Started out as a typical retired guys day, but turned into something more than that!

Shiftless

Well-Known Member
So here I am just a tick over 3 weeks away from being retired for 15 years!


I thought I would share this event that happened to me and others here last Friday.


On Friday I usually join a local Hot Rod group and meet up at a buddies house, talk a little on watz happnin, then fire up and go lunch somewhere. Stay at Home has crushed that event for weeks now. Usually 1930’s, 40’s, 50’s and 60’s cars of all different set ups and or all original patina rides show up. I would say 300 to 700 HP is the range of most. It has grown to bring generally 15 to 22 for lunch each time. All together 45 to 50 of us. Youngest is a semi retired 37 year old with the oldest of us who is now 84 and still races (hires a driver) but almost does all the work on his cars!!


Friday comes!


We are all jazzed as 30 car’s show up. We are meeting up because we have cancelled the last month of Hot Rod Friday’s and have decided to go cruise the area we live in so we can rattle windows and give all the “Stay at Homer’s” a little eye candy, and some serious thumpin! Yes, believe it or not we had to counsel a few 70 + year old punks not to do crazy burnouts at least on this day!!! As we started this idea, one of the wife's got in on it, took control off the route,and made a special arrangement that would just BLOW ALL OF US AWAY! We meet up and everyone gets the route which is a follow the leader type thing. Our friend's wife sets up on the local Facebook page”What, Where and When” we would be driving by their streets if they wanted to watch.


Starting out we are greeted by families on lawns, families on corners, waving holding signs like “Thanks for something different” was one of them. Chalk signs on corners thanking us for including them. It was VERY COOL! It goes on like this for an hour plus driving thru the local neighborhoods.


BUT THIS BLEW ALL OF US AWAY!


One of the Gal’s got us into a multi level care retirement home that handles everything retiree's could ask for to final stages of life care. You can have a home with a garage all the way to a full on Alzheimer wing at your disposal living here.

We were told we could cruise thru the place, just can’t stop and get out of your car. We pull in and there are signs everywhere you “CAN NOT” come on property “NO MATTER” who you are including Family! These people have been on lock down for over 40 days! No Friends, No Family, they get to see “NO ONE” but masked care givers in all areas. They stood resident’s outside their homes, apartments, stood on sidewalks, looked out of large panes of glass from buildings and in wheelchairs to watch us drive by while caretakers held or steadied the people. All clapping, waving and shouting their best shout they had!


The response was extremely humbling! We may be retired, but for some of us this is in our future! If that becomes my end days? I sure hope something similar to this brightens a day for me too! The last guy I see is a 92 year old, old time hot rodder I have not seen in over 15 plus years (thought he moved away) and here he is barely holding his thumb up the best he can while he is pumping his hand thumbs up with all his vigor left in his 92 year old limb. As I looked into his eyes and I wave my hand back at him I realized that this little cruise thru the Valley has meant the world to him, others and I get lucky to also be part of this! This was way more than I ever expected!

If you get a chance to do something similar hope you join in!
 

Operational needs

Virescit Vulnere Virtus
So here I am just a tick over 3 weeks away from being retired for 15 years!


I thought I would share this event that happened to me and others here last Friday.


On Friday I usually join a local Hot Rod group and meet up at a buddies house, talk a little on watz happnin, then fire up and go lunch somewhere. Stay at Home has crushed that event for weeks now. Usually 1930’s, 40’s, 50’s and 60’s cars of all different set ups and or all original patina rides show up. I would say 300 to 700 HP is the range of most. It has grown to bring generally 15 to 22 for lunch each time. All together 45 to 50 of us. Youngest is a semi retired 37 year old with the oldest of us who is now 84 and still races (hires a driver) but almost does all the work on his cars!!


Friday comes!


We are all jazzed as 30 car’s show up. We are meeting up because we have cancelled the last month of Hot Rod Friday’s and have decided to go cruise the area we live in so we can rattle windows and give all the “Stay at Homer’s” a little eye candy, and some serious thumpin! Yes, believe it or not we had to counsel a few 70 + year old punks not to do crazy burnouts at least on this day!!! As we started this idea, one of the wife's got in on it, took control off the route,and made a special arrangement that would just BLOW ALL OF US AWAY! We meet up and everyone gets the route which is a follow the leader type thing. Our friend's wife sets up on the local Facebook page”What, Where and When” we would be driving by their streets if they wanted to watch.


Starting out we are greeted by families on lawns, families on corners, waving holding signs like “Thanks for something different” was one of them. Chalk signs on corners thanking us for including them. It was VERY COOL! It goes on like this for an hour plus driving thru the local neighborhoods.


BUT THIS BLEW ALL OF US AWAY!


One of the Gal’s got us into a multi level care retirement home that handles everything retiree's could ask for to final stages of life care. You can have a home with a garage all the way to a full on Alzheimer wing at your disposal living here.

We were told we could cruise thru the place, just can’t stop and get out of your car. We pull in and there are signs everywhere you “CAN NOT” come on property “NO MATTER” who you are including Family! These people have been on lock down for over 40 days! No Friends, No Family, they get to see “NO ONE” but masked care givers in all areas. They stood resident’s outside their homes, apartments, stood on sidewalks, looked out of large panes of glass from buildings and in wheelchairs to watch us drive by while caretakers held or steadied the people. All clapping, waving and shouting their best shout they had!


The response was extremely humbling! We may be retired, but for some of us this is in our future! If that becomes my end days? I sure hope something similar to this brightens a day for me too! The last guy I see is a 92 year old, old time hot rodder I have not seen in over 15 plus years (thought he moved away) and here he is barely holding his thumb up the best he can while he is pumping his hand thumbs up with all his vigor left in his 92 year old limb. As I looked into his eyes and I wave my hand back at him I realized that this little cruise thru the Valley has meant the world to him, others and I get lucky to also be part of this! This was way more than I ever expected!

If you get a chance to do something similar hope you join in!
Thank you for making their day! That was awesome!
 

Shiftless

Well-Known Member
Just got sent a text from one of my friends wife. Apparently after the cruise around the retirement home the 92 year old guy I recognized was pushed back to his room in his wheelchair so he could call his Daughter and tell her what happened! She went on to explain that her father had been feeling down due to the isolation of no Family and Friends can visit! Said once she heard him say "It was the BEST" She really new it made his day!
 

Operational needs

Virescit Vulnere Virtus
Just got sent a text from one of my friends wife. Apparently after the cruise around the retirement home the 92 year old guy I recognized was pushed back to his room in his wheelchair so he could call his Daughter and tell her what happened! She went on to explain that her father had been feeling down due to the isolation of no Family and Friends can visit! Said once she heard him say "It was the BEST" She really new it made his day!
I’m sure the sound of that HP really got him going.
 

Shiftless

Well-Known Member
Most the guys have electric cut outs. When the 500 plus HP guys open them up the sound and vibrations get your attention no matter what age just at idle!
 

Shiftless

Well-Known Member
OH BOY its hapnin again!

We are doing another cruise 5-1! This time its to visit 7 of the local restaurants we go to for Hot Rod Friday Lunch! This time we have arranged for one of the staff of each restaurant to be there while we cruise thru and we do the touchless thang!

Meaning we will pull into their parking lot, each vehicle will hand out a window a sealed envelope with money for the staff to do what ever they please with! Buy some gas, get that prescription, get some groceries, their choice or if they want one person who needs it the most they can do what ever they want!!

Should be FUN! I am having to warn the people collecting the monies the Hot Rods Shake, Rattle and Roll and they can be LOUD at times but the Old Fartz behind the wheel are harmless old wrench spinning, immature 17 year old kid's and may appear to have not matured into their really old bodies! They should be safe!

The amazing humbling part again is! The owners of the establishments are all saying the same thing!
" altho the morale has been down and the influx of money will be nice, just knowing we care about them is worth everything to them" Many have applied or signed in or up for un-employment and here 6 weeks later no response! No monies coming in! They are suffering Big Time!

I hope all is well with you guys on this site! Make you appreciate the Steady Eddy check UPS offers each week!
 
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Shiftless

Well-Known Member
Well, we did it! We did what we called "The Envelope Cruise"!

Here is the crazy part. When I was going around to the 8 restaurants (was 7 at first) the stories from the owners just blew me away! I guess I should back up a little? I meet up usually every Friday for this thing called "HRF" (Hot Rod Friday, when I'm home) which is a wide array of gear heads. All different profession's. All walks of life. Just a wide array of hobbies and interests, yet we gather to share with Hot Rods on Fridays.

Back to "blew me away" like I said. So I hear word about the restaurant workers issues, so this cruise idea gets rolling to help them in some way. Well, what is better than cold hard cash! So as I am going around meeting all the owners to see if they would allow us to do this for them I keep hearing these stories about all their workers going on 6 and 7 weeks still not getting unemployment checks or the $600 stimulus check or even the $1200 checks and they are hurting so bad. Everyone of these owners described how and to what degree they offered their help their staff. Imagine, these owners stepping up paying rents and putting food on the table the best they can to retain some of the long time staff right down to helping the kid washing the floor mats. Problem is they are all just about tapped out!! What A FRIGGIN MESS! The owners were so humbled that we even thought of their staff! The staff couldn't even believe it since for 7 weeks its been hard as hell!

So Thursday I went around to each establishment and gave 1 very specific hat and a certain color protective set of gloves. Along with instructions on What time and Where to stand as a designated receiver for the company with some type of way to allow us to hand them personally from our vehicles a sealed envelope of cold hard Cash! Thus making it a touchless event!

Friday comes, We show 30 people the hat and gloves and say! Pull up to the person wearing this particular hat and glove "ONLY" and hand out your envelope and drive away! I also had the duty to tell the drivers some sad news to them, not all just a few (too many), NO BURN OUTS! Yes they took it pretty good. Not bad as some of these guys especially those in their 70's you would swear they just stole the family car, they know their going to be put in military school when Pops finds out and figure LETS DO IT anyway!

Imagine the look on the faces of people standing next to cars shaking the ground, blowers huffin and cars with cut outs open letting the designated receiver feel his own heartbeat getting out of rhythm a bit! The best part was the look on all the staffs faces just seeing someone cared about them! To us, that was priceless!!!

SUCH A BLAST! We drove around our local areas restaurants we picked, it took about an hour and half in total. We gave out the Drivers side window to those in real need over Six Thousand Dollars of cold hard cash so maybe they can get by for awhile with maybe a little food on the table, gas in the tank or maybe a much needed prescription for a child who knows?

Don't know how your area is doing? Hope all is well with you and the family! I'm grateful that is for sure!
 

Eat Sleep Fish

Jig Master
So here I am just a tick over 3 weeks away from being retired for 15 years!


I thought I would share this event that happened to me and others here last Friday.


On Friday I usually join a local Hot Rod group and meet up at a buddies house, talk a little on watz happnin, then fire up and go lunch somewhere. Stay at Home has crushed that event for weeks now. Usually 1930’s, 40’s, 50’s and 60’s cars of all different set ups and or all original patina rides show up. I would say 300 to 700 HP is the range of most. It has grown to bring generally 15 to 22 for lunch each time. All together 45 to 50 of us. Youngest is a semi retired 37 year old with the oldest of us who is now 84 and still races (hires a driver) but almost does all the work on his cars!!


Friday comes!


We are all jazzed as 30 car’s show up. We are meeting up because we have cancelled the last month of Hot Rod Friday’s and have decided to go cruise the area we live in so we can rattle windows and give all the “Stay at Homer’s” a little eye candy, and some serious thumpin! Yes, believe it or not we had to counsel a few 70 + year old punks not to do crazy burnouts at least on this day!!! As we started this idea, one of the wife's got in on it, took control off the route,and made a special arrangement that would just BLOW ALL OF US AWAY! We meet up and everyone gets the route which is a follow the leader type thing. Our friend's wife sets up on the local Facebook page”What, Where and When” we would be driving by their streets if they wanted to watch.


Starting out we are greeted by families on lawns, families on corners, waving holding signs like “Thanks for something different” was one of them. Chalk signs on corners thanking us for including them. It was VERY COOL! It goes on like this for an hour plus driving thru the local neighborhoods.


BUT THIS BLEW ALL OF US AWAY!


One of the Gal’s got us into a multi level care retirement home that handles everything retiree's could ask for to final stages of life care. You can have a home with a garage all the way to a full on Alzheimer wing at your disposal living here.

We were told we could cruise thru the place, just can’t stop and get out of your car. We pull in and there are signs everywhere you “CAN NOT” come on property “NO MATTER” who you are including Family! These people have been on lock down for over 40 days! No Friends, No Family, they get to see “NO ONE” but masked care givers in all areas. They stood resident’s outside their homes, apartments, stood on sidewalks, looked out of large panes of glass from buildings and in wheelchairs to watch us drive by while caretakers held or steadied the people. All clapping, waving and shouting their best shout they had!


The response was extremely humbling! We may be retired, but for some of us this is in our future! If that becomes my end days? I sure hope something similar to this brightens a day for me too! The last guy I see is a 92 year old, old time hot rodder I have not seen in over 15 plus years (thought he moved away) and here he is barely holding his thumb up the best he can while he is pumping his hand thumbs up with all his vigor left in his 92 year old limb. As I looked into his eyes and I wave my hand back at him I realized that this little cruise thru the Valley has meant the world to him, others and I get lucky to also be part of this! This was way more than I ever expected!

If you get a chance to do something similar hope you join in!
Just saw this. Great job man! And a good story.
 
Thanks! I preach all the time to stay busy.

Giving back and doing things like this just add to a full life when you retire!

Just seen too many guys (not all UPS) just get lazy and DIE! "friend That" more fun to stay busy and bug people!
Exactly what I do for $36/hr working PT. Even if I could make more money being retired. Too boring.
 
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