This was the first official public appearence of the NECVO. The DARE sponsored Dustoff Car Show in Burlington MA is a great show with lots of cars, and we were part of it for 2002. We didn't really enter to win individual awards, but all in all we won three! Rob and Joe won awards for their cars, and we all won what I was fighting for: The Club Participation Award. Yes folks, our 12 Vics/GMs and 2 Mustangs beat out the Rice Contingancy for the trophy! We took up a lot of space, and looked rather impressive for "normal" cars. No one else had a nifty banner with heavy duty posts, either!
The day started at Pass & Weisz Audi/Porsche yet again. I was almost the last person to arrive! Just on time for work as always... After my first peek at Cooper's LXS with the "pull me over" blue inserts, we all headed to the show. The guy at the first checkpoint looked at me funny when I told him I was showing my car. Then when I pointed back at the dozen or so cars behind me and said "We're all entering", he looked a bit pale. But it was off to the next checkpoints. The pre-registered cars got into the short line, while the others went into the "you should have pre-registered, it's faster" line. So we got a bit split up. As I was being given my paperwork, a man told me to tell everyone with radios that when we got to the man in black shorts, directing cars to park, we should inquire as to the overall health of his cousin Trish. That was the code for getting good parking. So I passed that info on, and next thing we knew, we all were intensely interested in Trish. Good ol' Trish....
The Sport Brothers, Paul and Cooper
After numerous parking location changes, we finally got everyone together and hoisted up our banner. Hoods were raised, windows were cleaned, bugs were scraped off bumpers, and the games began. Dave's Special Home Brew was just one of a slew of toxic chemicals available for use. Gadgets were compared, friendly insults were uttered, and people started to notice certain option packages no one had ever seen before.
In addition to the "Body Color Engine Cover Package" on Tom's car, there was the "Passanger Seat Delete" package in Jim's car. Word is this $500 option just didnt catch on in '94. Jim's car also sports the $1000 "Pirouette Package". This one is popular with police and taxi fleets. Stuntman proudly displayed his thoughts on the package with a simple note on his front bumper: "NOT AFRAID TO USE IT"
Jim, as usual, supplied us with one of the more interesting occurances of the day. There was a group using a remote control car right near us when we got to the show, which was about 9:30am. It was one of those fast and annoyingly loud ones. By 3:00, we were all a bit fed up with it. Everything came to a head when the thing finally lodged itself under Steve's Grand Marquis. Jim decided enough was enough, grabbed the little car, and confronted it's owners. He basically said that they should respect other people's cars and property, and that playing with a remote cotrol car all day near show cars was a less than brilliant idea. That was that for a while, until the car started zipping around again. Jim mentioned it to the security folks, and next thing we all knew, some idiot is in Jim's face, trying to start a fight. He stayed cool, kept his fists to himself, and thankfully security got the guy to calm down. You could hear a pin drop afterwards. People just stopped talking. It was a bit odd, but thankfully normalcy returned and I got my required shot of Stuntman consuming calories, though only in liquid form.
Next was the looooong wait for awards to be awarded. It seemed like overkill having 10 runner-up awards for certain classes, but it was ok because 2 went to NECVO folks. Rob's Vic and Joe's Mustang won! A while later, some folks had left for home, where appearantly they have lives. Everyone who was left sat in the shade, commenting on each other's sunburns, listening for more award wins. I personally was suffering from some form of heat exhaustion and was way too tired to listen to any more slow award giving. Finally, they reached Club Participation. We won, and we all went up to get the trophy. I was happy indeed. My planning hadn't been wasted! We walked back up to our cars to take some shots of the trophies. I felt that what we needed was a nice group shot of us all with our awards. So below is what I could take with the timer on my digital camera. We, the sunburnt holdouts, representing the NECVO family!!
Congrats to us all, and thanks to all who agreed to enter their cars. I dont think the idea of cutting up the trophy so we can all have a slice is the best ever conceived, but rest assured I will do my best to watch over it.
