Went to the local (Acadia Region) Corvette club's annual show.

Bunch of gray-bearded, bald-headed old farts (yeah, I know...) standing around polishing their toys. I'd rather drive mine than polish it.

Mainly wanted to check out the club. As expected all they do is get together to drive in a herd to someplace to eat. I don't drive in herds, got that all out of my system in motorcycle clubs years ago.

Besides, I'd never join a club that would have me as a member [/groucho]

Interacting with people is way overrated. Enjoy your solo drives.

Bring your tractor.

With Irish or Scottish accent: Now you’re figuring it out boy-o.

Yeah hood up meets are lame, boring. Cars and Festerment (Coffee) is much the same with the added bonus of the opposite, young, lame ass Gen Z. And stupid burnouts and speeding away, either hitting bystanders, or getting tickets from the police. It’s all boring as shit.

It’s the same on the motorcycle side. Standing around, pointing fingers, taking pics/video, then they herd off too, except it’s a pivot because they’ll do 100+ mph on the highway together. The point of a motorcycle is leaning it over through turns.

So it’s the same whether sportbike or sport car, all these people do is buy them to take pics for instacrap, go to hood up meets, talk about them, etc. Riding/driving is the point and if that was the point of your purchase stick to riding/driving the machine and leave the fake people to do what they do best, front. The forums for said vehicles are horrible these days too. They buy something like this, and drive it to work, commute, park it at a store. You’ll see threads about MPG and I’m reading this shit thinking, why didn’t you just buy a Prius and be done with it. They bought it for image, not to ride/drive it as it was designed to do. So in essence it’s the equivalent of a woman’s $5000 Gucci purse.

You're not anti-social. I've tried to join different groups as well. Ham radio, VFW, political meetings, etc.

I'm part of established groups and when there's a new face, I do my best to be friendly and do some basic introductions and chit chat.

When I try to join, people are just talking to each other and I try to polite and get involved. I just don't return after trying several times.

I had a Subaru meet when I was in Washington. It was even posted on Google Maps, until those fuckers took it down earlier this year. Stoplight Mafia. 14 years on Google Maps and some asshole flagged it and even with me contesting it with Google, permanently suspended. No way I could get it back up.

I started it back in 2009. It still runs today. We usually had a turnout of 50 or so cars and just stood around talking about the modifications we did, or dreamed to do. Ate food from Panera or the fish taco place. It was a really good time every Wednesday night.

Now as far as rides or times that everyone would want to go herd driving, I wasn’t down for that. I didn’t want any part of it and it always led to mass pullovers, hours of WSP meticulously inspecting your cars and writing tickets for modified exhaust, and many other things.

That’s pretty much my take on it.

I've found that when going shooting with a group of people, everybody mostly wants to shoot the breeze instead. This is fine, but when I want to get actual shooting done, I go solo.

I had the same experience when I bought the Shelby a few years ago. I immediately signed us up for the MN Mustang club. Our first event was their annual Christmas party at the golf club. Of course this is MN so there were no cars to look at. Walked in the a hundred other gray haired retirees and if they weren’t they appeared to be the type I’d never strike up a conversation with. Of course there are those who already know each other and stck in their cliques.
Then there’s the random table seeking. That can be hit or miss. I’m sure everyone else at the table is thinking the same thing about me :green:

That lasted 2 years. I learned that sitting at a car show for 7 hours or going on a parade cruise 10 miles under the speed limit. The best parade cruise I went to we were 15 minutes late for. Got to cruise the fantastic curvy route all by ourselves and by the time we got to the burger place, many were already getting ready to go. Perfect!!!

Yeah, I joined a car club also.

Seems all that was to do was shoot the breeze, ride around, etc...

There was no actual car specific knowledge to be found.

A slow drive to the golf course and drink wine? Yup, that was the place to be.

Wasn't asking about overriding the active dampers or the correct injector pulse width, but the most technical question most could answer would involve counting wheels and adding them up to four.

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:
I've found that when going shooting with a group of people, everybody mostly wants to shoot the breeze instead. This is fine, but when I want to get actual shooting done, I go solo.

Don't even get me started. 3 or 4 family members is usually okay. Usually.

Groups of casual acquaintances and/or strangers. NOPE! Two extremes, usually at least one of each in any random group: 1) The Mall Ninja with the hand-cranked rapid fire on his uber-tactical 10-22, and 2) The Range Cop that has a meltdown if you draw and fire or (gasp!) double-tap.

Not a huge fan of shooting by myself, but sometimes that's the only viable option.

Want feel left out of the "club"? Try showing up at a Harley or H.O.G. event.... On your Pan America!
The lack of bling and no Screaming Eagle gear makes me a social pariah!

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Want feel left out of the "club"? Try showing up at a Harley or H.O.G. event.... On your Pan America!
The lack of bling and no Screaming Eagle gear makes me a social pariah!

^^^ You were probably wearing a helmet too!

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Want feel left out of the "club"? Try showing up at a Harley or H.O.G. event.... On your Pan America!
The lack of bling and no Screaming Eagle gear makes me a social pariah!

I stayed away from H.O.G. events. Stereotyping, but many of them had seen too many biker exploitation movies of the sixties and tried to play the part. One of my co-workers used to refer to them as the Mr.Dressup club.

Eminence Front. Sort of.

I've never found a club or organization that was actually "welcoming" . They advertise for new members and then when you show up it's " Who is this guy ? " .

quote:

Originally posted by selogic:

I've never found a club or organization that was actually "welcoming" . They advertise for new members and then when you show up it's " Who is this guy ? " .

Back in the 1970's, my wife and I joined the Chicago BMW Motorcycle club, around 500 active members. We were made to feel very welcome. People would go out of their way to be helpful, and to do whatever they could to make sure that we felt welcome to the group. A great bunch of folks!

It takes time, but you just have to find the right group.

I have a Jeep I like to get out in so I joined a great Jeep club with a bunch of other like minded people that liked to get out offroad. It was great for about 5 years, then it got bigger, leadership changed, and it turned into a duck club more than a Jeep club. I drifted away, and apparently all the original core people did too because the club died a few years later. Unfortunately, the current Jeep culture places more emphasis on having a Jeep than actually getting out in the Jeep.

I ended up finding better groups though. The people in them don't give a shit what you drive, they just like getting out. I think the last time I went out we had rigs that cost 3k all the way up to 100k+. Nobody cared though, and everybody had a great time.

One of the red flags on this club was the President.

He was walking around the parking area making sure all the cars were at the correct angle and parallel to each other.

No, seriously! Even asking drivers to re-park to fit his OCD!

I know that I'm antisocial... no doubt about it! Didn't used to be that way, but in the past 6 to 8 years I've changed.

I do a cruise in once a month where specifically no one is in charge, though there are a few rules.
No revs
No burnouts
Don’t block Panera
Don’t be an ass.

It’s just a social meet. Somewhere between 200 and 300 cars of wide variety. Lots of conversations about cars, of course, but that’s because they are interesting.

“You made a 28 Ford truck with a Toyota 2UZ?”
“Yep!”

Land Rovers. Classics. Rods. Muscle. Trucks and sports cars. Multiple countries. It’s all good, varied that I’m not bored, and new folks who start with “I dropped my 10mm soc… wait, why is everyone smiling?”