Kingston, NY
September 23, 2007
A couple more local car shows appeared on the calendar. One in Fishkill, NY promised to be similar to the previous one. The other on the same day was in Kingston and appeared to be a bit different. It was not sponsored by a car club but by a couple of folks who wanted to raise money for juvenile diabetes research.
I was told there would be 600 or more cars on display there, and the publicity said there were 50 trophies to be given out. Not bad odds, close by, and for a good cause.
So I showed up at 3 in the afternoon, after spending the morning doing another thorough clean and shine job on the car. I had added a United Federation of Planets flag
to the setup (and broke the antenna on the car in the process) and a few other touches to the car. They placed me at the far end of the parking lot next to a Toyota Celica owned by a guy whose business was ... selling sound systems for cars.
So I had thumpy hip-hop music blasting at me all afternoon and evening. It also drowned out the Star Trek sounds emanating from the Zhang Heng from passers-by.
The show was huge, as advertised.
There was a much wider range of vehicles including classic cars,
antiques,
a Ferrari owned by 2 70 year old ladies,
some cars on the edge,
even an Isetta (when is the last time you saw one of these?)
lots of variety all in all.
The audience included all sorts of folk who would be going in and out of a mall on a Saturday evening. I think our location left us somewhat marginalized in that we were away from the action -- the booths, the stage, the concentration of the most interesting vehicles. I tried to find out how the judging was to be done, and could not get a straight answer. Someone said it was all People's Choice -- a popular vote by the spectators. But noone could find a ballot box, and other staff at the show knew nothing about it. To the end, the judging was a complete mystery.
Liz planned to come up and bring some Chinese takeout, and after I sent an email to all my local friends, a few others ended up coming. We had a nice picnic in the parking lot, and a number of other friends stopped by.
Later in the evening, the winners were announced. There were no categories, specifics, or even the names of the winners, since they did not take our names when we signed up. Numbers were called, someone went up, and picked up a trophy. I was not among them, although the guy next to me with the blasting subwoofer was.
It was a different kind of show. I actually enjoyed seeing the variety of vehicles. I did talk to a few people about hybrids and fuel economy, but not as much as I had hoped.
But it was a great picnic.
