We're in the money! We're in the money!

I didn't start this blog with any crazy dreams of becoming a blogosphere billionaire. But at some point shortly after I started it up, I reckoned I'd throw a few Google ads on the page, mostly out of curiosity about how the whole blog/ad revenue thing worked.  It turns out that the first thing I learned was that Google doesn't pay out anything until you reach $100.

For the first few months the totals piled up in numbers that were shocking to me, given the low traffic at a friends-and-family sort of blog devoted to beagle haiku, my own fantasy sports teams, and random photos of stuff.  Then the revenues dried up and the totals increased by mere pennies a month.  I reckoned that either a few friends and family members had tired of clicking on ads, or that Google had changed their payment algorithm to more accurately reflect the very limited desirability of the advertising demographic drawn by hound-based poetry.

Either way, my dream of making literally dozens of dollars a year while blogging from the comfort of my own home had come to a screeching halt.

Oh, I'd check in every few months to see if I'd come any closer to the magic $100 mark, but more to satisfy my abstract curiosity than my pecuniary interest.  I'd crossed the $99 mark a while ago, so I'd begun to wonder whether I could ever cross the magic $100 mark or if this was instead the Zeno's Paradox of the digital economy.

And then, lo and behold, what should I see in my e-mail inbox today?

-----

From: billing-noreply@google.com 
Time: Today at 12:51 AM

Please note that we've recently issued a payment to you for your Google AdSense earnings on Mar 25, 2014. Your payment has been sent and should be arriving shortly. For more information, please log into your account and visit your Payment summary page. You may also be able to find a reference number there to track or pick up your payment. 


Sincerely,
The Google Billing Team

-----

I'm gobsmacked!

I'd like to thank Katie the Beagle, Melanie Monagon's Drag-Racing Gremlin, and everybody in between. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to do with this windfall (I'm open to suggestions!) but I'll be sure you let my vast and profitable Patio Boat audience know what you bought me.

Now get out there and click on some ads. Let's get that next hundred dollars here by 2020 AD!

Go away, Winter, and take your beard with you!

As some of you know, I grew a wee little beard this winter to help fend off the cold. Today, I went to the barbershop:

Before

After

Now all I have to do is convince the weather to match my newly shorn state. Darn it, Winter, the calendar says that it's now Spring. It's time for you to go!

Detroit AutoRama: The Leftovers - Cycles, Exotics, and Oddities

Congratulations, intrepid reader! You've made it to the final post in the Patio Boat's epic AutoRama photo series. To be honest, I didn't set out to pen a saga, but even though I was only at the AutoRama for a few hours, I saw lots and lots of cool stuff that I reckoned was worth sharing.

This final post is a bit of a mish-mash of other stuff I saw that caught my eye. Let's start off with a couple of custom cycles:

There were at least a dozen of these custom-painted motorcycles lined up. The detail on some of them was truly astonishing.  Really, any one of them would be worth of a photoblog post of its own.

It's hard to read because it's black lettering on this matte black Lamborghini, but this Lamborghini comes to us from the Motor City Gumball Rally.

This 1971 DeTomaso Pantera comes to us from the brothers Mike and Jim Ring, the Ringbrothers, of Spring Green, Wisconsin. It was entered in the "Exotic Sports" class. Of course, almost everything looked exotic around here.

If there was an "Exotic Tractor" category, this 1938 Minneapolis Moline UDLX Comfortractor belonging to Diane Flis-Schneider of Lapeer, Michigan, would've been a shoe-in because it was one of one in that category.

Another exotic sports car, this practically new Fisker is already eligible to join us at the Orphan Car Show in Ypsilanti, since brief-lived electric-car manufacturer Fisker has already folded. The car itself was a great-looking automobile. I especially like the solar panels on the roof, which recharge the batteries while you're parked during the day.

Pictures don't do justice to the size of this mammoth 1937 Hudson Terraplane owned by C.J. Kumar of Stouffville, Ontario. The body was lengthened four feet and widened eighteen inches to fit on a 2006 Dodge Ram 2500 Diesel chassis. This means really re-shaping every panel and increasing the size of all the trim accordingly. For example, the original Terraplane front grille was stretched nine inches and widened sixteen inches to fit. The fit and finish was great and it all worked together, but the end result seemed more like an elephant than a Terraplane.

I mean that in the very best way.

Finally, we come to the question, "What was the craziest thing you saw at AutoRama." Well, honestly, I don't know, but I do know that the short list includes this 1939 Chevy Master Deluxe owned by Tom Carrigan of Vermontville, Michigan. Why? Because he shoved a turbosupercharged V12 Allison V-1710 aircraft engine under the hood, that's why!

How big is a 1,710 cubic-inch (28.0 liters) engine? That's almost as much displacement as four big-block Corvette engines! The Allison V-1710 produces around 1,500 hp at takeoff and was the primary engine for the twin-engined P-38 Lightning fighter of World War II fame.

That's crazy!

Which, in all fairness is the point of an awful lot of the cars at AutoRama. I had a great time looking at them all and want to thank all the designers, mechanics, and owners who put them together and brought them there. It was a great way to spend a snowy Saturday night in Detroit, and I look forward to seeing at least a few of these same cars out and about on the roads of Michigan this summer.

Detroit AutoRama: Rat Rods

The AutoRama Extreme display in Cobo Hall's basement was way fun. There was a great vibe down here. It was a notably younger crowd than the top-flight builds upstairs. Everybody seemed to be having a great time hanging out and looking at each others cars. Rat rods have a few different connotations for folks. On the one hand, they give off a real old-school vibe of hot rods built the way they used to be built once upon a time. Old cast-off car frames with a big engine and no apologies. On the other hand, sometimes "rat rod" seems to come in as an excuse for "badly built car."

In any case, cool is in the eye of the beholder. All I know is that some of these cars I saw in the AutoRama Extreme display in the basement were way cool.

And frankly, this batch look as if they're hanging out on a street corner smoking a cigarette.

Let's visit a few of my favorites, and you can decide how you feel about 'em yourself.  First up, this 1947 Austin Sheerline "125".  Shame on me for not getting the name of the owner, but it was one of my favorite cars in the entire show:

I could re-type the info, but the writing on the window says it all.  My favorite part? "It is finished!"

No need for costly re-chroming here!

Next up, alas, yet again another case in which I didn't get the owner's name, but I guarantee that whoever he is, he put as much work into this Chevy pickup as any of the shinier trucks on the main floor:

Sometimes builders will talk about stitching together a car. I've never seen the term applied so literally.

The detail on the inside of the cab was equally impressive. This truck drew a real crowd and not a single one failed to point out the arm rest.

Kevin Gill of Ooltewah, Tennessee, brought this 1929 Ford Roadster to the show. They don't get any more old-school than this.....

... unless, of course you're talking about this 1929 Ford Roadster owned by Steve Sabotka of St. Clair, Michigan. The Mexican blanket on the seat is what really pulls this decor scheme together.

Here's another great rat-rod pickup, a 1952 Dodge Pickup owned by Glen Vierheilig of Clinton Township.

There were quite a few old pickups in the rat-rod section. You might think this is just the predictable meeting of the current rat-rod and classic pickup trends, but pickups really do seem to make an ideal platform for rat-rodding.  I suspect its a combination of rugged looks suiting the rat-rod aesthetic and the capacity of a strong pickup frame to handle a wide variety of engines and suspensions.

Rat rods often feature a ton of detail. I love the diamond-plate steel flames cut out around the radiator of the 1961 REO rod.

I've got to be honest. Sometimes the details don't always come together smoothly.  Of course, that might've been the idea for this 1947 Chevy pickup owned by Robert Pope.

Another great old-school build: 1937 Fiat owned by Gerry Scarborough of Clarkston, Michigan. I love the old winged motometer on the radiator.

By the time I reached the back corner of AutoRama's basement, my only disappointment was that I hadn't seen a single MG in the entire show.  I mean, I get it. Detroit is the Motor City and American Iron rules the day.  But it still would've been nice to see one relative of my the FUN MG during its long winter slumber.

And then, in the farthest corner of the basement....

It's a 1957 MGA with a 283 V8 shoved in the engine bay. This barn find didn't look as if it had moved under its own power in quite some time. The sign on it said it was owned by "Singlefinger" (yeah, beats me, too) and was apparently built by two unknown boys from Marysville, Michigan.  I have no idea if the owner is planning to do anything with it, but if they go for the full rat-rod treatment, I picked up the ideal replacement for this logo at the Speedcult custom steel images booth:

Now all I've gotta do is build a rat rod around it!

Tomorrow? The Patio Boat Blog's final batch of photos from the 2014 Detroit AutoRama: The Leftovers - Cycles, Exotics, and Oddities.

Detroit AutoRama: Station Wagons

Before vast herds of minivans and SUVs nearly drove them to extinction the station wagon ruled supreme on the cul de sacs of suburbia. A few fabulous survivors of that era made it to AutoRama:

Speaking of ruling supreme over the suburbs, meet "The Suburban", a 1962 Plymouth Savoy owned by Gary White of Ionia, Michigan, and built by Marquette Classics.

Many of the original station wagons were woodies. Here they receive a tribute in the form of this sharp 1952 Chevrolet Woody Wagon owned by Bill Harris of Brighton, Michigan.

This fabulous green 1969 Chevrolet Chevelle wagon is owned by Jeff Betz of Clinton Township, Michigan.

This 1948 Ford Custom Woody is the subtly named "Viagra: It's a Woody!" owned by Bob and Donna Petrusha of Ortonville, Michigan. It started its life as a four-door wagon but was converted to a custom woody wagon with two suicide doors, hand-built panels all around, a chopped top, leather interior, air-ride suspension, and a double-overhead cam 4.6-liter Ford engine.

Down in the AutoRama Extreme displays in the basement I found this great-looking 1964 Chrysler Newport Custom Wagon owned by Dave Marchioni of Detroit.

Also in the basement we have this 1957 Ford Wagon owned by Rob Gabrjolek of Fleetwood, Pennsylvania. Its eye-catching orange-flake metallic paint looked great under the basement lights. I can only imagine what it looks like in the sun.

And finally we have the Total Recall Auto Parts of Marine City, Michigan, 1958 Ford Courier wagon owned by Tom von Meyer.  It's got a great line, but it looks just a smidge ... and I mean this in the best way ... well, kinda rat-roddy.

Indeed. We shall meet its fully rodentia-motive friends tomorrow.