I am a lucky guy, luckier than I should be. But it really isn’t luck, it’s being blessed. It’s just easier for people to think of it as just luck, removing all the religion stuff. If you’re lucky, you don’t have to pay anybody back. It is very obvious to me, and hopefully to you as well, after reading this. It truly IS blessings, and I have only one person and a car show to thank. We’ll call it what it is and move on.

I’ve had this shred of paper hanging over my desk for as long as I can recall, and the words on it have always proven true: “All things are delicately interconnected.”

I was but a toddler when Steve Lisk’s brutal ’71 Hemi-powered Challenger (it was originally a 383 car) prowled Woodward Avenue, yet that car carved a place into the foundation of my car guy-ness. And forty years later, it reenters my world. All things are delicately interconnected indeed.

I hear all of the time that people are “doing it the traditional way”. No, you’re building an unsafe artcar. What people fail to realize with this Ratrod movement is, the hot rodders “back in the day” concentrated on the mechanics first and would get to the aesthetics as time and money allowed. They wanted nice looking cars, not rolling outhouses.

In May of 2007, the aerospace company I am employed with was contacted by Marvel and the U.S. Air Force to provide an aircraft to use as a backdrop during in-hangar filming shots. Marvel wanted to have two of the most modern aircraft available, so they chose the F-22 Raptor and the RQ-4A Global Hawk. They got that and more, and we got to hang out with Tony Stark.

When a local girl on her way to the top needs a cool truck for her album cover, Round Six’s Brad steps up with his ultra low and cool ’49 Chevy. Brennley Brown from NBC’s The Voice classes up a low-down beater.

The red truck approached and the girls knew it too and it seemed like they anticipated my disappointment. So instead I focused on how far we’ve come and how close we are and feel the pride and accomplishment in that. The timing slip confirmed the speed of 81.577mph, only 1.424mph off the record…