{"id":225,"date":"2010-05-09T23:25:00","date_gmt":"2010-05-10T03:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/?p=225"},"modified":"2010-05-19T21:57:37","modified_gmt":"2010-05-20T01:57:37","slug":"down-and-home-tomorrow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/?p=225","title":{"rendered":"Down and home tomorrow!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was going to try to make it to my cousin&#8217;s house in Virginia Beach &#8211; but it was just running too late and I stopped about an hour out of town at some Comfort Inn &#8211; which are usually no frills &#8211; and this one is too. I have no complaints &#8211; same deal, the truck and car are parked within eyeshot of my window just like last night.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/truckathotel.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-226\" title=\"truckathotel\" src=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/truckathotel-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/truckathotel-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/truckathotel-170x127.jpg 170w, https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/truckathotel.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The trip today was great. Before I started on my way, I put some stickers on the car that just said &#8220;Visit www.MYUNCLESMUSTANG.com.&#8221; I&#8217;d like as many people to know the story about the car as are interested, and it seems that there are a few &#8211; especially on the road home. Right in the hotel parking lot this morning, the woman at the desk had a look at the car and then pointed across the lot to her red 2004 Mustang Convertible. Along the way, I stopped a few times and each time someone approached me asking about the car.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/atncreststop.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-227\" title=\"atncreststop\" src=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/atncreststop-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/atncreststop-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/atncreststop.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Next, a gentleman in the Cracker Barrel parking lot asked me if it was a &#8217;65. I told him it was a &#8217;66 &#8211; they have a different grille. He told me he had a &#8217;68 fastback &#8211; a gorgeous car in its own right &#8211; and wished me luck in my travels. He got a kick out of the fact that I was pulling it from south FL to NJ.<\/p>\n<p>Later in the day, right over the South Carolina\/North Carolina border at the rest stop, a guy named Billy from right in North Carolina approached and asked after seeing the sign, &#8220;I guess that&#8217;s your Uncle&#8217;s Mustang then?&#8221; We both laughed and he started ask questions about the car. The Q &amp; A is usually the same &#8211; where&#8217;d you get it? Florida&#8230; what year is it? &#8217;66&#8230;. And then I usually offer up that it was my Uncle&#8217;s and he was the original owner, it&#8217;s been sitting in his garage since he passed away in late 1998, and I am bringing it back to Jersey to restore it.<\/p>\n<p>Billy told me he has a restored big block SS Chevelle &#8211; I think he said it was a &#8217;65 &#8211; a true SS. Impressive vehicle. I wish I remember the year for sure. He examined the interior with an impressed look and I told him that I couldn&#8217;t open the door at the moment &#8211; the keys were packed away &#8211; but I could open hood and show him the motor. While looking at it I explained that it hadn&#8217;t been run in at least a decade, and I figured I wouldn&#8217;t try to start it. He\u00a0gave me some advice on what to do to turn the engine over. Pull the coil wire and crank it to get the oil pressure up &#8211; &#8220;it&#8217;ll be alright then&#8221; he said. I&#8217;ll give it a try &#8211; and also pour some oil over the valves before I do &#8211; that suggested by my friend David.<\/p>\n<p>While Bill and I were talking, Dwayne from Georgia walked up with a big smile on his face. The older gentleman asked me if it was a &#8217;65 just like the guy at Cracker Barrel did earlier in the day. I told him it was a &#8217;66, and about this time Billy was looking under the car at the floors &#8211; Mustangs are notorious for rusted out floors and I knew that this one has some early rot but aren&#8217;t through and through bad.<\/p>\n<p>Dwayne examined the car, the engine, and had a smile on his face like a kid in a candy store. He told me a story, and if I recall from then till now (I have to start keeping notes when I talk to these folks) a friend or relative of his had a relative that owned a Ford dealer. When she graduated, that relative gave her a Mustang convertible &#8211; and he drove in it. \u00a0With a satisfied smile, he said with that it was quite a memorable ride. It was then that his wife Linda came over and said, &#8220;I see he found his car,&#8221; smiling. She asked me if I bought the car, and I explained that it was my Uncle&#8217;s. She asked about my Uncle and I gave the abridged story.<a href=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/mapanduhaul_leg2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-233\" title=\"mapanduhaul_leg2\" src=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/mapanduhaul_leg2-300x203.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"203\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/mapanduhaul_leg2-300x203.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/mapanduhaul_leg2.jpg 628w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Billy, Dwayne, and his wife Linda all went on their way, as did I &#8211; but not before a biker named David came up and we talked a bit about it. He was riding from Myrtle Beach and expressed some dissatisfaction about how commercialized the place had gotten.<\/p>\n<p>So tomorrow I visit my cousin and then I ride home. Right now, I am here somewhere outside of Norfolk and Virginia Beach in a Comfort Inn that is adequate, but nothing to write home about. I am ready for bed &#8211; and yes, I have already checked on the car, at least 3 times from my window.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was going to try to make it to my cousin&#8217;s house in Virginia Beach &#8211; but it was just running too late and I stopped about an hour out of town at some Comfort Inn &#8211; which are usually &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/?p=225\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":352,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions\/352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myunclesmustang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}