We cruised into Pana Il. with a false sense of accomplishment. We were already at the second checkpoint, but we were only ninety-seven miles into our 266 mile jaunt. I parked in front of the mural, and left the car running, snapped the picture, then parked out of the way. We were on a large gravel lot with plenty of room. As with the first checkpoint, the Hot Rod staffers were there shooting pictures, and everyone was in high spirits.
I pulled out my phone, and called Dale again.
"We're still at the parts store", he laughed, "got the Belvedere all lined out, jumped in the Gremlin, backed up four feet, and it died. It's the module in the distributor. I've got another, but while we were testing it something's weird between the alternator and distributor wiring, and I keep getting a ghost spark. I've already burned up one alternator, this one's acting crazy, and now the dizzy...so I think I'm going to take the time to re-wire it now!"
"Good grief", I looked down at my phone, it's already 7:15, and you haven't put fifteen miles down yet!"
"I know, Darren's still back with Squirrel...they got someone to re-build the blower, and Darren took him to a parts store for all the extra's he might need, but he's not rolling yet either".