Perfect strangers

"and 100 more" (nth256)
01/19/2015 at 18:16 • Filed to: None

You know what I like about you, fellow Opponauts?

I like that I don't know any of you.

I like that you don't have any expectations of me, and I have none of you. I like that I can jump into a conversation and be welcomed, and I can abstain from a conversation and not be missed. If I disappeared from this forum, sucked into some Kinja netherworld (a "K-hole", if you will), you likely wouldn't notice, and any questions I had left unanswered wouldn't bother anyone.

I like knowing that y'all are here if i need ya. So, thanks for being there, everyone.

Here's some pics of someone I did know, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! A few years ago, he passed on to the Great Celestial Dragstrip, where aerodynamics and horsepower come easy, the Triple Nickel runs free on wire-brush wheels, and there's always aluminum billet for him to chuck into the lathe when he's ready.

!!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and (i think) a prototype of his radial engine.

The article linked above is one of his, laying some groundwork for his radial engine idea.

!!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! more about the engine concept in total.

One of Jocko's mid-engined, aluminum-bodied Streamliners. He built a few of them, I think all with the big drag slicks in the back, and he had one in his yard that had the bodywork removed that was a smaller, 3-wheeled variant (two wheels in front, one in the rear).

We met him after he'd just taken possession of a run-down cabin at the other end of the dirt road we lived on. He got the three-wheeler trailered out the the property, and since it'd sat unused for so long, decided to blow the junk out of the cylinders. He made three or four passes by our property, lofting clouds of dust over our yard as he'd powerslide into a left-hand turn up an adjacent road. My dad, very much keen on maintaining his peace and quiet out in the boondocks (and his meticulously-smoothed dirt road), stormed out to the road when he saw the characteristic plume rising up about a quarter mile away, headed in for another pass. When Jocko saw my dad in the road, he pulled to a stop, hoisted his portly frame up over the tube-frame chassis, and met my dad's scowl with a hearty grin. My dad would've continued to be pissed, but for two reasons: 1) you just couldn't be pissed off around Jocko, and 2) my dad couldn't quite wrap his head around the vehicle he was seeing.

We didn't know Jocko as a legend in the drag racing community. He was just some guy with a crazy car and some even crazier ideas. He bummed cash off my folks once in awhile when people hadn't paid up for commissioned work and things were lean. His wife made awesome carrot cakes from scratch, and she and my mom are still go hang out at a drum circle on occasion. Jocko threw a taco party once a year, without fail. He had an appreciation for women's asses, and had clippings of ones he particularly liked from various porno mags posted up around his shop. He live in a couple of converted buses, parked in an L shape. His hands were always black from aluminum dust. He had about a dozen unfinished projects around the yard. He had an english wheel that he used to hand-roll sheetmetal. He and Joanie had an ugly little dog named Tina Turner who always wanted to lick your face. To us, he was just a guy.

Streamliner, this time in Dean Moon livery:

He somehow managed to con my dad into painting fiberglass scale models of the Streamliner, that he was selling to pay the bills. My dad, retired on disability and always onto a new project of his own, rigged up a paint booth off the side of our garage, and did probably 15 of the models. My dad never thought of himself as a detail painter, but his work was excellent, and Jock was pleased enough to keep asking him to do another.