(GM VP Harley Earl in the forward-leaning Buick Y-Job, a concept car that became a prototype. Photo General Motors). I got a note from an alert reader in New Mexico this morning who asked what the difference was between “concept cars” and “production models.” It was a good question, since the lines blur. The question […]

(1955 Hudson Italia at the Bill Reddig AMC Show at Grissom Aeroplex, Peru, Indiana on 08 August 2015. All photos by Socotra). We got the fever at the car show. We always do, and leave while searching eBay motors for the perfect AMX hot rod, or a curious model Nash or Rambler Ambassador we remember […]

Increasingly, I am looking forward to closing out DC. I have been here a long time, but I think I am feeling that the run is done. I have lived in Big Pink longer than I have lived anywhere in my life (albeit in multiple units) and discussions with my brother in the rented Rav4 […]

We talked about all kinds of crap on the way from Indianapolis over to Circus City for the big car show. It was great to see my brother again, with a lot of water under the bridge and some significant changes in our various relationships and physical conditions. He had run in four of the […]

(A total of 42 cars participated in the Bill Reddig Rally at Grissom Air Park near Peru, IN, on Bill’s birthday yesterday. Photo Mike Socotra). As discerning readers well know, Peru, Indiana, is known as the Circus City. Back in the day, the rails going north and south and east and west all intersect here […]

Sorry if I got you alarmed yesterday. After I wrote about the Chinese weaponizing the personal data they stole on you and me and all my friends and family, it turns out that particular shoe has not dropped yet. A few minutes after mashing the button on my trusty lap-top the word began to spread- […]

What just happened to the Joint Chiefs of Staff ought to make us very nervous. Really nervous. Sorry- the unexpected and untimely death of a peer officer caused a rupture in the carefully crafted Socotra Production Plan, which would have lurched back to the sawn of the modern Iranian Continuing Crisis. Something else happened this […]

BOHICA On Gonzo Station Gentle Readers, The odd events of the holiday season thirty-six years ago seem to resonate today. I think, on the whole, I prefer ancient crises to the ones of the moment since we know how it all turns out. Wait, this is still going on, five or six wars later, the […]

(Eager tourists gather around the US-3 Viking utility aircraft, the only airplane with the legs to fly to Diego Garcia, and hence, the only way off Gozo Station in 1979080. Needless to say, she was a very popular airplane. Photo USN). Gentle Readers, this is a day to cut the lawn at Refuge Farm and […]

December, 1979 I am not going to inflict the next episode of Nick on you this morning. In the process of getting from one thing to another, I ran across this ghostly note from a previous self. I scarcely recognize the young man. He was pretty full of himself. Well, that is what I think. […]