I live in a very weird town.
Los Alamos, NM was never meant to be a town, of course-it was a temporary place to secretly develop and construct the atomic bombs used in WWII-after that, the land it was on was supposed to be returned to the homesteaders, Indians, and boys school that it had been seized from. Of course, that never happened, and now its a full fledged city, with a population of just over 12000-a population that swells to close to twice that during the work day. According the census, Los Alamos has the highest number of PhDs per capita in the U.S. Its not unusual to see some of our nutty professor types showing up for lunch in their pajamas of course, now they can claim to have started a fashion trend, but should they have? :lol: Its the sort of place where you can see an atomic bomb at the carwash:
No wonder such a small town has 40 churches ..:lol: (Of course thats a model :lfao: )
And we have wonderful free weekly summer concerts. Last Friday was the Red Elvises:
View attachment $red elvises.jpg
And, oddly, for such a small town, a Ferrari Owners Club, and an Exotic Car Owners Club. I went to a meeting or two, about a hundred years ago, but Im not much of a joiner (Really Some day Ill post about the Los Alamos Mountaineers Club .:lfao: ). Some Ferraris can be had pretty inexpensively, but you wouldnt want one-Ive often wondered how Tom Selleck managed to fit in a 308GTS for Magnum, P.I. never mind drive one-its a squeeze for me at 62, and hes 64, only to find out they were specially modified just so that he could fit, with padding removed from the seats, the seats bolted in further back,and a smaller steering wheel installed even then, his head was well above the windshield frame:
View attachment $tom selleck.jpg
You can probably pick up a decent 308 GTS for $15k, but wouldya wanta? This Ferrari talk may seem like a digression, but, trust me, its not. Los Alamos, though ..
..like I said, an odd kind of town. Im glad I didnt grow up here, like Rita-thats the wife-did.
One of Ritas best growing up in LA stories is how, two weeks short of the end of her junior year in H.S., her calculus teacher told the class that theyd basically been taught all she had to offer them, and how Joey Martz, a kid in her class, stood up and proceeded to fill the next week with mathematical lectures that amazed the class and the teacher Joey Martz, who has all the social grace of a cup of mud, but a genius IQ, went on to become head of the labs weapons division-a job that carries a salary somewhat above the presidents-as in the POTUSs- and, not really being the sort to be adept at obtaining the company of women(see social grace of a cup of mud), spent his money on a big house with a really big garage for his exotic cars. Joey-er, Joe Martz, who went on to be President of the Los Alamos Ferrari Owners Club, and the Los Alamos Exotic Car Owners Club-having not just two Ferraris, but a couple of NSXs, a Detomaso Pantera (yeah, those arent that expensive, either ) and 2 Lamborghinis.
No, Im not jealous at all. :lol: Really, I cant even sit-that is to say fit- in all those cars but one of them, and, besides, I got Rita-thats the wife :lfao: And Joe does almost all his mechanical work himself, meticulously, and drives pretty well to boot-like me, he sought out higher levels of drivers ed to go with his equipment, so I dont begrudge him anything-give me my Porsche any day, though. :lol:
This all has another point, anyway, that puts this post in the Study, instead of the Locker Room .
Theres a document that s been floating around the internet for about 15 years or so, now-you can find it on the NSX forum, and the Ferrari forums, and a few other places. Its an Exotic Car Owners Code of Conduct, and it was originally penned by one Joe Martz:
And that brings us to rules 4 and 5 (I really dont have much use for the other happy, friendly rules-Im not always going to have a smile on my fact, and I have more time for volunteering than Joe ever did, so rule 6 is B.S., since, until recently, I didnt have any time at all .:lol: )
Rule 5, though-a rule to break the rules-what a concept! Mind you, Im not averse to opening it up on some of the roads that we have out here, but even the highest powers of observation and diligence can preclude all dangers to myself and my vehicles when I do so-I once nailed a jackrabbit while doing about 135 mph, once, and-while I didnt crash, or even slow down, it did do significant damage to my front air dam .what was I supposed to do? Swerve for a jackrabbit and maybe crash? I dont think so .:lol:
On the other hand, that Mask fellow from the TAPOUT crew could have used a little of Rule 5, I reckon
I think if youre breaking the rules ,though, and you know it, then youre breaking the rules and thats pretty much it: I did it;Im glad I did it, and Ill do it again. Thats why I have a radar detector and jamming equipment-so that I only get one very small speeding ticket every two years or so (usually for like 10 over, when Ive often been violating the speed limit by doubling it :lfao: ) so that, most of the time, I get away with it. Which is, after all, an American tradition-we watch heist movies and root for criminals to steal something that belongs to someone else, and are most delighted when they get away with it-usually with a funny, Oceans 11,Italian Job, Hot Rock kind of twist. For years, the official start of summer where I grew up was a photo of a kid jumping off the railroad trestle over the Croton Reservoir-NYCss water supply. Illegal to jump off the trestle. Illegal to be on the tracks. Illegal to swim in the reservoir. The caption usually read, An unidentified teen (wink, wink, nudge, nudge :lol: )executes a dangerous and illegal jump off the railroad trestle into the Croton Reservoir, signaling the beginning of summer Of course, 9/11 probably changed that, and swimming in the reservoir might just be an act of terrorism, now.
There was even an article in this months Outside magazine on breaking the rules, and actually teaching your kids when its okay to break the rules, like swimming at that favorite swimming spot right underneath the sign that says NO SWIMMING. I gotta wonder, though, where we draw the line on this sort of behavior-not harming others? Only potentially harming ourselves? Silly rules? Ive known people-too many, really-who skied in closed off areas-really good skiers, well within the limits of their ability, not harming anyone else-that were killed by avalanches for doing so-on that day, at any rate, they should clearly have obeyed the AREA CLOSED sign.
So, thats pretty much my question, MTers-where do YOU draw the line?
Los Alamos, NM was never meant to be a town, of course-it was a temporary place to secretly develop and construct the atomic bombs used in WWII-after that, the land it was on was supposed to be returned to the homesteaders, Indians, and boys school that it had been seized from. Of course, that never happened, and now its a full fledged city, with a population of just over 12000-a population that swells to close to twice that during the work day. According the census, Los Alamos has the highest number of PhDs per capita in the U.S. Its not unusual to see some of our nutty professor types showing up for lunch in their pajamas of course, now they can claim to have started a fashion trend, but should they have? :lol: Its the sort of place where you can see an atomic bomb at the carwash:
No wonder such a small town has 40 churches ..:lol: (Of course thats a model :lfao: )
And we have wonderful free weekly summer concerts. Last Friday was the Red Elvises:
View attachment $red elvises.jpg
And, oddly, for such a small town, a Ferrari Owners Club, and an Exotic Car Owners Club. I went to a meeting or two, about a hundred years ago, but Im not much of a joiner (Really Some day Ill post about the Los Alamos Mountaineers Club .:lfao: ). Some Ferraris can be had pretty inexpensively, but you wouldnt want one-Ive often wondered how Tom Selleck managed to fit in a 308GTS for Magnum, P.I. never mind drive one-its a squeeze for me at 62, and hes 64, only to find out they were specially modified just so that he could fit, with padding removed from the seats, the seats bolted in further back,and a smaller steering wheel installed even then, his head was well above the windshield frame:
View attachment $tom selleck.jpg
You can probably pick up a decent 308 GTS for $15k, but wouldya wanta? This Ferrari talk may seem like a digression, but, trust me, its not. Los Alamos, though ..
..like I said, an odd kind of town. Im glad I didnt grow up here, like Rita-thats the wife-did.
One of Ritas best growing up in LA stories is how, two weeks short of the end of her junior year in H.S., her calculus teacher told the class that theyd basically been taught all she had to offer them, and how Joey Martz, a kid in her class, stood up and proceeded to fill the next week with mathematical lectures that amazed the class and the teacher Joey Martz, who has all the social grace of a cup of mud, but a genius IQ, went on to become head of the labs weapons division-a job that carries a salary somewhat above the presidents-as in the POTUSs- and, not really being the sort to be adept at obtaining the company of women(see social grace of a cup of mud), spent his money on a big house with a really big garage for his exotic cars. Joey-er, Joe Martz, who went on to be President of the Los Alamos Ferrari Owners Club, and the Los Alamos Exotic Car Owners Club-having not just two Ferraris, but a couple of NSXs, a Detomaso Pantera (yeah, those arent that expensive, either ) and 2 Lamborghinis.
No, Im not jealous at all. :lol: Really, I cant even sit-that is to say fit- in all those cars but one of them, and, besides, I got Rita-thats the wife :lfao: And Joe does almost all his mechanical work himself, meticulously, and drives pretty well to boot-like me, he sought out higher levels of drivers ed to go with his equipment, so I dont begrudge him anything-give me my Porsche any day, though. :lol:
This all has another point, anyway, that puts this post in the Study, instead of the Locker Room .
Theres a document that s been floating around the internet for about 15 years or so, now-you can find it on the NSX forum, and the Ferrari forums, and a few other places. Its an Exotic Car Owners Code of Conduct, and it was originally penned by one Joe Martz:
And that brings us to rules 4 and 5 (I really dont have much use for the other happy, friendly rules-Im not always going to have a smile on my fact, and I have more time for volunteering than Joe ever did, so rule 6 is B.S., since, until recently, I didnt have any time at all .:lol: )
Rule 5, though-a rule to break the rules-what a concept! Mind you, Im not averse to opening it up on some of the roads that we have out here, but even the highest powers of observation and diligence can preclude all dangers to myself and my vehicles when I do so-I once nailed a jackrabbit while doing about 135 mph, once, and-while I didnt crash, or even slow down, it did do significant damage to my front air dam .what was I supposed to do? Swerve for a jackrabbit and maybe crash? I dont think so .:lol:
On the other hand, that Mask fellow from the TAPOUT crew could have used a little of Rule 5, I reckon
I think if youre breaking the rules ,though, and you know it, then youre breaking the rules and thats pretty much it: I did it;Im glad I did it, and Ill do it again. Thats why I have a radar detector and jamming equipment-so that I only get one very small speeding ticket every two years or so (usually for like 10 over, when Ive often been violating the speed limit by doubling it :lfao: ) so that, most of the time, I get away with it. Which is, after all, an American tradition-we watch heist movies and root for criminals to steal something that belongs to someone else, and are most delighted when they get away with it-usually with a funny, Oceans 11,Italian Job, Hot Rock kind of twist. For years, the official start of summer where I grew up was a photo of a kid jumping off the railroad trestle over the Croton Reservoir-NYCss water supply. Illegal to jump off the trestle. Illegal to be on the tracks. Illegal to swim in the reservoir. The caption usually read, An unidentified teen (wink, wink, nudge, nudge :lol: )executes a dangerous and illegal jump off the railroad trestle into the Croton Reservoir, signaling the beginning of summer Of course, 9/11 probably changed that, and swimming in the reservoir might just be an act of terrorism, now.
There was even an article in this months Outside magazine on breaking the rules, and actually teaching your kids when its okay to break the rules, like swimming at that favorite swimming spot right underneath the sign that says NO SWIMMING. I gotta wonder, though, where we draw the line on this sort of behavior-not harming others? Only potentially harming ourselves? Silly rules? Ive known people-too many, really-who skied in closed off areas-really good skiers, well within the limits of their ability, not harming anyone else-that were killed by avalanches for doing so-on that day, at any rate, they should clearly have obeyed the AREA CLOSED sign.
So, thats pretty much my question, MTers-where do YOU draw the line?
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