I’ll be taking the next two nights off.  See you next year on the 2nd!  Happy New Year!

One year, I wrapped all the presents using gold and silver aluminum foil into all kinds of shapes.  Another year, I wrapped presents using only recyclable materials.  This year, I made some jeeps and cars :-).  As you can see, I don’t take wrapping too seriously.

Happy Holidays All .. I’ll have my kids for the next week (starting tomorrow morning), so updates will be occasional and arbitrary.

Looks like the side is patched.  Not sure if there is value here or not.

“This 1950 Antique Jeep with plow is ideal for restoration or parts. Please contact John on 908 295 8134. $900 or best offer”

http://newyork.craigslist.org/jsy/cto/2120821068.html

This was supposed to be published last night (sat night) …. but somehow I never hit the “publish” button.  It just goes to show you that it REALLY WAS one of those kind of nights ….

It just seems like one of those type of nights, so I’m going to save updates for the morning.

See, not only did I manage to lose my 3 month old phone tonight (by placing it on my car and driving off), but then I wrote an amusing story about it, only to have the post disappear when I published it.  I think it is time for a beer …  Night all!

UPDATE: **SOLD** Was $1200

It’s a project, but appears as solid as the seller suggests.

“I BOUGHT TWO WILLYS AT ABOUT THE SAME TIME A FEW MONTHS AGO. I HAD PLANNED TO FIX UP THE 1946 BUT THE WIFE..WELL YOU KNOW…. ” WHY DO YOU NEED TWO JEEPS !! ” OKAY WHATEVER. THE ONE I AM KEEPING DRIVES, BUT NOT IN NEARLY AS GOOD SHAPE AS THE ONE I AM SELLING ! THE BODY IS IN GREAT SHAPE , I HAVE EVERYTHING IT NEEDS TO PUT BACK TOGETHER AND DRIVE EXCEPT AN T90 TRANNY , T18 TRANSFERCASE. THE ENGINE RAN GOOD BEFORE IT WAS PULLED BUT I PLANNED TO PUT A 283 CHEVY V8 IN IT. COMES WITH ALL THE STUFF TO WIRE IT FOR 12 VOLT. TIRES ARE 90% AND THE CHASIS ROLLS EASILY. NO TOP. THANKS , ”

Given it’s the holidays, calling tonight a Silent Night seems appropriate as I found very few jeeps for sale of interest.  So, the few I found I’ll save for tomorrow.

Besides, I’ve been checking out the new Google Books search query and have found some additional family history to add to my geneology research.

Right now I’m doing a search on “Willys Jeep” using Google Books and hope to find something interesting.  If I do, I’ll report it tomorrow.  Enjoy your night!

UPDATE: **SOLD** Was  on eBahy.Topping the list of issues with this “1945” can be seen on the passenger side image ….

“1945 JEEP WILLYS. 1/4 Ton. Engine CJ2. 4×4. Four (4) Cylinders. 45,000 Original Miles. Manual Transmission. Engine and Transmission in perfect conditions. New Military Non-Directional Tires. Military Campaign Equipments attached to the Jeep. All Interior restored. Soft Top.. Everything looks and works perfect. The Jeep has been restored according with the terms to participate in Classic Car Shows.”

No Updates tonight (sat night).

Catch ya tomorrow night …

Here’s a great pic of some kids taking a 1/2 size jeep out for a spin.  You can find more pint-size cars here.

Of all the things I’ve seen done to a jeep, I can’t say I have ever seen a jeep dressed with astroturf (or carpet of any kind).  For the record, this is an All Wheel Drive Russian Niva.  See all the pics on here:

Next update sunday night.

Gerald recently sold his snow plow.  Through a few email exchanges, I learned snow plowing was always an adventure, but not always fun ….

Geralds writes, “Plowing was fun as long as it was just for me. The Jeep did a great job. One of the odder experiences occured when plowing long lanes and roads:  the jeep would go silent.  After spending some time wondering why this occurred, I finally figured out that so much water was coming into the engine compartment that the belt would just slip and then the motor would go quiet.  It seems that most of the noise from a stock Willys comes from the fan, especially in low range it is the steel blade that makes the most noise.

Seems like everyone would call and want me to plow their places out with “that Jeep” I had.  It was hairy out on the road with the plow.  The weight would come off the back wheels and the jeep wanted to turn around.  And the roads would always be bad since that is when the snow came.  I ended up putting about 300 pounds of sand bags in the bed.  Here is a pic of me plowing one day.

The biggest frustrations I had was that sometimes old ladies (and men) would bitch about how I pushed the snow and ask if I could move it over about 2 feet or so, or complain that I was digging up the grass at the edges of their yard and driveways; all this after almost killing myself getting to their place to make a couple bucks.  And I wasn’t the only ones who had a problem with the slick roads, as you can see from the picture I took below …

Also, it would be hard on the old girl;  when going to the neighbors or misc old folks who needed a plow, salt on the road became the enemy.  It isn’t even the plowing so much as the tons of salt that would find there ways into every nook and cranny on the jeep.  Since there was no chance to wash a jeep in freezing temperatures, the salt caused rust to invade the original body on my 3B.  So, when I rebuilt her I had to replace the body.

But, like the picture above shows, it was fun some times too.  My jeep was a plow jeep its whole life until the restoration in 2006.  No more work for it as my driveway is only about 300 feet; So, if I need to plow, I just get out in the snow with my 84 John Deere 318 (or my neighbors bobcat when things get really bad). (See more pics of Gerald’s 3B, before and after the rebuild)”

Well, I wont’ be sending my kids to college with all my earnings from the sale of the 3 Champs, but I made a little money on the deal and did a good deed for the Champ community.

I have to say that getting a chance to poke around them, seeing how they were built, etc, was an interesting experience.  And, with more time and money, I think they would have been a fun rebuild; however, I am quite pleased to be rid of them!

No updates tonight (monday night)!

I’m sorry to say that I experienced a death recently, a close friend with whom I have shared close calls and turbulent times.  While my friend was there most times, there were times that this friend was nowhere to be found.  For this reason, I don’t wholly miss my friend.  In fact, though I buried my friend, rather than entombing my friend 6ft under ground, my friend is entombed in my computer bag.

Yes, my Samsung Instinct died; Or more accurately, I put him to death.  He was behaving badly over the last week, so I punished his disloyalty by purchasing a new phone with a new provider — a Samsung Captivate with the Andriod OS with AT&T. So, though my old friend is gone and buried, he is not missed … not in the slightest.

With my new phone, I can now text again, dial phone numbers, surf the web and even download APPS.  Oh happy days!

Since I am now back in the age of modern phones, I felt it was time to implement a ‘mobile edition’ of eWillys.  For now, it is simply a mobile browser addition, meaning it is a little friendlier for the phone — at least it is on my android phone.

Let me know if it works or doesn’t work.  You can always turn it off by scrolling all the way down and clicking on “turn mobile off”.  Once you turn it off, you can view the regular site.  To reinstate the mobile view, you’ll need to clear the cookies in your mobile phone browser.

Here’s a good link you can use to find Willys Parts

This seller wants to make a deal.

“I would like to trade my 4×4 ATV’s for a Jeep Wrangler, CJ or Willys in good condition. Each of the ATV’s have working wenches and are 4 wheel drives. They run great and don’t need anything that I know of. One of them is a Yamaha Grizzly 400 and the other is a Kawasaki Prarie 360. Send some pic’s, describe your trade and let’s do business. I need a vehicle and don’t have the cash. Let me know what your thinking!! Send your emails to your autopro@rocketmail.com Thanks for the interest…”

http://cosprings.craigslist.org/cto/1955878452.html

This truly deserves a longer story, but the coffee shop will close soon and I need to eat & to get back on the road to Boise. A Big THANKS to Josh for alerting me to this opportunity!

Yes, tonight I bought 3 Austin Champs.  It turns out one of them is a Royal Marines RN Champ.  There are only 3 of these know in existence (it’s the gray one). You can see some big pics here.

Looking for something else, I encountered these two treasures from treasurenet.com.

Just a few updates tonight.  We’ll return to more updates tomorrow (Sunday) evening …