Kevin and I are similar in a lot of ways. We’re both Army veterans who played with helicopters during our time in. We both have a sense of humor that would get us fired in five seconds flat at most businesses. And we’re both drawn to old cars that are more problematic than someone who tells you, “I think you’re my soulmate! You should meet my parents, they’ll love you!” two hours into the first date. Just like that scene, the smartest decision would be to do an about-face, “meep-meep!” like the Road Runner and move your ass before the first tranq dart starts flying through the air. That isn’t Cupid’s arrow, that’s ketamine.

Unfortunately, we both are blind to that last statement. Which means that Kevin decided to do something I’ve done myself. In the winter of 2000, just before Christmas, I packed my ’78 LeBaron with all of my stuff and hit the road on my first-ever road trip. That meant that I was facing down bitter cold temperatures, blowing wind, and a Midwestern ice storm in a car with a rattled suspension, bald-ass tires, maybe 100 horsepower on call, and only a general sense of direction. Three days after I got to my destination, the passenger side front suspension completely failed and I found myself on the side of the road, the car on the subframe and the wheel about 800 yards up the road.

Kevin’s intentions were just as pure. After working with the team at Donut Media for a few days, he found a 1970 Ford station wagon and decided to drive it home. The FMX’s reverse gear was gone, it’s bleeding out oil like the Deepwater Horizon incident, and he’s just in time to arrive back home in Iowa to greet that wicked little blizzard that swept through the country in December 2022. Did we mention “no heater”? Look, we’ve all joked about buying up the cool iron that is in California and moving it to places where you can actually do something with it without CARB checking up on you like a technical inspector with an impending divorce, but dude.

Kevin, a friendly word from your buddies here at BangShift: next time you think you ought to fix the bleeding Ford…fix the bleeding Ford.