THE 3,022,190th BLOG!

According to Technorati, "Truth With Speedzzter" is the incredibly popular 3,022,190th most popular blog in the world.

Wow. It ranks that high?

Just think if Speedzzter hadn't whacked on "Click and Clack" about their myopic phobia of high performance automobiles a few months back -- and received visits from the dozen or so "Car Talk" Kool-Aide (tm) drinkers defending the joys of motoring in slugs with twenty (or less) pounds-per-horsepower-- this blog would probably be languishing below 4,000,000th in popularity!

Speedzzter is obviously "making a difference"

Technorati Profile

GEARHEAD TELEVISION SHOWS

Have you noticed all of the new "gearhead" televisions shows popping up?

"Forza Motorsports Showdown," "Bullrun," "Drive," some new ESPN2 show featuring Pontiac Solstices (I can't remember the name off hand), another incarnation of "Hot Rod" TV, increasing numbers of "auction" shows (RM, more Barrett-Jackson) . . . .

All of this "high octane television" is just begging for some on-line reviews.

But it also reminds Ol' Speedzzter (America's 3,022,190th ranked blogger) of some other GEARHEAD TV ideas posted back in 2005 over on Car Craft.com under Speedzzter's alias "Turbo Ted" . . . .

As these ideas (and satires show) the gearhead TV developers haven't scratched the surface yet.

[flashback]

On page 29 of the October 2005 issue [of Car Craft Magazine], new CC honcho Doug Glad ended his "Fads 2005!" comment on the spate of auto-themed reality TV shows with a challenge: "Can you beat these? We think not."

Maybe. Maybe not.

Let’s see.

• "Being Jeff Smith"(TV) – Inspired by "Being Bobby Brown," this show goes inside the wacky life of a GMPP covert operative as he does the General’s bidding in his own family and at the car magazine providing his "cover."

• "Dude, Where Are My Cars?" (TV movie) – Sandal-clad publishing mogul David Freiburger tries to track down two or three dozen "project cars" he’s stashed all over L.A. Features irate neighbors, junkyard dogs, impound yards, aggravated mini-storage managers, code enforcement officers, beautiful vacant lots . . . .

• "Top Elimidator" (TV) – Nuclear-hot So. Cal. women cat-fight it out on the wind-swept, high- desert strip at Palmdale – but not some piddly pink slip! The grand prize is the opportunity to go on a date with CC’s own junkyard crawler, Steve Magnante! The sick twist: the winner can choose to send the loser on the mandatory date instead!

• "Auto Club Testdrive" (TV) – CC’s staffers thrash their project and personal cars and get towed home by the Southern California Auto Club.

• "Junkyardmaniac" (TV) – Inspired by Goldberg’s successful History Channel show, noted Junkologist Steve Magnante tells the story of our automotive heritage through his searches of yards across the nation, focusing on rusted-out muscle, automotive oddities, and "screamin’ deals."

• "American Junkyard" (TV) – Inspired by Discovery’s "American" series, this program delves inside the "high pressure" world of recycling cars and trucks at a family-run "Pick-a-Part." Features high-stakes impound auctions, dealing with bizarre, bargain-hunting customers, huge utilities scrapping vintage rides for "pollution credits," lots of forklifts, pitbulls, and . . . THE CRUSHER!

• "American Race Driver" (TV) – Inspired by Fox’s "American Idol," aspiring racers face off on a variety of tracks in some hideously obsolete equipment for the opportunity to sign a contract with JACK ROUSH (later to be hooked by Roger Penske . . . .) [this idea was published before the announcement of Roush Racing's "Driver X" show]

• "My Classic Carburetor" (TV) – Our team of retro rodders rip evil EFI out of nearly anything on wheels and replace it with "All-American" vintage carburetors. Episode One: Tunnel ram on the boss’s new Lexus LS 430.

• "Tunervision: The Softer Side" (TV) – NOPI Tunervision without all those annoying cars. Highlights the essential facets of the NOPI lifestyle (g-strings, mud wrestling, rap music, etc.).

• "CSI: SMOG" (TV) – The latest spin-off in the "CSI" family follows the adventures of the California Air Resources Board as they try to rid the planet of "gross polluters," illegal inspection mills, excess carbon dioxide, "tampering" and other hazards to the public health.

• "Law and Order: Rice Squad" (TV) – Ripped from the pages of Super Street, Sport Compact Car, Turbo . . . Rice Squad smokes out the most egregious aesthetic and safety violations on the tuner scene . . . (inspired by the infamous Rice Cop website)

• "Shrinks" (TV Miniseries) – A team of psychologists analyze why apparently sane individuals appear on "Pinks" and risk the "slips to their whips" on a handful of drag races.

• "Tape, Wire or Bust" (TV) – Aspiring novice Car Crafters have one month to turn an ordinary used car into a BITCHIN STREET MACHINE using only the basic staples of low-buck Car Crafting (duct tape, tie-wraps, J.B. Weld, rattle cans, etc)

• "Where in the World is Rick Dobbertin?" (TV Special) – Move over Matt Lauer! Former Pro Street prodigy Rick Dobbertin dropped off of the CC map with a series of amphibious car projects and an ambitious trip around the world. This show links Rick’s insane pro street past to his latest "Hydrocar" project.

• "Earth-Trek" (Movie) – Inspired by "The Mosquito Coast"(1986) and Rick Dobbertin’s real-life 1993-1996 attempt to circumnavigate the globe in his Dobbertin Surface Orbiter, this film dramatizes what it’s like to spend three years cooped up with your wife inside an old milk tanker, dealing with the FBI, Columbian drug lords, DEA, and constant sea sickness. A cautionary tale of Car Crafting over the edge.

• "Cheap Trucks" (TV) – Spun off of Spike’s "Trucks," this innovative how-to show explores building trucks on a tight budget and with the old stuff "Trucks" heaps in the garbage dumpster.

• "The Activist’s Life" (TV) – Car-hating safety and environmental activists (such as Ralph Nader, Joan Claybrook) actively participate in Goodguys events, NMRA races, rod runs, NASCAR, the SEMA Show and the Hot Rod Power Tour. (And who wouldn’t want to do a poker run with Joan or Ralph?)

• "Meet the Gearheads" (TV) – A family of tire-smoking Car Crafters and street racers moves into an upscale suburban gated community . . . .

• "Racing Year" (TV) – This program answers the burning question: how many races can a racer run in a single car in one year? (Not just a measly week!) Beginning with the Grassroots Motorsports $2006 Challenge, the "Econoracer" team thrashes a single race car in every kind of automotive event they can make in 365 days (bracket racing, Maxton, Bonneville, autocross, open track days, open road races, ice racing, rally . . . .)

• "Tour de Force" (TV) – Our cameras and microphones follow John Force everywhere. [This idea was published before "Driving Force" was announced . . . and "Driving Force" even titled one segment "Tour de Force" . . . ]

• "Mopar Inaction" (TV Special) – Beginning with Freiburger’s plea for more Mopar entries in Real Street Eliminator, this special explores why Team Mopar didn’t bother to show up. Includes pointless footage of Brice Road at the Mopar Nationals.

• "Lifestyles of Rod and Custom" (TV) – This program goes inside the lives of performance industry icons . . . how many Hawaiian shirts does Boyd own . . . Freiburger’s sandal collection . . . George Barris’ thing with eyeglasses . . . .

• "Rodder Eye for the Minivan Guy" (TV)-- The "Fab Eight" (five is just an odd number) makeover boring suburban stiffs into "kool," gasoline-in-their-veins Car Crafters and bikers.

• "Plagiarism By Design" (TV Special) – Inspired by the long running "Victory by Design" series, this special investigates the latest "retro" automobile styling trends, with special focus on Ford’s J. Mays and DaimlerChrysler’s revival of Hemi-mania.

• "Rent-a-Racer" (TV) – Two teams of Car Crafters are each given a rental car, a Summit catalog and a week to prepare for a series of races. The winners get cash. The losers have to fix both cars and try to explain everything to the rental company.

• "Reload the Truck" (TV documentary) – Inspired by Bob Segar’s "Turn the Page," this documentary follows performance industry field reps to car shows and races, showing the grueling pace of life on the road (set up the display, answer dumb questions, give out swag to moochers, take down the display, do it all over again).

• "Chip v. Boyd: Mano y Mano" (TV Special) – Inspired by the Coddington-Foose brouhaha, Chip and Boyd are locked together into a well-stocked garage. Each will then personally build a rod from the ground up (no outside helpers), to be judged by Detroit’s Riddler judges. Chip also provides insights into how he lures Boyd’s employees over to his shop.

• "Track Dog" (Movie) – Inspired by "Supersize Me," a journalist lives for a month on nothing but race track hotdogs.

• "The Dukes of Oahu" (TV) – A TV classic, updated for the tuner age-- Uncle Soji struggles to keep the family sugar cane plantation out of the hands of Boss Wofat. He’s helped by his two kung-fu master/import tuner nephews, Cho and Lu -- who always are running and fighting to stay out of the cuffs of "Five-O" (Roscoe P. McGarrett and Dano). Cho and Lu make the scene in a tight Toyota Supra twin turbo, called the "General Yamamoto, " and when they aren’t catching air, they are always surrounded by a half dozen NOPI Chics. Hondas and Toyotas will be crashed at twice the rate Mopars were sacrificed in the original Dukes series.

• "Camaroworld" (TV) Hosted by tech master Marlin Davis, "Camaroworld" explores the mullet-wearing, trailer-park-meth-lab lives of today’s Camaro enthusiasts.

• "Dubs-a-Smokin’" (TV) – Inspired by "Wheels of Fortune" and Wendover, NV’s casinos, this game show features a huge "dub" wheel set up for roulette. The buxom blond assistant "spins" the wheel by doing a massive burnout . . . .

• "Yeah, It’s Got a Hemi" (TV) – Inspired by the Hemi-powered snowblower at the Woodward Dream Cruise, this DCX-sponsored program demonstrates to ambitious Car Crafters just how many ways a Hemi can improve life. Episode One: Hemi-powered garage door opener.

• "Closed Throttle" (TV) – The "Turbo Twins" of "Super 2NR" and "Full Throttle" fame try to bluff and shmooze their way through real automotive trade schools (S.A.M., U.T.I., Wyo Tech). Should be a real challenge.

When is that nurse going to get here with the meds . . . .

• "The World According to Freiburger" (TV) – After they cancel "Dude," Freiburger’s next project explores his thoughts on applying the Car Craft Way to all areas of life and love.

• "The Price is Light" (TV) Loosely inspired by "The Price is Right," contestants must guess which performance part is actually priced LESS than in the Summit, JEGS or PAW catalogs.

• "Trading Racers" (TV) A tuner and a Car Crafter trade cars for one week and "trick out" each other’s rides. (Then the sparks fly . . . .)

• "Glad Times" (TV) – Inspired by the ‘70s comedy "Good Times," the family of a grossly underpaid, overworked magazine editor (with a junky Camaro "project car" ensconced on the patio) provide hilarious zingers and hijinks.

• "Cheaters" (TV) – Inspired by the long-running "Winners" program and the tedious dialogues between Pontiacquack and Str8chevygrl [a Car Craft forum dialogue about the merits of cheating to win dirt track stock car races], "Cheaters" tells the real "how-to" story about how many have cheated their way to racing fame and fortune.

• "Ad Men" (Movie) – Inspired by Barry Levinson’s "Tin Men," aggressive magazine ad reps promise the world to sell "column inches." "Freiburger to indorse the "1 psi electric supercharger? No problemo! You wanta cover shot? You got it!"

• "Hidden Zeros" (TV) – Why should racing’s "Hidden Heros" get all the attention? This show sets the record straight by telling the stories of all those back markers," DNFs and non-qualifiers you didn’t know you loved.

• "Car Craft Nation" (TV) – After Speed TV cancels "NASCAR Nation," [which it seems that they did] where else will you go for pointlessly "fresh" analysis and "lifestyle" coverage? Think of this show as a video version of "Off the Rack . . . ."

• "Beater Revolution" (Canadian TV) – Inspired by Tom and Peter’s little sports car show, "Beater Revolution" thrashes what the rest of us drive daily. Taps into the groundswell demand for more beater coverage. And it’s cheaper to shoot it in Canada (more rusty beaters, too) . . . .

• "That Olds Won’t Float" (TV Movie) – Touching dramatization of Sen. Ted Kennedy’s Chappaquiddick debacle from the drowned Oldsmobile’s perspective.

• "Dream Car In Garage" (TV) – "Overhaulin’" for stuffed garages. Our team of space utilization experts unpack an unsuspecting mark’s junk-filled garage so that his or her car actually fits in it.

• "NOSmasters" (TV) – A crack team of Pro Mod racers put insane amounts of spray into nearly any internal combustion engine – with the goal of seeing how many kits they can throw at it before it becomes an external combustion engine. Plenty of carnage, fireballs and angry spouses.

• "eBay Build-off" (Sponsored by PayPal) (TV) – Primedia’s charity build-off taken to the next level. Teams have to build and race a car exclusively with parts found (fenced?) on eBay.

• "Viva La Burnout" (TV) – Ever wonder what would happen if you put an A78-13s on a top fueler? Will Mickey Thompsons make mondo smoke on the steps of the U.S. Capitol? Smokin’ more than a Compton sydeshow, "Viva" answers all these profound rubber-burning questions and more . . . . (Inspired by the infamous webside "Tire Popping 101" and, of course, MTV’s "Viva La Bam")

• "Track Connection" (TV) – Somewhat inspired by Chuck Woolery’s old show "Love Connection," the audience listens to bench racing jibber-jabber among four street racers and then picks two to face off in a big money run.

• "Designer Sketchpad" (TV) – Tired of all those designers drawing cars for magazines that "you must build?" This program makes the designers put up or shut up. Three designers prepare drawings for a real customer who must choose and build the best design (inspired by a similar show on HGTV . . . don’t ask about it, okay) Oh Ted . . . . (gotta go)

[Flashback ends]

Speedzzter sincerely hopes that the legions who don't read the 3,022,190th most popular blog in the universe enjoyed the following trip down memory lane.