1957 Chevrolet Cameo
Connie Britton
Wait: red hair, freckles, dimples, long legs — and all that riding next to me on the bench seat of that exquisite Chevy truck?
Whichever route I chose, the trip would take me weeks…
Category: Drive Time
Time For Another
…All-American Road Trip. (To see the actual East/West Coast route options, go here.) As for the first trip, your choices are limited to cars — in this case, of the 1950s — and women of U.S. origin.
Your car / companion choices are from the following pairings (no swaps or substitutions):
1) 1950 Hudson Hornet
Gillian Anderson
2) 1957 Willys Overland
Jennifer Morrison
3) 1957 Chevrolet Cameo
Connie Britton
4) 1957 Studebaker Silver Hawk
Mariska Hargitay
5) 1950 Willys Jeepster
Emma Stone
6) 1957 Ford T-Bird
Sarah Shahi
7) 1958 Chevrolet Impala
Winona Ryder
8) 1956 Chevrolet Bel-Air
Ali Larter
9) 1959 Cadillac Eldorado
Diane Neal
10) 1957 Chevrolet Corvette
Ashley Graham
There ya go. Your choice in Comments. Mine will appear on Monday.
That Tariff Thing
Ignoring any sensationalism from the Daily Mail (like ignoring rapaciousness from the IRS), I see that Britishland faces a 10% tariff hike.
Which, using Kim’s patented Law Of Ten Method, means nothing. (The corollary to said law, when applied to budgeting, says that you can always take 10% off anything without much or indeed any problem. This is true of a household or corporate budget.) Remember too that tariffs are not applied to the retail sale price — i.e. what you pay for them — but to the cost of goods in the home country. Even so, I expect that U.S. retailers will eat some of any wholesale price increases, so the retail cost of goods to the consumer will not be that onerous. Especially after we’ve just gone through Bidenflation. [25,000-word rant on that topic deleted]
I see this, with amusement:
The UK currently exports around £60billion worth of goods to the US.
Almost all of these goods will now be taxed 10% to send them to the US, making it more expensive.
Within this £60billion, British cars make up just over £6billion of the exports. Trump last night announced a 25% tariff on all imported cars, again making it more expensive, and less attractive, to buy UK-made motors.
So those Rolls Royces, Bentleys and NuJaguar Duracell cars are going to cost more (not the full 25%, as I expect that the manufacturers thereof will eat at least part if not most of the tariff). Somehow, I’m pretty sure that the Murkin buyers (plutocrat scum) of said luxury items will not be driven away by what is not a significant price increase.
Doubtless, my post-lottery Eagle E-type will cost more:
…but I’m pretty sure the lottery winnings would absorb the hit with little notice. [/snark]
As for companies like AstraZeneca (the Covid guys) with their ~5,000% profit margins, my heart bleeds custard, the chiseling scum.
The Euros (20%), on the other hand, may have a harder time of it, and the Chinese (34%) harder still. Whatever. Peruse the table below, and feel free to comment about any of the countries that you may know about.
The Balkans are not listed, but I’ll be curious to see what if anything happens to the price of, say, Prvi Partizan ammo.
Finally, just remember that the United States is the world’s largest market for just about everything made in that world, so if prices rise too high, Americans will just stop buying that imported shit. Which suits me just fine. I’d like to see a whole bunch of textile mills, for example, re-open in places like Mississippi, who could sure use the jobs that they lost to the cheaper sweatshops in Asia in not-so-long-ago times, when the Finance assholes moved their operations abroad.
Interesting times.
Quote Of The Day
From EPA Head Guy Lee Zeldin:
The EPA will continue to protect human health and the environment while unleashing America’s full potential. That means reconsidering the regulations that have restricted every sector of the economy, such as the illegal Clean Power Plan 2.0, Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, and Particulate Matter 2.5 levels. Under President Trump guidance, the EPA also has ended the electric-vehicle mandate that threatened to destroy America’s auto industry and made cars cost more. Instead of forcing Americans to buy expensive vehicles they neither want nor can keep powered up, we are restoring choice to consumers and bringing automaking jobs back home in line with our Great American Comeback initiative. This commitment to our manufacturing base contrasts with Biden administration policies that shipped jobs overseas.
What was that? Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over the sound of big American-made engines revving…
Good Morgan
No, that’s not a silly translation of the German greeting, but a “new” Morgan model:
Yeah, it’ll cost you over a $125k, but it is hand-built, after all.
And yet I don’t know… all those smoothed contours make it look like an airbrushed A.I. creation, somehow.
Here’s an older model, just for comparison:
Am I the only one who thinks this?
Speaking Of Simplicity
Harking back to last Saturday’s post, here’s one way to “simplify” a classic car:
Looks purty, dunnit?
Of course, this E-type’s about like Washington’s axe — all that’s left is the name (in this case, the body) — but at least this new version has a cold-start percentage greater than 30% (the old E-type’s average) and the lights and windshield wipers can work simultaneously (to mention just some of the features).
The price paid for this restomod actually set a new record for nosebleed — although it’s in the same range as all other E-type restomods — but even if I had the money, I think I’d prefer something else.
I remember once thinking that the ultimate restomod would be a Dino body stretched over a Porsche Cayman, but that would probably cost less than a restored Dino, from what I’ve seen. (Nearly half a million bucks for Ferrari’s “entry level” car from the late 1960s? Are you kidding me?)
And returning to the above XKE, I have to think that I’d prefer to lose the rocket launch geegaws and stick with the original six-cylinder 3.8-liter Jag engine. But that’s just me.