There Will Be Casualties…

So, this morning I find myself typing feverishly on a 50-year-old Olympia typewriter. I’m not sure why I use this old thing, but it sure as hell isn’t a matter of convenience. This damned device is slow and heavy and primitive. It is a sort of dark industrial green color that makes it appear to be three times larger that it actually is. The site of it in my office often confuses people – especially when they see the high powered Apple set up right next to it while their ears ring as the slow and labored THUNK of the archaic Olympia keys slap into a brittle ribbon located just forward of the cheapest paper I could find.

To me though, it’s a glorious mechanical sound similar only to the tic of a fine Swiss watch. When my imagination is working the way it should and the words are flowing, this old Olympia provides a sound track that just amplifies my writing. Or so I think it does. And in that way, I guess I do know why I use this damned thing. It’s like foreplay. It puts me in the mood.

And now ladies and gentlemen, I’m in the mood.

I had planned to save this announcement for September 1, but then I realized that the first fell on a Sunday. And who wants to do any serious thinking on the weekend? Certainly not me. So here I am.

The Jalopy Journal and the H.A.M.B. have sat untouched for almost five years now. We haven’t done a redesign. We haven’t added any features. And our rules, which are as old as the site, haven’t changed a bit. And frankly, things have rolled along just fine. The site continues to grow exponentially and month-by-month. And for the most part, our membership seems to be happy too. The numbers prove it. The average amount of time a user spends on the site has never declined, the number of new threads continues to climb, and last month was our busiest month ever.

So, things are golden. I have no reason to bitch or complain, but I do anyway. See, I’m bored. Bored with the status quo as it were… And rather than be a casualty of this dull boredom, I’ve decided to get back to my roots and fix the unbroken.

But I guess its unfair to argue that the H.A.M.B. isn’t broken in some ways. While we work pretty damned hard in an effort to keep the forum on focus, I do believe it has slowly crept past the threshold we set over 15 years ago. As membership grew, it just became harder and harder to stay on point and feverishly police the tone and direction. Looking back, it’s impossible to blame any one person for this. But I always liked Harry Truman and have to concur here – the buck stops with me.

So the first step of this multistep process of curing myself of boredom is to reiterate to you, the membership, the rules of this forum. They’ve been refreshed a bit and you can review them here. I am laboring over this damned machine right now and imagining myself approaching you guys in some dusty old garage, hat in hand, and asking you humbly for a favor – please sir, read these rules and guidelines before you read anything else today.

See, me and the my pals that help run this joint have decided that it’s time to become a little more picky about the content that we host. The Jalopy Journal and the H.A.M.B., after all, are dedicated to spreading the gospel of traditional hot rods and customs. And we all feel that it’s time to take that mission a little more seriously.

All that being said, I don’t think our dedication to tradition alone will suffice. And to that point, there are some structural changes coming next week to help aid in that direction as well. I’ll save that news for then as, despite the manic THUNK of the keys filling my ears, I haven’t quite got those changes ironed out yet.

I have a feeling that “trial by error” will be a constant chant around the headquarters for the next few months. There are so many changes coming… And I’m sure there will be casualties, but at the end of the day I’m also sure they won’t be in vain.