Father's Day and the Newport Car Show

Yesterday was Father's Day, and the day of the Newport Car Show. I almost didn't go, because it was pouring rain in Amherst, and Newport weather didn't look much better. After hearing the rain sheeting off the roof and overflowing the gutters at 5AM, Martha elected to stay home and pet our old crazy blind toothless poodle instead. But this year Cubby had his license. He wanted to drive his Grandpa's old car, and he had his girlfriend ready to go. I guess that tipped the balance . . . Here we are, pulling out during a break in the rain.



Despite the weather, Cubby made half the trip with the top down, but we had to put it up before Providence when it really started pouring. When we arrived it was 55 degrees and rainy, but we parked the cars and waited for the action, which actually never materialized. The weather cleared from rainy to gray, but the turnout remained low.

In this photo you can see a chilled wet Cubby in front of the Class J cars . .



Despite his appearance he actually had a good time, and I marvelled at the fact that he's 18 and still willing to do things with his dad. At his age, I was two years down the road and totally sick of my own parents. It was some years before I reconnected with either of them. Cubby seems to like me better.

Weather notwithstanding, my friends Fran and Cathy prepared their usual tailgate feast which would surely win an award if they had a tailgate picnic competition at this show (but they don't) In 2006, my friends Jan Anderson and Bobby Hartsfield won at the British Invasion with their tailgate picnic, and they say they'll do it again this year.




Here are a few of the cars . . .



This is a 1965 Porsche 356C that was next to my friend Neil's car. I photographed this one instead of his because I like bright colors and his is gray.




This Corvette was right behind me on the field.



I'm not sure where the Shelby came from but it was nice

Cubby drove his Grandpa's Jaguar to the show, and he took second place in the British Sports Car class. Here he is in the award line . . . You can judge the prevailing weather for this June day by the color and the jackets . . .




Here's his award. They give us plates, which Cathy and Fran serve car show food on . . . I do not know if Cubby will hand over his plate for that purpose, though.



Afterward we headed into town for lunch at the Red Parrot. The picture just shows Cubby and Masha but there were actually 16 people at the table. We had a bunch of the people from work . . . Jeremy and his mate, Maribeth and her mate and kid, Bobby and his mate, Jan and friend, Cubby and Masha, and four more guests.

The put us on the third floor because there are years when the guests get loud but this year they all behaved. I think it's the open windows, visible behind Cubby. When you're on the first floor, drunk and loud, an open window is just irresistable. You just gotta throw someone through it. But it's a long way to the ground fron the third floor, both for the guy you toss and for you, trying to exit the place down three flights of stairs before the cops arrive.



I have never personally tossed anyone out a window but I have seen it done. We had a most spectacular window-tossing incident on the 1979 KISS tour, but that's another story. In any case, nothing happened here.

We looked at boats, and headed home