Rust and grime, dust and time

Time takes it’s toll on old cars. Dirt and road grime build up over the years as does rust which is always the biggest demon when restoring an old car. There’s only two ways to deal with rust and that’s cut it out or sand it off.

Although no one wants rust and grime, its pretty cool to see the changes that take place when cleaning up the parts that are in need. Scraping off dirt and old oil to reveal the part beneath it to later prime and paint. It is too damn expensive to pay for new parts when old ones are still good but only need cleaning or paint. Paying someone to do the work is also an option but again do you want to spend money on things like that when you still need new wheels and tires? Save the money for the good stuff. Check out the picture on the left. Rust removed and ready for paint, while the picture on the right shows the parts primed, painted and ready to be put back into the cars chassis.

     

 

Picking through the extra parts that came with the car, I found it wasn’t worth cleaning, repairing and recovering the cars original bucket seats. In hind sight, I should have inspected the extra parts more carefully because half of them weren’t worth taking. One call to a local Auto Recyclers netted me new set of buckets and a center console for $140.00.Perfect leather seats from a Mini Cooper which is a definite upgrade from the ’72 Chevelle bucket seats. The console with its cup holders and armrest/storage compartment adds a touch of today’s cockpit conveniences.

Restoring a car takes a lot of patience and time but its also very Zen in that it’s quiet time you spend detailing and thinking usually by yourself and in the end you feel good about the  results and that you accomplished something rewarding.

 

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Kate and Ally’s, Forked River NJ

DON ‘ T expect the television actresses to serve you, DO expect a surprisingly great meal!

Always looking for a new place to try, this past Saturday evening was no different. Known for their catering prowess, I had been tempted to try their dining room for years but always seemed to forget about them when thinking of places to try. A mistake I won’t make again.

Starting out with two appetizers, Carpaccio and one of the specials that included Shrimp and Lump Crab meat with a Lime Chipotle dressing, was enough of a serving for the four of us. Although the Carpaccio was delicious, I have to say the Shrimp app was extremely good. I love fresh Lime on salads of any type, and the dressing on the Shrimp and Crab really sets off the seafood perfectly. Drag each morsel through the Chipotle drizzle and it makes it all that much tastier. What dressing that was left on the dish mops up nicely with the crusty bread served with the meal. Speaking of the bread, try not to overdo it because its served with a side of herb butter that makes you want to eat it as continuously.

Dinner plates were the following: Roman Pork Chop, Panzerroti, Rigatoni Marcia and my dish was the evenings special Penne with Lump Crab meat, Shrimp and Pancetta in a light( perfect amount) Sherry cream sauce. Since I only ate  from my plate,  I can only comment on my meal. I have to say that I was worried about the cream sauce as with most restaurants, they usually overdo it. Our waitress, I believe her name was Kathleen, bragged about how great the dish would be and I should definitely try it. I must admit she was spot on with her description and completely correct about how good it was. I always judge a restaurant by the size of their Shrimp and portion served. Shrimp should be sized  U-15 or bigger and ALWAYS at least SIX  Shrimp for a dish with a combination of ingredients. Both criteria were filled along with what seemed like eight ounces of Crab meat. It must have been quite a bit because I tasted it in every bite and you could see it’s wonderful lumpiness throughout the dish. It always makes me happy when I have a pasta dish that isn’t a pound of penne with a splattering of the dishes main item. Just the opposite was true with this fantastic dinner.  All the meals were so good that everyone tasted each others choice and none of us could decide who had the best dinner. That’s rare in itself, that everyone’s meal was just a s good as the others.

Writing a review wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the great service staff . Extremely friendly and able to describe in detail each menu item, the wait and bus staff were top notch and trained well. Next time your looking for a great meal and great service at affordable prices, look to Kate and Ally’s to make your dining experience a memorable one! Call ahead for reservations and be prepared not to be seated after 9pm.

Regular Guy rating  * * * *

Kate and Ally’s

216 North Main Street,
in Forked River. 08731

609-971-8888

www.kate-and-allys.com

 

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Ready, Aim, Fire

It really can’t be that hard. A toilet is a pretty big target so I just can’t figure out why so many men can’t seem to get that yellow stuff in.

I have seen some pretty bad urinals in public places that I refuse to stand in front of. Urine on my shoe bottoms is not tolerable, so why then would I want to see it in my own house. I think I might have to get a “port-a-potty ” for the next party, or maybe a flexible shield for the rim. How about battleships in the bowl like they do for little boys potty training. Maybe I can make a game of it. Seriously, your mommy isn’t going to cleanup after you anymore and I sure as hell don’t want to. I almost cringe anymore when a guy comes to my house and needs to pee. Figure it out guys and aim for the water……or try using the white stuff on the roll next to you to wipe up the drops!!!

Just one man’s opinion

The Regular Guy

 

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My new girlfriend

Last week my new girlfriend greeted me happily as my wife looked on affectionately. A black beauty for sure but no threat to the wife as she is quite comfortable with the new addition to our household. The first day of hopefully a long lasting relationship between myself and my (soon to be, hopefully completed) 1972 Chevelle.

Yes I am heading back to the days of my youth, to again restore a prized possession. Purchasing this new canvas to create a modern day ride with nostalgic looks, I shall undertake a long and meaningful journey to bring this fair maiden back to life. As of now she runs, and hiccups a lot, but fear not I shall prevail.

I would like to share my quest with all who care to watch this car transform into something some would call a “one off’ “    creation. Modern day technology in a ride from the past. What better than yesterdays muscle car looks with today’s comforts and safety. Not one for today’s models, I set out to build what “I ” would want in a car. Stay tuned.

 

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Get better napkins will ya!!!

When a burger is so juicy and bursting with toppings, you have to provide strong napkins. Twenty or so napkins later, I got through my Tex Mex Burger at my now favorite burger joint, Burger 25. Almost three years ago when I started my blog, I spoke of my affection for hamburgers and my quest to find and consume the best ones. I have now visited Burger 25 two times and both times left satisfied with a full belly.

The first thing you see when you walk up to the counter is an adult sized font menu on the wall. Actually its the whole wall that portrays 25 different burger varieties and other menu items to compliment or instead of your burger. Easy to read is an understatement especially in today’s world of handheld devices. Its a pleasure to not have to don my glasses just to order up a burger combo.

Step up to the plate and order up one of these Tex Mex Burgers if you like avocado, tomatoes, lettuce, bacon, jack cheese and fried onions. A lot to handle  on a burger but soooo damn good you won’t want to put it down. Messy is par for the course when you add too many condiments to a burger and hence the need for a quality napkin. Anyhow, its fun adding to the pile of white paper on the side of the table, after ever bite, if only to see just how many it will take to get through the meal.

Check out Burger 25 next time you in the area, both in Bayville or Brick , New Jersey.

Burger 25

456 Atlantic City Blvd (Rte 9 south)

Bayville NJ 732-269-2625

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What do you “cherish” most?

 

In times like these I get to thinking. I wonder what it is that people cherish most in life. Is it their car or jewelry?  Maybe it’s their spouse or children? How about that beach front house you built? What exactly is it that people cherish most in life?

Happy Easter! To most of us, Easter is about family, especially children. Setting out the plastic eggs filled with money and candy for our children to find while we sit and watch in joy as they find those little jewels of happiness. For adults it’s about getting together and celebrating. Big meals, wine, fancy desserts and sports on television.  But for most of us, we forget the true meaning of Easter and why we really should be celebrating this day.

Today, as I stood by myself in church, I noticed that most of the people in attendance were of the gray haired variety. I thought to myself how sad it is that we need to reach our golden years before we give religion a place in our lives. How we as adults are so busy with life that we can’t find the time to give thanks for what we have accomplished.

I am ashamed to admit that I don’t find enough time in my life to give thanks to God for all I have and for the people in my life that make it so special. I am too caught up in just trying to make it through each day, pay the bills and try to get enough sleep to start all over again tomorrow.  The only difference, I think, that separates me from most of my peers, is that I recognize how sad it has become that we are all forgetting we were put here for a greater reason than earning a living.

Money, as you might not realize, has become our God of worship. We scurry around all our lives trying to find ways to earn enough money to garner the things we “cherish”. While this is happening we are allowing time to slip by and our life to fade to almost a blip on the screen. Not only do we forget God and religion, but we don’t even see the everyday beauty in life itself that surrounds us everywhere we are.

I thought about what I cherish most and I first thought of my wife, but then I took a minute to think about it. What I thought of was how lucky I was to be alive today. How seeing all these people in church made me think about our greater reason for being here and that I wished I could find a way to help make the people around me stop and rethink why they are alive. How I wished I could take stage like our President and instead of spewing garbage, tell everyone to take back their lives and focus on peace and understanding, not fighting and gluttony. Yes gluttony. We are all guilty of it. The bigger televisions, the fancier phones that we hardly use to call people from, the cars that cost more than homes.

I have always felt that I would have been better served to be born in the forties or fifties if only for its simpler times. Today with all our technology that’s supposed to do us a world of good, we have become slaves to it. Even when we spend time together socially we allow our phones to interrupt us and become what is more important than the people we are with. It is sickening what we have become.

Life is fleeting, life is also very scary, life is fragile, and life is short. Now that I am on the back side of my expected life span, I can see that more clearly. What scares me though is that I cannot find a way to change it without upsetting the balance of family and self in my life.

So as I conclude this post I think that I have taken one good thing from this day. I woke up this morning, kissed my wife and went to church to thank God for all I have. To tell him, I know you are there and I think of you often. To apologize for not being the best person I could be and to promise to try harder to spread his word. I prayed that we as a people would wake up collectively and realize how precious life is and find a way to “fix” this world before it was too late.  I know, what I “cherish “most. I cherish my life and the God that gave it to me.

Peace be with you all

The Regular Guy

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Key Lime Cafe, Stuart Fl

Outdoor dining in great weather is a hard to beat allure when looking for lunch on a sunny afternoon. Key Lime Cafes outdoor seating area offers just the right mix of sun and shade, along with drink specials and a grill style menu.

After dining today at Key Lime Cafe, I decided to read other sites customer reviews before writing one of my own.

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Snip, clip or strip will ya mate

 

Come on man! Those ear, nose eyebrow and neck hairs aren’t working for you. Just because your older now and can’t see them too well doesn’t mean they aren’t visible to others. That eyebrow isn’t supposed to meet the nose hair at the center of your cheek. I am surprised that they don’t ignite when you light that cigar! Ask the wife or your favorite salon girl to clean you up. And please… do it once a month after that.

Just One Man’s Opinion

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Policticans SUCK..well most of them

Do I give a crap about being politically correct. No. If all politicians don’t suck its only because they are too new at it.

It’s really difficult to avoid talking politics today. Everyday I’m inundated with emails about our representatives from all levels of government about what crimes and negligence they are part of. No matter which side you stand by (and I really can’t believe that some still are staunch supporters of their party), you have to be questioning what the hell is going on. Politicians at all levels are ripping us off, practicing insider trading, overtaxing us to pay for their special interest groups, lying under oath (see Holder), committing crimes (see Fannie/Freddie), not being arrested and then being placed in new positions under this administration and so on and so on. This is not only sickening and disgraceful, but what I don’t understand is that so many of the general public still think that this is just part ‘conspiracy theory” nonsense, racism or even worse, they just accept it.

When, if at any time will this end? Are people not fed up enough to demand that our politicians be held accountable for this mess we are in? Its time to stop this business as usual and elect people who aren’t lifetime politicians. How about running the country like it was a small business. When a small business owner faces declining business, he can’t raise prices and expect that customers will come in and just pay more. He has to cut expenses, trim the fat and possibly take home less income to save jobs and the business itself. I have an idea. How about our politicians pay into social security, Obama-care(or whatever the health plan is we are mandated to join), limit terms with no pensions or lifetime pay and eat from the same dish they are serving us. Wouldn’t that help trim the deficit? After all, we have all been asked to suck it up and pay more in taxes to fix the mess they created but never once do we see our reps taking a hit for the better of the country. Is it really that difficult to comprehend? No, not really but why would anyone buy into that notion if its never demanded of them.

Wake up folks! Your losing your homes and retirement savings with no better plan ahead to help you get them back. Politicians are still living and saving at the same levels they have been for years. Has any of them been affected by this like we have? Our President, his family, his staff and lower level politicos continue to fly around our country on taxpayers dollars while a great majority of us are worrying about where the next paycheck will come from. Does it make sense that the employee in this case does better than the employer? Where else in the world does that happen?

Wake up! Its getting late and your letting this happen. Get out and vote for who’s better on their platform, not who’s better on camera. Hold the next group accountable and lets start working on “real change” this time.

Just one man’s Opinion
The Regular Guy

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The Super Bowl..one players thoughts

Great take on the game itself..thought I should share this in case you missed it

Editor’s note: Minnesota Vikings punter, Tripping Icarus bass guitarist, video game aficionado and Twitter icon (@ChrisWarcraft) Chris Kluwe offers his take on the Super Bowl for the Pioneer Press.

The Super Bowl. It is the culmination of an entire year’s worth of work for 106 players and their coaches. It is the gladiatorial spectacle writ large, an entire nation the stage, hundreds of millions of spectators enthralled by 60 minutes of savagery, a chance for three hours to be part of something greater than an individual life. It is the chance for an obscure name to clamber atop the pedestal of greatness or for a celebrated veteran to ruin a career with one ill-timed drop or errant pass. It is the opportunity to rise above the mundane and the petty and achieve immortality. It is everything.

The Super Bowl. It is nothing. It is the overindulged watching the overcompensated while marketing companies rub their well-manicured hands with glee. It is the definition of materialistic consumption as million-dollar advertisements vie with one another to see which can blare the loudest, bedazzled peacocks and sequined foxes strutting their wares for an insatiable audience drunk off emotion and liquor and too many mini hotdogs such a steal at only $3 a box and, no, don’t ask what’s in them.

The Super Bowl. It is a celebration of life. It is the child who grew up with a blind father and almost had to quit playing football to support his family never having to worry about money again. It is the receiver who, despite all odds, was able to fill in at cornerback and make a key play to keep his team in the game. It is the fan who found the strength to rise above the miserable conditions at home, inspired by his favorite team, now a doctor or teacher or mentor and cheering that team on from the stands. It is that penultimate story of the quarterback no one thought would amount to anything, now living the Hollywood dream with a supermodel wife and widely regarded as the best player at his position and, boy, if you tried to pitch that as a movie script, would you be laughed out of the room.

The Super Bowl. It is the funeral march of despair. It is the same quarterback, slowly walking off the field after having come so close to victory only to watch it snatched away by an improbable circus catch, the width of a blade of grass the difference between perfection and an offseason of what-ifs. It is the bitter taste left in the mouth of an entire organization, one some have felt more keenly than most, to travel so far and walk away with only a consolation “Division Champion” ring that most would rather melt down than look at, so stinging are the memories. It is the knowledge that on the one day when it mattered the most, at the pinnacle of greatness, you JUST WEREN’T GOOD ENOUGH GET A JOB YOU LAZY BUM, never mind that those words will echo through your mind long after the lights are shut down and the last piece of confetti is swept away, perhaps to linger the rest of your life. It is the sickening thwack of an angry husband striking his wife, unable to articulate the pent-up frustration and rage he experiences from watching what is, after all, only a game.

The Super Bowl. It is the pathos of the stage on a scale Sophocles could only dream of, a million different story lines merging and swirling together to form one vast tapestry of drama, comedy and tragedy – a resonating stillness of chaos that brings the audience and actors alike so close to a transcendental moment that can never be captured, only experienced. It is the shining instant of perfection, but it is not guaranteed, never guaranteed, only the chance to participate, and is it any wonder that it happens on a Sunday?

The Super Bowl. It is the ultimate dichotomy, at once both a celebration of socialist equality amid the thunderous roar of a capitalistic juggernaut, a dance that any team can attend with that promiscuous belle of the ball, Advertising. It is our society, our culture, our America. It is the gloriously triumphant epitaph that will one day adorn our tombstone of decadence, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

It is the Super Bowl.

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