Robby94LS..... The Blog

 Am I..... A "Ford guy?"  I was recently thinking about this after seeing an old picture of me as a kid, probably middle school aged. I was standing in the driveway of the house we moved into when I was in middle school next to a Ford Thunderbird. Behind it, in the background, you can see in the carport a Ford Escort. I vividly remember both of these cars. Unfortunately the Thunderbird which had the 3.8L V6 that was known for head gasket issues fell victim to that issue so that car was gone before I could drive, but the Escort is what I learned to drive on. By the time I was learning to drive we had a Chevy conversion van in addition to the Escort. The reason I've never thought of myself as a "Ford guy," is because my dad was a Chevy guy. When he was younger him and his friends had Camaros, Novas, Chevelles, and he even had a 1941 Chevy (not sure what model) for awhile. Because of this, while other kids with budding interests in cars had supercars of the time as...

                I currently drive a 2017 Ford Fiesta ST. When looking back at the history of cars I’ve owned and driven, it’s probably objectively the best car I’ve ever had. I could go on about why, but it would just be one of thousands of other “slow car fast” articles combined with, used car guy owns a newer car for the first time, so I’ll spare you.  Despite being the best car I’ve owned, I often find myself longing for past cars that are in many ways objectively worse. The 2 I miss the most are of course, my baby, the 1994 Acura Integra LS that is my online namesake, and the 1995 DSM I owned a few years after the Integra. Lately I’ve been trying to figure out why this is. Were they better cars than I realized and I just wanted the latest and greatest, failing to realize what I had? Is the Fiesta not really all that great? The more I thought about it, the more I realized, there was one difference m...

One of the things that’s made me laugh as I’ve come back to this blog and looked at some of the older posts, is how 10 years later, as much as things have changed, they’re also the same in a lot of ways. For instance, one of the posts that caught my eye was from May 11, 2016, I did a YouTube review of Coors Banquet beer back when I was trying to do a lot of beer reviews. What made me laugh is I had just picked up a 6 pack of it after not drinking it for YEARS, easily 2 or 3 years. I probably had these stashed away somewhere at that time, but I took pictures of them to send to my brothers.   My grandfather was a bit of a hoarder, and one of the things he collected was matchbooks. He had HUNDREDS if not thousands of them. Of course this was one of my favorites. The Coors branding has always seemed frozen in time to me, somewhere in the 70s or maybe early 80s. I look at that matchbook and think about what it must have felt like to spark up a Marlboro with these as you crack open a...

 If you've followed any of my social or YouTube channel, you'd know that one of the highlights of my year is attending the Washington Auto Show every January. Well, during the  one  week the show was in town, we had a snowstorm, and it was an already busy week at work. I had the week planned  perfectly,  including a day to go to the eye doctor and then the car show. Unfortunately, I couldn't change everything around and ended up missing the show. So, the  one  sure video I make per year for YouTube won't be happening.    Maire suggested attending another show, and I may, but the new car shows are different than a lot of other shows. I looked into the Philly auto show, and even the Chicago auto show, I never realized that they’re all clustered around the same time of year. The Philly show was only a week later so I couldn’t make that happen in time. Maybe I’ll get to Carlisle or just set a goal to attend a few different Cars & Coffee e...

 It's been a WHILE! The year, 2026. Gone are the blog days, and even vlog days, we are now in the thick of the "short form" era. At the start of this year there were online jokes that 2026 was going to be 2016 all over again. The mannequin challenge along with other memes and challenges of the time resurged for a little while. I brushed it off, but as I was looking through my Google Drive and came across this... I think I may embrace this. I think I'm going to bring back blogging for 2026! I'd love to bring back vlogging too, but being realistic, I just don't think I have the time to do all of that, although I do love it. So even though it's the end of Feb, welcome to 2026, the year of the BLOG!! 

Haven't posted here in awhile, but that doesn't mean I'm not up to anything! Maire and I have done our usual fall beer fest, managed to work a few more bike rides in, been to a number of breweries, and biggest of all, went on a real vacation!! If you don't already follow me on Instagram, you can see pics of all those adventures there, check the main page for a link!