of stuff, that’s a huge wow factor,” Tonks said. “We thought this would be for our clientele. It’s something they wouldn’t normally be exposed to and unique for them to see.”
With 29 customized hot rods on display, Tonks said it’s an opportunity to showcase Canadian talent.
The hot rod showcase will be a good pairing for the tenth installment of the Cruise Nationals. Considered a salute to the weekly or daily cruises that happen in cities and towns across the province and the country, ten cars will face off for the coveted winner-take-all title for the best classic car.
The top 10 vehicles built in 1975 or earlier — two hot rods, two restored vehicles, two muscle cars, two fifties vehicles and two trucks — are chosen from 60 vehicles selected at 10 regional qualifying car shows where attendees cast ballots for the top six cars. The top 10 cars were selected at Autofest Oshawa in this past August.
An online vote on the auto show website started on Dec. 10 where people could cast a virtual ballot for their favourite classic ride. The voting closed at the end of January.
“To augment that, because those are online votes, we have three celeb judges who evaluate each car,” Tonks said of the three judges from the Toronto Star’s Wheels section who will tally scores for each vehicle. “They’ll evaluate each car in their own right and once we get the results from their values we weight them with the online votes and we come to the decision who is the top three winners.”
From customs to classics, the trifecta is completed with a trip to Autoexotica, a showcase of some of the fanciest vehicles on the road today — within the dreams of many, but maybe not price range.
Bentley, Rolls-Royce, McLaren, Ferrari, Aston Martin and Lamborghini are on display to showcase the lavish, premiere driving experience the carmakers provide for its upper class clientele.
“It’s a huge draw. Everyone aspires to it,” Tonks said. “Not everyone is in a place to operate in that type of stratospheric territory, but there isn’t a person who isn’t an automotive aficionado who doesn’t want to see and experience these types of cars.”
And what was known in years past as Sports Compact Revolution has evolved. The showcase, which highlighted cars, fitted with after market gear like the rides in the Fast and the Furious movie series, has now become Sports Compact Evolution.
The number of exhibits available indicates a wide-range of opportunities for attendees to soak up the automotive world, said Rosenthall.
“We have to be as diverse as the auto show attendee with what we do,” he said.

Do we love classic cars (and guns) too much?

From Mother Nature Network: Do we love classic cars (and guns) too much? 

Anger over the crushing of a '59 Chevy Bel Air matches the passion over a gun buyback in Tucson (home of the Gabby Giffords shooting). 

The two-tone 1959 Bel Air,with Stovebolt Six and Powerglide, shortly before it met an untimely death in a safety-related crash test. (Photo: IIHS)

Do you pat your car’s fender after putting it away in the garage? Do you give it a name? Do you call it “he” or “she”? If so, you’re not alone — millions of otherwise normal Americans treat their inanimate cars as if they were alive. Why else the outrage when all those EV-1s got crushed in "Who Killed the Electric Car?"

 

I’m not reporting this from some high cliff of superiority — I do it too. When I scrape my car’s paint, it’s as if it is feeling actual physical pain. Why do we do this? Frankly, it’s complicated. The ownership of an automobile (and especially a classic with a long history) is intertwined with all the emotional experiences we’ve had in it, from a first kiss to the drive to the hospital when baby’s due. You can’t just send it to the crusher without a second thought, but you also have to put it in clear perspective — it’s not alive!

 

Understanding the emotional attachment people develop toward firearms is a bit harder for me, but it’s obviously there for millions of Americans.

 

I was reminded of this whole phenomenon this week by two unrelated incidents. In the first, Bob Palma, a columnist for Hemmings Classic Car, is moved to rage by an insurance institute’s crashing of a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air (Stovebolt Six and Powerglide, if you were wondering). Here’s the gory video:  (Viewer discretion is advised.)

 

 

Now, the point here is that cars of that era were not very safe, and that’s underscored by the Bel Air’s total annihilation at the hands of a 2009 Malibu. In real life the impact would have killed the occupants in the old Chevy, cute as it is. The Malibu driver, in an intact passenger cabin, with advanced safety protection, could probably have walked away. The fatality rate in crashes of that era — with no crumple zones, seat belts, breakaway steering columns or airbags — was much higher. That’s why the death toll hasn’t gone up (much) despite a vast increase in vehicle miles traveled. As Consumer Reports pointed out, the crash test “shows just how far passenger protection has come in the last 50 years.” But the columnist (writing in the March 2013 issue, though the Bel Air went to glory in 2009) completely misses the point, instead bemoaning the sad fate of that two-tone classic car.

 

“That Bel Air was a well-preserved original car,” wrote Palma, who’d actually inspected it in Arizona before it was sold to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety for $8,500. “That bat-wing sweetheart had survived five decades, only to suffer five seconds of intentional — not accidental — destruction in a vain, senseless act.” Palma wrote the IIHS a “terse” two-page letter condemning the crash test as “grandstanding” that was “foolish” and “irresponsible.”

 

Readers of a New York Times column on the crash test were similarly incensed. “What a waste of a nice ’59 Chevy Belair!” says one. “What a waste of a sweet Bel Air,” adds another. “Nice whitewalls.” I'm recalling similar grief over the hugely successful Cash for Clunkers program ("they crushed a perfectly good 1964 Le Mans!"). As much as classic car owners (and I'm one) don't want to admit it, their shiny beasts are often big polluters, minus catalytic converters and other emissions equipment.

 

Photo: Steve Rhodes/Flickr

 

At least some of us (not me) are similarly fetishistic about guns. That’s demonstrated clearly in a column written by Steve Kozachik, vice mayor and City Council member in Tucson, Ariz., (scene of the Gabby Giffords shooting). He led a local gun buyback program (turn your weapon in to the police and get a $50 grocery coupon) that met with a furious reaction.

 

“The response made it clear the event I was planning hit a nerve among a group who evidently believe the proper disposal of a firearm is tantamount to the desecration of a holy icon,” said Kozachik, who has recently switched his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat in protest of the party’s position on guns.

 

“Guns are not fetish objects,” Kozachik wrote. But they obviously are for people who hate the idea of perfectly good rifles and pistols going out of circulation. Being killed, as it were.

 

I’m not advocating the crushing of all classic cars or the melting down of every gun. I’m just sayin’. Perhaps we’re getting a bit too emotionally attached to these man-made objects. If it would save one kid’s life, taking some deadly weapons out of circulation isn’t that big a price to pay. If it would stop one horrific fatal crash and teach us more about safety, saying R.I.P. to some antique car survivors is perfectly justified.

OMG!

Never realized I hadn't posted in over 2 weeks!

Sorry, folks

Things have just gotten away from me the last week and a half...posting should be back on schedule starting this weekend.

UK: How to insure a classic car

From The Telegraph:  How to insure a classic car 

For the rebellious among us, the Goodwood Revival, which takes place this year on September 13-15, is a salivating, lusting experience: all those wonderful classic cars making exhaust noises that on new models are thoroughly illegal, pushing out CO2 at non-PC levels, and which have safety systems that at most involve just a brake pedal.

How wonderful, you may think, to kick over all those wretched, nannyish, namby pamby health and safety regulations and just own and drive a car that takes your travel back to basics.

It can be anything from a Ford 8 Model Y (£100 when new) to a Jaguar D-Type but apart from buying the machine and maintaining it, there is another very significant aspect to consider: insurance.

For years I insured my – now elderly - Porsche 911 through a large insurance broking firm. Initially treated as a regular daily driver, it had an unlimited mileage, business use, two named drivers, fully comprehensive cover that cost between £400 and £500 each year over the best part of a decade. But two years ago that soared to more than £750.

There was no written explanation, no apology, not so much as a by-your-leave. Surely some mistake? No. It was due to the increasing number of spurious claims and the escalating cost of repairs, younger drivers, and many other factors. None my direct concern. What about the effect of the Arctic ice cap melting?

Unamused, the broker said that as the car was not used a great deal, around £500 would buy a limited mileage classic car policy. Give it a go? I was busy, and agreed.
At last renewal, though, the figure was back to £700. I had covered about 1,500 miles in the car in the previous 12 months, and to put it mildly, it leads a cossetted life. I tried to explain this to my insurer. But in essence I was talking to a flow-chart and a computer. No understanding, no interest: this is what the computer says – and that's that. Hopeless.
So I decided to call some classic car insurance specialists, which led to a quote almost halved from the original: mileage limited to 3,000 annually (it could be increased if necessary) and business use included. The key to achieving this proved to be the ability to talk to people who knew precisely what my car is (a 3.2 Carrera Sport coupé), and how I would treat it.
Among the specialist companies is broker ClassicLine, which employs only two dozen people but looks after around 25,000 classic cars. Director Darren Coote said that unlike some large brokers and insurance companies that are involved with the mass market, including young drivers, van drivers and those with a poor reputation, ClassicLine's clients own cars that cover low overall mileages, that are cherished, invariably driven with great care, and not parked in dodgy areas. Owners often belong to established marque clubs and most are aged between 35 and 70, says Coote, "So we can offer exclusive schemes that are not available elsewhere. And our rates have risen little over the last few years. For example, 10 years ago a Triumph TR6 would cost from about £85-£90 to insure. Today it's from £100."
Why? "Because a TR6 owner is unlikely to use his car as a daily driver. Statistically it will rarely go out in the wet and it's very much for Sundays and special days only," Coote adds.
It's the same for exotic Ferraris and Lamborghinis, he says. And they are generally cheaper to insure than a 911, as Coote explains: "That is because a 911 is so usable. Even the older ones are practical, reliable, can be - and are - used daily for shopping, commuting and business trips. So, compared with some other exotic models, insurance costs for them can be higher."
ClassicLine also handles current or late model "future classics", such as Mercedes' SL, the Jaguar XK-RS, 911s, or any Ferrari or Maserati. Says Coote: "The proviso is that they are treated by their owners as being something very special, covering less than 6,000 miles a year. We wouldn't be comfortable with 20,000, whatever the car or its age."
Sometimes, regular insurance companies and brokers can be very cautious. The words "Bentley Turbo R" uttered by journalist Simon Harris resulted in a request for £1,000. He had just bought a very smart 1988 Turbo R (price new £110,000) for £10,500: "So I went to a classic car broker who understands cars like mine and why I would own one. Now, my cover is £225 a year for a 3,000 mile limit. But despite its fuel consumption (17-18mpg), I enjoy driving the Bentley so much that I'm likely to exceed that. No problem, I was told, and for an extra 2,000 miles, I expect to pay about £50."
So when it comes to insuring a classic car, it seems that choosing a specialist is the best policy.