The Charger

Hi,


I have recently taken a liking to the old Dodge Charger, and mom told me to tell you some reasons why. Here is a picture of one. :)

I love old Chargers, let me count the ways. ;)

1. My dad had one a long time ago.


2. They are like the sportiest cars I have ever seen.


3. They have big motors and a nice body style.


4. This particular car (see top picture) has hidden headlights.


5. The picture below shows the tunneled rear window that all Chargers have.

The bad part is they cost $30,000 to buy one that is fully restored, and you can't find parts at all, but I think it's worth it. :)

Gotta go, Jacob

Muscle cars

Continued from previous post.
"Or at least you understand one of the reasons people love them. There's a lot more to the appeal of a muscle car than the act of driving one. A convertible Hemi 'Cuda didn't fetch $7.5 million in the spring of 2003 simply because the buyer wanted a fast car to run through the quarter-mile. A muscle car's appeal has as much to do with what it symbolizes as with what if actually is. Symbols are powerful things--people die for them every day--and a muscle car symbolizes freedom. More precisely it symbolized an era of freedom.
It was freedom of that brought the muscle car into existence--the freedom of cheep gas and open roads, the freedom offered by the postwar American dream, the freedom to go just about anywhere and do just about anything. And it was the perceived loss of freedom that brought the classic muscle car era to an end. In the sour aftermath of the Vietnam war, the first war we clearly did nit win, our sense of national omnipotence began to wither. With the loss of faith in our elected officials following the Watergate break-in, we suddenly found ourselves adrift without fixed stars to lead us into the future. After the shocking realization that oil was a finite resource, one that depended on forces beyond our control, we confronted the fact that the tap on our economy's lifeblood could be shut off at any time. The freedom symbolized by the muscle car suddenly seemed fragile and transitory in the face of this terrifying trifecta."
Continued in the next post.

Change of pace

Hi again,
This is TEACHER DAWN. Jacob asked me to introduce to you this new topic which he will be writing about for awhile. We were enjoying the book, "The Upland Game Hunter's Bible," right
after Jacob got his shotgun for his birthday. However, at our last trip to the Bismarck Veteran's Memorial Library, Jacob took a turn for the worse--just kidding, son!

It's just that his father's passion for loud, fast cars has taken root in my quiet, mild-mannered teenager. We brought home a stack of books about hot rods--old and new. He picked this book about 3 inches thick that day. I told him that I used to make it a practice to take the skinny books home as I used to lug books for all of us alone. Now that I have a strong, young man to help me lug, we may as well load up. :) The cake decorating ones that I brought home for Cora were much thicker than the ones I used to check out too. May how things change in a few short years!

Anyway, the writer of "MUSCLE--America's legendary performance cars" really has some deep thoughts about how societies' views on things affect car design. I was impressed with his understanding of how feminism (meaning the "Anything you can do, I can do better" mindset) has weakened our men and how that in turn has led to wimpy cars as compared to how they used to be. This guy is a deep thinker AND he has some fantastic pictures of the totally awesome muscle cars that were with us for only a decade.

Truthfully, I was ALMOST ashamed of myself as I listened to Jacob reading this. I can recall when Robert and I were dating, his brother drove in the yard with this bright yellow Dodge Charger. That thing was sooo loud that it made my heart beat so fast in my chest that I felt it thump, thump, thumping. I recall turning to Robert and asked him, "Who in the world is THAT?"

Robert had said, "That's my brother."

"What kind of a wild thing he must be," I thought and said something of that sort to my prospective husband.

Robert had quickly wiped the smile off his face and turned away from me. Years later he told me that this car had been his pride and joy when he was in his later teen years and early twenties. In fact, he had sold the car to his brother just months before he met me! I know for a fact that, had he been driving that Charger when we met, instead of his nice, quiet El Camino (not sure of the spelling), I'd not have given him a second glance.

As I listened to Jacob reading yesterday, I wondered why I thought of the young man who drove the Charger as "TROUBLE" instead of as "STRONG." I certainly am quite fond of my brother-in-law now years later, so why did he seem "WILD" when he drove a muscle car????

I truly am glad that I am more open-minded now to see that strong men are what men are supposed to be!!!!! Women who truly love them will come to understand, somehow, their need to control LOTS of horsepower with their very own, bare hands. How's that for an introduction, Jacob?

Jacob and I both want you to experience the thrill of hearing the authors, Randy Leffingwell and Darwin Holmstrom's description of driving a muscle car. So we quote from page 10 of their book already mentioned above. We quote:

"No other automotive experience matches the magic of executing a perfect second-third speed shift in a fast muscle car. For the most part, running a muscle car through the quarter-mile (even a perfectly tuned muscle car) is an exercise in brutality. It's exciting, thrilling even, and it's intense. But most of the time there's too much going on --too much car to control, too much power going to too little rubber, and too many parts that might break--to transcend the brutality of the moment and enter the magic zone.
When you drop the clutch and launch the car, you try to find a balance between wheel spin and traction, a delicate act when attempting to transmit outrageous torque through skinny, period-correct, bias-ply tires. When you make the first-second speed shift, wrestling over sized synchros around in that bone-crusher of a transmission, you're still doing the traction dance, trying to get the tires to hook up and blast you through the quarter-mile. By the time you make the final third-fourth speed shift, you're going fast enough for a muscle car's barn-door aerodynamics to come into play; the front end lightens up and steering inputs become more suggestions then direct controls. You're too busy trying to keep the beast on the road to fully enjoy the experience.
But a perfectly executed second-third speed shift is pure magic. You slam the gigantic shift lever up from second to third with no clumsy grinding noises emanating from the gearbox, then mash the right pedal to the floorboards while the rear wheels twist the engine's prodigious torque into the terra. At that moment you know what it feels like to wield God's own jackhammer, and you've experienced one of the peak moments in the automotive world. Muscle cars are loud, uncomfortable, and impractical compared to more sedate modes of transportation. But the moment you execute a perfect second-third speed shift, you know why people love them."
Continued in the next post,

Jacob

I've got my permit ;)

Well,

Mom says that I should tell you the 12 steps to get your driving permit.

1. Go to the drivers licence division in the transportation building.
2. Wait in line, if any.
3. Show valid ND ID, which can be a birth certificate and social security number.
4. Fill out a form.
5. Pay $5 to take the written test.
6. If pass, return to the examiner, if fail, leave.
7. Have your eyes checked in machine.
8. If pass, they take your picture, if fail, leave.
9. Pay $10 more.
10. Wait for permit to print.
11. Verify information
12. Leave.

And that is what I did up in Bismark yesterday, along with a whole lot of other stuff.

Well, I had better go,

Jacob

BIG shotgun

Today, I found a video about a guy shooting a 13 foot long shotgun. I have posted it here. It is called the punt gun & it is loaded with 2000 grains of black powder, & the guy who shoots it says in a different clip that he uses 70 grains to load his .50 cal. rifle.

I like this video because it shows what can be done when someone puts their mind to doing something. There are more video clips that you can find on YouTube.

Birthday

Hi,

On November 5th I turned 14, and I am here to tell you what I got for presents. :) Cora gave me a book called, "The Art of Woodburning"; a talking book called, "Nory Ryan's Song"; & a movie called, "Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo." The movie was very funny!

Andrew gave me 1 gift (a very nice one though), and that was a Saitek AV8R flying joystick :) I use it when I fly on Flight Simulator for those of you who don't know what a joystick is used for.
Dad & Mom gave me the new shotgun; a pair of new gloves; the expansion pack for flight simulator; & Andrew & I went on a hunt to find 12 pairs of socks! Mom had hid them in places that are warm or could provide heat.

Well, I had better get going.

Jacob

Pheasants

Hi,

I just read in the book, "The Upland Game Hunter's Bible" about how hard it is to find, let alone shoot, a pheasant. Mr. Holland says, on page 21, that "A cock pheasant is undoubtedly the orneriest, most contemptible, low-down, miserable bird that a hunter ever had to contend with. There's no trick he doesn't know or won't use. Where possible he'll drop his head and tail to the ground and sneak away like a thief in the night, miraculously inconspicuous even in thin cover; if he can see his way clear, he'll dig in and, with head and tail high, run like a race horse; He'll squat within two feet of a hunter's feet, and let the man walk right past him; and he'll fly only when he is cornered -a rare thing-or when it is strictly to his advantage. And when he does jump, he'll do so with a flash of color and a raucous cackle that will throw a man's timing about twenty degrees off center. All of which is high praise. More power to him. And all of which makes the subject of how to hunt pheasants difficult to define."

All of this makes me very eager to go on my first pheasant hunt, and I will let you know how it goes after we do it.

Gotta go,

Jacob