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This morning's gas prices in Hamden, CT (New Haven) $3.73 Regular (Cash) @ Hamden Gulf $3.85 Regular (Cash) @ Hamden, Citgo  

Signed my paperwork in February and received my SRI April 5.

Teen Mustang Owner Fighting Cancer, Gets Bad News https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/ford/2024/04/23/teen-mustang-owner-cancer-jim-farley-ford-charlotte-motor-speedway/73411364007/   Joseph Tegerdine had never been on a professional racetrack, let alone behind the wheel of a Ford Mustang Dark Horse actually rocketing 112 mph. He remained fearless even as his life continued to be dominated by sharp turns and tight corners.   "It was kind of terrifying at first. Then I was like, 'oh, this is actually pretty chill.' It's just really, really fun," Tegerdine, 18, of Springville, Utah, told the Free Press. "There’s so much to be thinking about in this car that your brain is 100% occupied — a little more gas, hit the brake hard, turn, turn. It’s just surreal."   He mentioned the Oscar-winning film "Ford v Ferrari" and asked, "You know that famous line?" — referring to the part where legendary racing driver Carroll Shelby says, "There's a point at 7,000 rpm ... where everything fades. The machine becomes weightless."   Tegerdine said, "It was 100% that feeling. Everything fades and you're floating."     Why a racetrack in Charlotte The young man traveled earlier this month from Utah to North Carolina with his father, Joe Tegerdine. (Father and son have the same name. For clarity, we'll refer to the father as Joe and his son as Joseph). Ford CEO Jim Farley offered the two a trip to the Ford Performance Racing School at the famed Charlotte Motor Speedway. The auto executive, himself a competitive race car driver whose first car was a Mustang, wanted Joseph to experience the untethered thrill of a Mustang on the track. Farley had read on social media that Joe Tegerdine bought his son a 2020 Mustang because the teen's bone cancer was moving too quickly to not grant all wishes immediately.   "For those wondering why I’d buy my 18yr old son a 330hp Mustang, well, he’s been given months to live and can’t work long enough to buy one himself," Tegerdine tweeted on X. "His comment on the way home, 'Dad, I’m going to squeeze a few extra months of life just to be able to drive this.' ”   More than 13.8 million people read the post, and nearly 200,000 have commented, shared, liked or bookmarked it.     Dad, the general manager of North America for Reencle home composting systems, has heard from people who survived cancer, who lost children, who urge the family to remain strong.   "There's so much social upheaval and so many people are hurting right now ... to be able to have literally thousands of people reach out, you just realize most of us are just good people doing our best to try and live a fulfilling life," Joe said.   "We get caught in this doom cycle," he said. "I attribute a lot to politics and politicians trying to divide us and focus on negative and dark things to maintain power and generate wealth for themselves. The rest of us get caught in these cycles. To be able to step out and see the goodness of humanity and people is super inspiring to me. It reminds me that, for most of us, that’s our reality."   Feel yourself airborne When Farley offered the trip in a private message to Joe, the father-son duo accepted immediately. Other Mustang owners were at the track that day, too. Ford put the father and son, with custom helmets, in their cars to create unique drive experiences they would share later.   "We had a drifting course," that taught how to make controlled skids sideways through turns, and smoked the tires, Joe said. "After driving, we did a timed skills course with cones and instruction with professional drivers. That was really cool. In the afternoon, we headed to the main track, where we had a pace driver, and three cars would follow. It was Joseph and I and another car. We hauled butt behind the professional driver. I think I got up to 115 miles per hour on the side wall."   But that wasn't all.   "In the end, we got to ride with a professional driver and it was like, I mean, G-forces after G-forces. You could feel yourself airborne in the seat. You come through a turn and you feel all the pressure in the turn and as soon as they hit the throttle out of the turn, you're pinned to the sat," Joe said. "Joseph was so excited. I had not seen him have that much energy for months."   They attended a dinner hosted by the racing school on April 11, the night before heading to the track. Joseph ran into Laurie Transou, chief engineer of the Mustang program, and talked design and engineering. (Last year, Transou encouraged young adults to take their moms to the racetrack for Mother's Day instead of brunch.)     Proximity to Transou was coincidence, Ford said. She had scheduled months in advance attending the program. Joseph once wanted to be an engineer — before his classes were replaced with medical treatments and surgeries.   "Normally, you'd have conversations about, 'when you’re an engineer,' or 'you could come back and do the two- or three-day course,'" Joe said. "But then you realize this is probably it. So you’re very much in the now. And embracing that moment together because there’s a recognition of the finality of it. You know there’s not going to be probably a next time. So we just try to enjoy those moments together."   Farley told the Free Press in a statement, “I’m just pleased we were able to help Joe and Joseph enjoy a very special day. It was an honor for our team to host them in Charlotte.”    It was a great time for a kid who has always loved speed, Joe said. Joseph used to ride like lightning on a motorbike at their old Texas cattle ranch. In eighth grade, a sore knee led to the cancer diagnosis for Joseph, who played football and ran track. When driving the Mustang, he drives with a prosthetic right leg now. Cancer required amputation.   Still, never feeling like an invincible teenager This past weekend, Joseph took his girlfriend, Lily Flake, to her prom at Mapleton High School.   "It's fun to be a little teenager for a bit," he said. "I’m technically a teenager, but I’m not really a teenager. Teenagers think they’re invincible. They have the ability to go do stupid things and they don’t think of the consequences. 'Yes, we’re going to load 10 people onto a golf cart and go zooming around town, no problem.' But at age 13, I had to come to the reality that I’m very much vincible and I'm going to die. I never really got that whole 'invincible teenager who can do whatever and it’ll be fine' feeling."   Joseph said, "But it’s nice sometimes to remember, it sounds dumb because I'm only 18, but it's nice to remember to stay young sometimes. My girlfriend helps with that. She loves fun things."   Asked how he's doing this week, he said, "I don’t really know. It's kind of just confusing, I guess. There’s just a lot of a lot. So I don’t know exactly how I’m doing. You just kind of go through every day and take it day by day."   Life can be a blur, like an Eras Tour experience After nearly two weeks, the trip going to Charlotte feels like a blur, Joseph said. He compared it to what he called "a Taylor Swift phenomenon." He explained that people go to her concert and don't remember details. "I don't know if you've ever heard this. You're just on this adrenaline high for, like, four straight hours. When you walk out, everything kind of settles and like, whoa, that just happened. But you can't really remember what actually happened. Everything is kind of hazy. You remember the feelings associated but you couldn't put, like, words to what you were feeling at the moment."   In August 2023, he attended an Eras Tour concert with his girlfriend at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.   These adventures are intentional. For Joseph, everything in life has to be about right now, his father said.     "You just have to make a choice. You can either get depressed and life is over and 'poor me' or whatever or just accept the fact that this is what life is, and we're all going to die at some point and we all have to reconcile that," Joe said. "You never want your children go before you, but millions of people before me had to deal with it and millions will after me. ... I have a strong faith in the afterlife. I don’t look at death — I don’t see it as the finality that sometimes I think we’re prone to. To me, it's like a transition. It’s the next adventure. But it's going to be hard to say goodbye."   Finding a glimmer of comfort in shocking loss Doctors delivered really bad news last week, Joe said. Scans came back, and Joseph has tumors going up through his hip and down into his leg. His osteosarcoma has become worse than doctors feared. A life measured in years is now measured in months.   For a few minutes, Joe stopped talking. And he just cried.   "His favorite uncle passed away" Sunday, Joe said.   Joseph saw his Uncle Jerry just a few weeks ago, and nothing seemed wrong, Joe said. Then the man went to the hospital a few days ago with pain and the doctors discovered necrosis of the small intestine after having his colon removed awhile ago, Joe said. Doctors went in to try to fix the issue and couldn't. He died.   That was the family member who called and texted and sent pick-me-up gifts and provided a constant presence to Joseph through the child's cancer journey over the past five years.     "Joseph’s only fear of death is being alone on the other side," Joe said. "We want to be greeted by our parents and brothers and sisters. So, to me, knowing that his uncle will be on the other side waiting for him, to me, is, um, just a tender mercy. Because I’m not going to be there to be on the other side with him."    

For the record, I’m not against unions.  I’m against union tactics like strikes just to get more compensation - especially when it’s significantly higher than the rest of the market.  It puts employers at a competitive disadvantage and it absolutely drives business to other states and countries.  And it protects bad employees and stifles productivity.  I’ve seen it first hand.   I believe an employer has the right to determine employee pay.  Period.  If you don’t like the pay or benefits then go find another job.

Nah, I was raised by someone who worked for the UAW and I was on strike when I was 17 years old working at a local grocery store for a few weeks. My old man said the union was pretty much useless outside of him being able to retire a little early due to the Edison plant being shutdown.    The issue is that the vast majority of the time, the union is a self serving entity with ties to ideologies I don't particularly care for.    Demographically unions may have more influence due to a shortage of workers due to smaller cohorts and labor becomes harder to fill in certain positions. But to blindly put your faith into a union is downright stupid. 

Got it...you both are anti-union....good to know.

Unions don't stand tall for anyone except a small portion of union reps. They hurt the workers by encouraging companies to relocate factories to foreign nations. They hurt the American consumer by driving up the cost of the product, and they hurt brands by dragging down profit margins.Unions are the HOA of the corporate world, they don't help anyone. Everyone understands why they were created, but believes they don't have as much of a reason to exist in modern day society. 

Tesla is being enigmatic about this, the basis of the 2 being low cost was changed construction process. I assume that was cutting out more time consuming steps in the body shop area, the rumour was the vehicle being gigacastings in a few major pieces that could be quickly joined…that process could be applied to the next generation 3, Y, S and X if Tesla chose to do so.   And I suspect the deflection of the rumoured 2 to an autonomous taxi vehicle is probably an smart way to cover what is really planned without lying in investment calls. Of course, this is speculation but you’re  right about Musk announcements ending up being inaccurate but it serves the purpose of redirection  away from disappointment over Q1 results falling short of expectation.   At some point, Tesla sales wil start to level out unless it offers a 2 sized vehicle that markets like  Europe and China crave but I doing so that will probably carve into 3/Y sales as people in those regions probably chose a smaller vehicle for their needs.

First of May inventory numbers for Ford will tell us the actual days supply for each vehicle type. If combined F Series inventory remains below 200,000 I think that will help supply rather than  hinder. We all know how much Ford has jacked up MSRPs over the past few years or even encouraged XLT buyers to buy  higher trim levels so this is where incentives and discounting gets interesting…..remember those XLT that used to have lux PACs? All I’m saying is that Ford may take a different route….