February 2005, Volume 8, Issue 2


General Meeting - Febuary 1, 2005

The meeting was called to order at 7:00 PM, President Keith Thorson presiding. We were visited by Neil Dorfmeier. He owns a black, 1997 WS6 Trans Am.

Due to the absence of both the Secretary and Treasurer, the Secretary's Minutes and Treasurer's Report were dispensed with.


Old Business:

Leo had no events to report.



New Business:

Super Bowl Party - 2/6/05:
Game time is 3 P.M. It will be at the Straw Hat Pizza on Kiefer Blvd. Meet at 1:30 p.m. at Levitz, leave at 2:00 p.m.

Valentine's Day Brunch - 2/13/05:
Meet at Levitz, 8:30 a.m.. leave at 9:00 a.m. Adults: $16.99, 2-12: $9.99, 0-3: free.

Movie and Bowling - 3/6/05:
Details to follow.

Crab Feed - 3 /19/05:
Placer County Fairgrounds, $30.00 per person, must let Leo know.

Chili Cook Off - 3 /20/05:
2 P.M. at the Raff's.

Dennis Moved to Adjourn, J.J. Seconded.

My Gratitude to Ted Bechtel for taking notes while J.O. and I were enjoying a Panama Canal Cruise. At about the time of the meeting, we had just left Huatulco, Mexico, on the way to Acapulco.

Respectfully submitted - Irene Raff - Secretary.

MEMOIRS OF AN OLD CLUB MEMBER.

By Gary Vollstedt

Introduction.
I'm writing this article to reflect on the past adventures or if you would like, the history of the Trans Am Club. I would like to talk about the past runs and events that I and the Club have attended. I have been in the club since 1979 so hopefully I will be able to rattle on for a while, and make for some interesting reading. So with that said, let us get started.

Chapter 1.
This story at times will read like a dime store novel, but I will make it as believable as possible. It starts one night after dinner when I went to Reliable Pontiac and bought my second Trans Am. One of the employees wanted to start a Club. He had a list of people and he wanted to know if I wanted to be on the list. We know the answer to that question 25 years later. A meeting was set up at the Roseville High School one night and I think that about 15 people showed up. The Raffs and Ackersons were in attendance that first night.

Our first run was held in September 79. It was a pleasant drive to Yosemite National Park. Now let me elaborate on how the day really went. We all meet at the Cal Expo circle at 6 am, that is 6 am. There were twenty cars waiting and willing, it was quite impressive because none of us had ever done this before. The nice thing about the first year was everything was new. We left the parking lot around 7 am and went down the road. Now remember no one on this run had ever caravanned together before in their life, that I knew about and it showed. One time we were going 80, the next we are going 35, this is on Highway 99 to Merced. Once we got to Merced we met up with the Club from Fairfield. They had around 10 cars, so you can see this is starting to be a very large group, all of whom had never caravanned together. Did I mention that it took a very long time to get to Merced, or it just seemed that way. At least 3 hours. After leaving Merced to Yosemite, we went up this winding road and there were a few happens along the way, one was when J.O. Raff decided to punch holes in his hood shaker because someone told him it would breath better. Everyone was a wealth of knowledge in those days. We had the usual stops, gas, restroom, its just that no one could do it together at the same time. Which everyone knows takes forever. The next big thing that happened was three young men that came with us were hung over from the night before. To cure their hangover, they started drinking at 6 am the morning that we started our trip to Yosemite. On the road to Yosemite one of the young men decided to climb on the roof of the car and started swinging a sword, the car had T-tops so he could hang on without falling off. Our first official meeting was held by the river in Yosemite National Park. I didn't go back with the people that drove up there because they seemed unorganized and I didn't think I wanted to drive with these crazy people. That was twenty five years ago. The ride back was much faster and even though I had left an hour after they did, I meet up with them at a gas station in Merced.

The next big event was designed to make money for the club, a crab feed of all things. Being that no one had done a crab feed before, why did we think we could do one now, well why not! In those days crabs and crab feeds were cheap and we made money. By that time we had an activity group with six to ten people, we reserved the hall, ordered the crab, had salad, spaghetti, bread and booze. The key word here is booze, we had tickets to sell, and we did, we even had a band. A great band the fart band. Everything was going pretty good, but we had no idea who was coming to help, if anyone. By 4 pm, everyone was there, Al and Pearl were cooking spaghetti, and doing a good job. J.O. and Irene were collecting tickets at the door. We had the President and Secretary from the L.A. Club show up and thought it would be good to have an event for just Trans Ams. Did I mention the booze, the night was going good, the band was great, the crabs great, then came the fight, did I mention the booze? Gary and his brother and his best friend had to be in the middle of it. That kind of ended the crab feed for that night. A good time was had by all!

...to be continued.

TACA, GSC Meeting Place and Time.

Our meeting place is at:
CARROWS RESTAURANT
4601 N. Watt Ave.,
North Highlands, CA 95660

Please have all food ordered before 6:45 PM.

Birthdays.
Steven Serio , Feb 2nd
Ted Klein , Feb 6th
Don Shanahan , Feb 10th
Lourdes Apilado , Feb 11th
Angel Hernandez , Feb 12th
Jennyfer Childs , Feb 23rd
Susan Bentley , March 1st
Nicole Rajkowski , March 1st
Pearl Ackerson , March 19th
Nicole Rajkowski , March 1st
Terry Trimble , March 26th
Jim Prinzivalli, March 29th

Upcoming Events.

GENERAL MEMBERSHIP - 2/1/05
7:00 PM, CARROW'S Restaurant.
4601 N. Watt Ave.
North Highlands, CA 95660.

AUTORAMA - 2/4-6/05
Our club as along with 7 other clubs have been cut from participation in AutoRama due to lack of space.

SUPER BOWL PARTY - 2/6/05
Straw Hat Pizza
Mills Station Road
Rancho Cordova, CA
Meet at 2:00 P.M., Game starts at 3:00 P.M.

VALENTINES DAY BRUNCH - 2/13/05
Cache Creek Casino
Brooks, CA.
Meet at Levitz Parking Lot 8:30 A.M., Leave 9:00 A.M.
Brunch is served 10:00 A.M. - 3:00 P.M. and you can stay and eat the whole time! Adults: $16.99, Seniors: $14.99, Children: $8.00.

GENERAL MEMBERSHIP - 3/1/05
7:00 PM, CARROW'S Restaurant.
4601 N. Watt Ave.
North Highlands, CA 95660.

BOWLING AND THE MOVIES - 3/6/05
More information to follow.

CHILI COOK - OFF- 3/20/05
The Raff's
7125 Spicer Dr.,
Citrus Heights, CA.
2:00 P.M.
Categories will be Best Red, Best Green, Hottest, Wimpiest, Peoples' Choice.