show and shines at VW shops

Inspired by the old SCS Showdowns, but more so, for me, by the couple of shows we put on at Buggy House in the late '90's. Up through about 1996 or so we'd lug all the inventory and our booths to various local VW events in the SF Bay Area and Sacramento. It was a pretty labor-intensive undertaking. So I got the idea to just hold our own show at the shop.....like a Customer Appreciation Day. I planned 2 shows before I quit, and both were a ton of fun. I wrote a monthly newsletter for the shop and mailed it to customers that requested it, and pretty much every month I'd focus on a customer's car. So I invited these owners and their rides, we charged no California sales tax, sold raffle tickets, gave away catalogs, T shirts, hot dogs and burgers, soda pops, and generally had a great day with our customers. We never got to the point of having a live rock and roll band, but we got together a bunch of CD's and put Koko (Geoff) in charge of spinning them. I wish I had a scanner to share some of the pics from those shows. Some notable cars that attended were: Tony Wilkie's green 1965 S/G car, the ex-Gary Berg Berglar (still in nice shape back then), Jim Lose's 11 sec drag sedan (with 84mm Okrasa and Autocraft Stage IV VW heads), John Versgrove's 1963 "Hawaiian-Look" convert with Berg 2213 IDA race gas motor and Berg 5 (and Darrel "McNutcase" McNulty driving it), Dan the Upholstery Man's mirror-black 1956 oval with 2332cc and my 12 sec '67. We had a bit of everything there...stockers, customs, sandrails, bajas...it was really cool. And there was no judging, it was just a chance for guys to shine up their stuff and display them. We raffled off 009 Screamer Kits, Engle 110's, full flow kits, free tune ups on stockers and a set of ported 42 x 37 heads. Being it was on company time, the beer wasn't conspicuous, but it was there all the same. I think most of us had our own stash.
Couple of funny stories...think both occured at the same show....maybe stealth67 remembers...
1. things were just starting to happen, it was about 7:00am or so, most of the display cars had arrived and were arranged in our back parking lot. I was still trying to make sure everybody on roster was in place and got their freebies. I hadn't pulled my '67 back there yet, it was parked right on the street in front of the shop. I hopped in, and was going to pull it around back. A couple of customers (Tim and Les), plus this girl I "admired" were standing on curb next to my car and started to cajole me into some tire smoking. Man, it was like high school all over again....me, with no will power, fresh 2276 built to the hilt, Led Zep in the cassette player, couple of guys egging me on, and a cute chick watching it all go down with the playful look of encouragement in her eyes. Foot to floor, 7500rpm, crank wheel to full lock, sidestep clutch.....WWWWWWRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH..A-A-A-A-A-A (7700 limiter), the world is going around me in a cloudy blur of tire.............and oil smoke. I'm at the edge of control and thinking "why is the car so out of shape?" and all the kids on the curb are screaming and waving their arms in a panic..."SHUT IT OFFFFFF SHUT IT OFFFFFF!!!!"....and I'm thinking "COPS!", so I straighten out and pull into driveway. Behind me follows a green greasy trail of Kendall 40wt. I blew my HP-1 off and sprayed Mission Blvd with about 2 quarts of Kendall. What a fu**ing mess. My boss, Jerry, is already storming out to street with a big full bag of Grease Sweep and a broom. Oh shit. I look under my fender, everything is covered in oil....tire, filter, lines, valve cover, header....all of it. "I probably should go clean street before I fix my car" I thought. I walked out to street and silently took broom and kitty litter fromt he boss, and cleaned up my oil slick. I could tell he was pissed....

. The rest of the day went great, except for avoiding him all day. Not one word went between us all day. By day close, we had made over double what we'd normally average on a Saturday, every customer was happy, the mess was clean, gave away all the food and drink. I thought, now would be the time to apologize. I approached Jerry, and said, "I'm sorry I acted like a dumbass. I won't do that anymore. I gave in to those guys egging me on and ....." Jerry interrupts me "Are you fu**ing kidding with me? I stood there and watched you bounce that poor fu**er off the limiter and write your name out there in tire rubber and I got a hard on 2 feet long!!!"

Other funny bit....Dan the Upholstery Man was ribbing McNulty all day about the Hawaiian Look 'vert with the Berg full-on motor in it. McNulty was basically the driving force behind the 'vert and was getting hot under the collar with all the "Zotz" comments and the semi-hemi comments and so on. Dan really had no clue how scary the 'vert really was. So at the end of the day, Dan is still running his mouth...."get some 94's in that thing, you puss.." and stuff like that. So Darrel fires up the 'vert...and this thing just sounds like the frigging engine wants to get out of the car....Berg 86 x 90.5, FK87, 11:1, Berg 872 heads, IDAs...and smells like VP gas. Dan stops joking. Darrel pulls out of lot, stands on it, 8000rpm front shocks full extend, dual quiets for wheelie bars, another 8000 shift, big smokey burn out U -turn, 8000 shifts thru close 1st -4th and into 5th....little Darrel, his lumpy head just above window sill jerking with every shift, flies by Buggy House at probably 115mph. Dan stood there gape-mouthed.