Author: Kim du Toit

Worthy Substitute

Drive Time

Hmmmm… for about the cost of a new Honda SUV, you could have this beast instead:

1965 Chevrolet Biscayne Station Wagon

Lemme see:  a bench seat, four-on-the-floor, that fine Chevelle 402 engine, a tow hitch and a bobbing head thingy on the dashboard…

Are you kidding me?

Yeah I know, the Biscayne (in all its incarnations) handles like a barge, uses gasoline faster than you can throw it out the window in 5-gallon cans, and has steering that can charitably be called “vague”;  to mention just some of the objections that will be hurled at me in Comments, no doubt.

Don’t care about any of that.  It’s frigging wonderful:  a vision of mid-60s excess, a manly (family-manly?) vehicle that today would stop traffic (for all sorts of reasons) as I went about my daily business of chugging around north Texas as I visit the range, the supermarket and local bookstores.  And I do believe it has space to carry all my guns to a Schutzenfest — in itself, no small thing to be sure.

Maybe it’s a Good Thing that I didn’t win the lottery last Wednesday night [sob], because otherwise I’d be talking to a guy in Yucaipa CA right at this very moment.

Different Kind Of Island

Real Estate

Following on from yesterday’s post about that island off Miami, here’s an alternative:

As a former city boy, I have to say that I wouldn’t be averse to this kind of setup — just not in NYfC.  The thought of restaurants and stores being just an elevator ride away… yeah, I could do it.

And as for the inevitable “privacy” complaints:  acceptance of its loss is just part of the compromise one makes when deciding to live downtown.

Thursday Landscape

Travels

The Red Lion, Lincoln Ave, Chicago

Best Brit food in the city.  Fish & chips, meat pies, cottage pie, Welsh rarebit… the works.  Also decent beer:  ales and bitter.  When I lived there, we’d go to the Lion about twice a month for dinner.

The pub burned down several years ago, but it was rebuilt and, I’m told, is even better since the rebuild.  It’s located in rather a shitty area, but it’s a block or so up from the Biograph Theater, and the alley next door is where the cops wasted John Dillinger after he’d seen Manhattan Melodrama.

I’d call before going there, just in case it’s since closed — I have no idea how the Covid lockdown affected it.

Getaway

Real Estate

Okay, I could do this, following an appropriately-sized   major crime  lottery win:

First improvement I’d make:  a clay pigeon station (on the ocean side, away from prying eyes behind binoculars).  Second:  hang some steel plates between the dock pilings, for some .22 plinking.

Third:  some kind of seagoing vessel (screw that helicopter foolishness), for both commuting and fishing purposes:

…and lastly, a Barrett M82A1 rifle, to repel any prospective intruders from distance:

I have the shorter-range issue well covered, as you may imagine.

Feel free to add your suggestions in Comments.