Great plan! Really admire the way you can handle so many projects and still working. What are you planning with the front end sheet metal? Hope you get enough time to catch up- know you have many projects but looking forward to seeing what you do with the Merc.
I've always had a pile of irons in the fire all the way back to beginning...from model cars, school, youth group and jobs when I was a kid. So, this season in my life is really no different.....except now throw in grandkids who live next door. LOL The hood blew open on the previous owner and tweaked the hood and the tops of the fenders. I've fiddled with them over the years and gotten the hood fitting better, but hard to fix all the way without disassembling the whole front end. Several years ago I lucked into a nice front cap for real reasonable. So, rather than go through all the messing around to finish straightening what I have (plus, the inner fenders have had the vent ducting removed and I want to put them back), I'm just going to swap out the fresh stuff. It's all already blasted and in epoxy sitting here just itching to go on. LOL
It's really not healthy for me to reread this thread. I love the Merc and want to see it together, but I keep looking at that pretty little Chevy sitting behind Duncan in that pic... Knowing it has a 261 under the hood doesn't help. I am having to combat the sin of envy over the Chevy. LOL
Like most all the car projects in my life, nothing new to report on the Merc. A few odds and ends on the other cars here and there (repaired and repainted/blended in the smashed lower fender on the Chevy where a speed bump ran the lake pipe up into the fender and pecking away at putting a new front end in it now). The lake house is FINALLY in sheet rock after stripping it all the way down to the studs, all new wiring and all new plumbing, so hopefully it will actually be a house again in the not too distant future. Hard to believe it's been a little over two years since I last drove it. One of the last drives was over to the office for a photoshoot for the local interest magazine that was doing a story on the local car club. My dad was one of the founding members, so they included pic of him standing beside the Merc. I also found an old picture that baaaarely has his Merc in the background. This is the only picture of his Merc (his first car in '57 as a reminder from the first page of the thread)...a light blue '51 4dr with a '53 Chevy grille (although mom doesn't remember the light blue and only remembers it always being in grey primer LOL). I happened across a '51 very similar to Dad's for sale online a while back and saved the pics. For Christmas a couple years ago, @Tim combined the picture of dad with the picture of the internet Merc and created a painting of a picture of dad with his Merc that never was. Hangs in their dining room now. I realized I've never posted it here before, but it's fitting I think, since he's the reason I've always wanted a '51 and finally ended up with one.
Nearly forgot about that one! Glad you got to take home a new piece this weekend was good seeing you.
The two step process for un-dorkafying. Step one: step out of the car Step two : shut the door. hahaha :’)
Thanks guys! The sad part is, at this point, Dad doesn't really remember any of this. He does remember I have cars (he often asks me if I still have his, but doens't remember it's a Mustang and that yes, I do) and that he was the one who got me interested in cars. So, all is not lost, but the days of him and I working together or going to shows together is over. Actually, Mom is having new floors put down at the house and his train set needed to come down....first time he hasn't had a train layout up in my entire life. But, he doesn't really remember much about it or having even ever run it (this one has been up over 25 years). Bwahahaha! True enough! Most everyone will agree my garage is filled with "What a waste of beautiful machinery" Hahaha!
Dimentia/Alzheimers sucks. It runs in my family, so I have told my daughter and son in law(who live on the 5 acres next door) to just fence in the entire property and leave me alone. I’ll be fine. You know I am somewhere on the property having an adventure.
Really sorry to hear about your Dad, I’m going thru the same thing with my wife and after 59 years together it’s tough to take but I owe her the best life she can have. As a result the Merc sits but the other day one of my grandsons said he wanted to help get it back together! Hope you get to enjoy as much time with your Dad as possible.
I told them to get me a dog collar that shocks me if I get too close to the fence. With all joking aside, it's a cruel disease and I am not making light of it, it's just something I have to plan for.
Good plan!! LOLOL... I'm possibly in the same boat. EVERYONE on my mom's side of the family got it; my mom, all my aunts and uncles, my sister. They all were long lived too, which doesn't make it better. But on the upside, no one on my dad's side got it. Also long lived, and every one of them was sharp to the very end. By the time I'll know, it'll probably be too late...
It is super terrible. We have a neighbor at the lake struggling with it. He was a cabinet maker and they worked for 15 years on redoing their house themselves (hope it doesn't take me that long lol) to be ready to retire there just in time for him to be diagnosed with dementia. He told his wife he didn't want any treatment or meds...he just didn't want to know what he wasn't knowing. Very hard on her, but she honored his request. Another example to us to not save all the "going to do when we retire" things to retirement....too many folks don't get to enjoy it like they thought. Live today.... (and yeah....it's a concern that I'll end up in the same boat same as you guys...so keeping an eye on that. LOL) Sorry about your wife @wide34. It takes a lot...as you know all too well. Please make sure you have help and someone/someones who can come and give you a break now and then!
Good point on not waiting until retirement to do things we want to do Dave. We have all likely seen people in our lives work their butts off toward a good retirement that they never got to enjoy. None of us know if we have tomorrow. So, my plan is to just enjoy what I like to do now and not worry about ever retiring (or at least that is what my retirement savings might say)…. These cars are expensive anymore.
We have more than we can count. My best friend from high school lost his parents to a car accident 9 days after his dad had retired. Never took a sick day and cashed in his sick pay on the way out the door and bought a brand new Road King with it. Never got to ride it. Plus numerous with cancer, the previously mentioned dementia, etc. After the whole covid thing and surprisingly surviving a 2 month+ shut down relatively unscathed, it was our wakeup call that it's ok to walk away from "real" life a little bit and go do some of the things we've been working for while we still can...real life will still be here when we get back...so we have been. (I still wouldn't mind jumping off the hamster wheel sooner rather than later though LOL).
I'm going to retire in 2 years, 2 months and 22 days, but whose counting? I am thrashing from now until then to gather all the stuff I need and want for my retirement, then I am gonna have some fun.
The Jalopy Journal
