I Love VW Buses!

Vintage VW Promo for 1965 13 Window Deluxe Bus

Volkswagen Promo 13 Window Deluxe Bus
Originally uploaded by VWBuses

This is a wicked cool promo piece from somewhere between 1963-1967 1965 for a 13 Window Deluxe Bus. This cool piece of history was made possible by a donation from my buddy over at SoupUp Magazine.

Smitty the Splitty rollin' in Fort Worth Parade of Lights 11/28

Smitty the Splitty!
Originally uploaded by VWBuses

I have it on good authority that Smitty the Splitty will be decked out in illuminated peace symbols next Friday 11/28 at the Fort Worth Parade of Lights. The organizers of Mayfest will be using Smitty to advertise Mayfest 2009, also in Fort Worth. I hope to have a story on here soon about Smitty, including pictures from the parade.

I Got Caught by a Red Light Camera in Arlington... And It Was Wrong!

Sure, I kick puppies, steal candy from babies, and I occasionally speed. But the one thing I don't do is run red lights; that just seems like a dangerous pastime. So, as you can imagine, I was astonished to receive a "NOTICE OF VIOLATION" from the Arlington, Texas Police Department for running red lights.

As I opened the envelope to reveal the details of my apparent violation, I was adamant that I didn't do it! I don't run red lights!

After some lame DivX issue with the video codex... you know, YouTube can broadcast the stupidest stuff, but this outfit can't figure out a lightweight, cross-platform way (i.e. Flash) to deliver the grainy video of the violations. Perhaps its a conspiracy... if I can't watch the video, and if the video is poor quality, it will be harder for me to fight it.

I was still adamant that I didn't do it. I don't run red lights.

So, after pulling my Windows computer out of the mothballs and installing the DivX codec (seriously) I finally saw the video. Whoops! I guess I did run the red light. Wow. How could that be?

As I watched the cartoon-like sped-up video of me not stopping at the red light and making a right hand turn and admitting that I did it, I started to think why. Turns out there is a Chipotle burrito place just outside of the frame. I guess I was in a hurry to get home and eat it. I was so stoked about my upcoming burrito-fest that I apparently threw caution to the wind and ran the red light.

But wait! Upon closer examination of the video, I noticed something... a green right-turn arrow. Yup. While the lights in the other lanes in my direction were red, the light in my little lane on the right, by the curb, did in fact have a green arrow. It is very hard to see from the video, but it is there. Vindication! I told you, I didn't do it.

So, where is the "please check this again" button? How can I clear my name quickly and easily? Hmm.... what? To fight this, even though the video is clearly in my favor, I must go to court!

So, now the fun begins. What do I have to do? First, I was the driver, but the ride belongs to my Special Lady Friend so technically she got the ticket. Since I like her and want to keep things happy, we decided to have the blame transferred to me.  To do this, we have to download the Non-Liability Affidavit PDF from the http://www.violationinfo.com/ website. Then we fill that out, get it notarized and take it in, along with the request for a hearing to the City of Arlington. The city will notarize it for you for $5 but I didn't want to give them any extra money. I decided to go to Hellbent Tattoos, Body Piercing, and Notary instead. Turns out the Notary wasn't there, so I ended up going to a mailbox place. That was a bummer because I wanted to go to the tattoo place to get a document notarized. I've always thought that was the weirdest combination of services. Anyway, it still cost me $5.

So we headed over to the Police Department ready to do battle. Well, not really, we just wanted to setup the court date and then we'd prepare for battle. When we got in, the police officer behind the counter asked what we wanted. We told him we needed to transfer blame and setup a court date. There was a mistake on the video. He asked if we wanted to watch the video so we sat and waited. Not too much later a lady came and got us and took us to a back room. She turned the computer on and opened up the administrative side of the Violation Info site where she had much higher resolution images and video. She pulled up the still pictures first and what do you know; there it was, plain as day, the right turn arrow. She couldn't believe it. Apparently this is rare and the systems actually do function correctly most of the time.

She called someone who had my ticket dismissed. Well, as my Special Lady Friend explained, it was her ticket that was dismissed. They never did the transfer of blame and we wasted $5! In my attempt to keep them from taking more of my money, I ended up wasting some. The lesson here? If the violation you received is clearly wrong, go right down the police station and very nicely ask them to review the video and pictures. They will dismiss it. Only do this if it is really a mistake, otherwise you'll look like an idiot... apparently some people do this.

The coolest part was that the lady who worked with us most likely assumed we were wrong and that I really did run the red light. As you know, our prisons are filled with innocent people, or so they claim. But she never let me know what she really thought. She was nice, smiling, and non-combative. When she saw the mistake, she took care of it and we all laughed. It went off swimmingly. Not at all how I expected this to go and it almost made me trash this post.

I will say this... even though we had a happy ending, the entire process is flawed. Since this was obviously just the officer who reviewed the video missing something, wouldn't it be easier to have a "please review again" button. If I'm wrong, you can add another $20.00 to the fine. If I'm right, you cancel the violation and send me a $5 Starbucks gift card. Okay, fine... you don't have to do the gift card. But if this were a fair process, the ability to push back for a second review would be there. As it stands, they have made it so difficult to fight, that it would be easier to just pay the fine. Ah ha! Of course it is, they give you 12 ways to pay and make that as smooth as cheese. But to fight it, even if I am clearly innocent, that takes time and effort. I won't go down the slippery slope of conspiracy theorists, but this is so obviously just a money grab its not even funny.

At least the lady at the Police Department was nice and I got the ticket dismissed.

Cheap Gas Alert: I paid $1.66/gal in Irving today

Gosh... it feels like back toward the turn of the century, when the cheap gas flowed like wine. I paid a whopping $1.66/gal for Unleaded fuel today. E-85 was down to $1.35. So this doesn't have anything to do with buses, but it is auto-related.

 

I could say that I didn't see any buses in the wild today, does that keep this post relevant?

Vintage VW Ads

My buddy over at SoupUp Magazine sent along a couple of vintage Volkswagen ads. The first one is from 1981 and is for the "not a VW Bus" Vanagon. Too many people, especially on Flickr, tag these as buses. They aren't. Buses stopped in 1979. However... this is still a cool ad so I posted it:

The second ad actually has a bus in it, along with a Squareback and a Beetle. I'm not sure of the date, but given that the Squareback stopped production in 1973, and the look of the bus, I'm going to go out on a limb and say this ad is from that year. Please correct me if I am wrong.

1 Week Old! Great Success!

So we surpassed 240 views on the Flickr photostream and 130 on this blog. Huge numbers? Well, I'm not bringing the interwebs to its knees, but pretty cool considering I haven't done much to promote it. In fact, the only thing I've done is send the Flickr link to the Fort Worth VolksFolks. I think they distributed internally to their members. Other than that, people have found the Flickr pics and this site organically... they searched Google or Flickr and just found our stuff. Cool!

Remember to spread the love that is ILoveVWBuses.com... tell your friends, send pics and stories. I want this to be something more than just me posting pics of buses I find. Although that is pretty fun.

Thanks!

Finally! I saw a bus. Its been a few days.

Orange and White VW Bus Campmobile in Arlington, TX - Front View
Originally uploaded by VWBuses

We were driving to the store last night and my special lady friend spotted this fun Campmobile. I was starting to get worried, I had not seen a bus in public for nearly a week. More pictures of the bus are on  the Flickr account.

Of course, at some point, I will probably have pictures of all the buses in this city, but until then... I'm on a mission. Even if I already have a picture, I still like to see them out and about. However, if you know of a bus that I should get a picture of, or have other tips for me, check out this post.

Got Tips? Have pics to share or know of a Transporter rotting in a barn?

Got some tips or Photos you want to share?

Message us on Twitter @ILoveVWBuses, message us on Flickr (vwbuses) or send an email to tips [at]  ilovevwbuses [dot] com if you have photos to share, a tip on a VW Bus for sale or one decaying in a barn somewhere, or info on an upcoming VW event. Our home base is Arlington, Texas, but contact us no matter where you are located.

If you do share photos, please include as much information as possible. At least say when and where the pic was taken. If you can include the owner, the model year, even better. The best? Information on when the owner got the vehicle, what they've done to it since they've had it, etc.

Peace out, yo!

I Love VW Buses Logo!

My special lady friend put together this killer logo for the site. I wanted to share it with the world. I need to figure out how to change the layout of this blog to incorporate it. It has all of the elements I wanted in a logo for this gig. The main thing was that it have some hand-drawn elements (the heart, the splitty in the heart, and the VW logo. Killer.

Soon... you'll be able to buy a bumper sticker with the logo on it at my Cafe Press shop.

Awesome!

Two Tarrant County VW Meetings Tomorrow Night 11/11/2008

The Fort Worth VolksFolks are meeting tomorrow night, 11/11/2008 at 7:00 p.m. at Spring Creek Barbeque   located on the corner of Camp Bowie West (Hwy 80 / 580) and Las Vegas Trail on the west side of Fort Worth.

The North Texas VW Club is meeting at 7:00pm. at J. Gilligan's 400 E. Abram in Arlington. (817) 274-8561 Table service, Quiet, Good food choices. It's located between, S. Cooper and S. Collins. I'll be at this event since I've never attended either meeting.

Have fun everyone!