Your story about coincidences

[Dennis Kirban]

As the title says do you have story about a coincidence in your life?

I got a bunch of them. One I recently put in my weekly Inner Circle to my Turbo customers. I posted this same question on another car brand forum I am on and it got quite a few interesting stories.

Here is one of mine:

As most reads know I have bought and sold over 300 of the 1986-1987 Turbo Regals. In recent years I would hear from new owners wanting to know by chance did I own their car at one time. In recent times I would get more requests as the values keep gong up. About three months ago I finally decided to go through my records and put them not only in year order 1986 and 1987 but in sequential VIN order based on the last 6 digits after the GP or HP in the 17 digit VIN.

In some cases I have a number of records even copies of window stickers. While researching something on the VINs the other day I made a neat discovery. I actually had two turbo Regals that were in sequence for 1987.

I even owned both of them in the same year 2000 one in February and one in July of the same year. One was HP448885 and the other was HP448886.

The chances of this is probably like you hitting your state lottery. One car came from Maryland and the other came out of New Jersey. I have no idea where they are today. Keep in mind turbo regals were intermixed with regular Regals on the Flint assembly line until the last 10,000 GNs were made in sequential order from what I understand.

That is a strange coincidence.

what is your story?

denniskirban@yahoo.com

 

[toofastforyou]

My car's serial number ends with "62", and one guy who lives in my area has the exact same number except for the last two digits which are "97" … Our cars are only 35 cars apart… It's the closest number to my car I found to date.

Claude.

 

[t-typinator]

,

 

[ITSAV6]

My first motorcycle a '74 Honda CB125 street bike, my first car a '67 GTO 4 spd vert, and my T Type are all aquamarine in color.
Before I was born when people would give you an old car to get it out of the yard my Dad was given the front half of a Model A sedan. He had seen the back half of one when he was deer hunting and he was given the back half...same car several counties apart.

 

[VtheGNMan]

My wife and I grew up in different towns but we noticed in one of her childhood pictures taken at the pool that I am in the background. Didn't meet for another 15 + years after it was taken. Girls still had cooties at that time in my life.

 

[skidlid]

My kids play high school hockey. Every morning my wife gives them vitamins to take. One Saturday morning before a game my daughter asked why her brother has one more pill than her. My wife tells her that one is a fish oil pill to help concussions and that her brother needs them because he gets hit so much. My daughter told her mom," if I take one that would be the day I get a concussion." Four hours later on a breakaway a girl dived at her taking out her legs resulting in an ambulance ride to the hospital for a concussion!

 

[T What?]

I bought my 87 T from the 2nd owner with 62k original miles on it in 2008. It was my dream car and I loved it very much. In 2011 I was a single dad to my my daughter. The economy became very poor for my line of work and I was broke. My daughter needed new clothes and shoes. I was forced to sell my last posession that was worth anything. Sold the car for $7500 to a guy in Alabama.

Fast forward to 2015, I started looking for another Buick, contacted a guy on Craigslist that had an 86 t type roller. We got to talking and my old car came up in conversation. Turns out it was his brother that had bought it from me. He gave me his number and I called him and asked if he wanted to sell it back to me. After a few months of going back and forth about price, we made a deal. Turns out he literally drove it from my house to his and parked it. There was about 170 more miles on it since I had sold it to him. Literally got my car back unmolested with little to no use since I had sold it. I have owned several "cool" cars. This was the only car that I would think about nearly every day after I sold it. I am in a much better position in life now and will never let it out of my sight again.

 

[TURBOELKY]

My 87 GN was crashed 10 years ago. I wanted to buy it from my buddy then, but he left it sitting in a garage for 8 years. I was given the opportunity to own it, so we made a deal. Took some time to get the title, clean title as the accident was not reported. When I finally received the title, it was issued November 24th...my birthday.

Recently had a carfax ran. The car was bought in Burbank IL, and now resides in Burbank CA lol. It was made for me.

 

[johnnycasx]

my 1986 monte carlo ss rolled off the assembly line on november 4th 1985, one day before my 1st birthday

 

[Dennis Kirban]

Great stories......like the one above about being born one day prior to lst birthday.....for me to come close to that I would have to find a 1947 car.....

Referring to my initial post about having two turbo T Regals with VINs in sequence is unusual to say the least.....I recently heard from one of my customers that really hit the jackpot with the VIN numbers all by accident.

Here is his story:

Back in 1987 he wanted a GNX but they were all over priced. Instead he bought a Grand National. Fast forward to 2002 he decided to seek out a GNX and bought one out of Illinois. Nothing strange about this or unusual. When he got the registration to put in his GNX glove box he made a unusual discovery....one that would be very tough to duplicate today.

The VIN of the GNX he purchased the VIN was the sequential number in front of his Grand National which he still owned. In other words.......he owns a 1987 Grand National and a GNX with VINS that follow each other in sequence. If you remember your GNX history ASC merely pulled Grand Nationals off the Flint assembly line not sure if in any order or random or if they picked ones with great paint jobs but whatever method they used they all started as production Grand Nationals.

The chances of this happening is probably like hitting your state lottery....or owning two GNXs that are in sequence like 500 and 501 which in most cases would not share a sequential VIN number.

Needless to say if and when my customer decides to ever sell his unique cars it makes a sweet package deal. Some times dumb luck works out better than if one tried to do this....

true story

denniskirban@yahoo.com

 

[deezdad]

turbobuick.com/threads/sad-coincidence.178583

 

[VIJim]

The last 4 digits of my Buicks Vin are 7771, the last 4 digits of my phone number are 7771. I had the phone first, obviously it was meant to be!

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk

 

[texasmr2]

Too many my old fart brain can remember.

 

[TurboTGuy]

I've posted this story before but this thread seems to be appropriate for it , so here we go again..........




I was living/working in Sedona, AZ in 1986, driving a clapped out old '70 Olds Cutlass. I had read the article in Hot Rod about the GN and wanted one soooooooooooo badly.

So, a couple of months later, in Feb of '87, I go to a job interview at the Mint Hotel and Casino in downtown Las Vegas, what is now the big side of Binion's Horseshoe. I got the job and while having a celebratory drink at the Union Plaza, I hit a $27K plus progressive jackpot on one of the first generation video poker machines.

So, I am now GOING to buy a GN, come hell or high water. The search for one lead me to a GN at Peter Epstein Buick in Palm Springs, CA. The day I was driving out to look at it (no internet or cell phones back then) I get a call from a guy in Indio, CA who says he has a car "identical to" a GN he can sell me for 5K less than a GN. Indio and Palm Springs are only separated by a few miles of ugly desert so I said "What the heck, I'll stop and look at it".

I get to the dealer in Indio and the salesman excitedly takes me around back to show me this plain Jane, white exterior, blue bench seat, column shifter, crank window Regal with a bump on the hood, a little "T" on the fender, and the 3.8 SFI badges on the hood bump and deck lid. This thing was a grampa car like no other. They wanted 11K.

I wrinkled up my nose, said no thanks and headed on out to Palm Springs where I paid $17K cash for an 86 GN with the plastic wrappers still on the seats and just 9 miles on the speedo................. She was my pride and joy. 10 years later she was stolen out of my driveway in broad daylight. Never even a trace was found.

Fast forward 15 years and after a very costly divorce, I've stashed enough money away to think about another Turbo Regal.

I'm looking at Craigslist and see a car advertised as GN/T type. The ad says "White T-Type 68K miles, restored to California emissions legal. Buy with confidence, Lou's Automotive."

So I call, we talk, I drive to CA, I go look at and subsequently buy the car from Lou Czarnota aka TurboLou. It is a plain Jane, white exterior, blue bench seat, column shifter, crank window Regal with a bump on the hood, WITHOUT a little "T" on the fender, and the 3.8 SFI badges on the hood bump and deck lid. This thing is a grampa car like no other. Lou tells me all the badging is in the trunk. I paid 11K for it.

Now here's the kicker.

Even though Lou told me the car had been repainted recently, once I laid eyes on the car, I immediately thought to myself "Could it be? Might it be?"

Was there a chance this little car was the one I took a pass on all those years ago?

So I go to GM Archives and find out that this car I just bought was shipped from Detroit to San Jose, CA and then dealer traded to a store in, you guessed it........ Indio, Ca.

Now, just how many Turbo Regals with those odd options do you think that dealer in Indio bought/traded for back in '87?

I'd venture to guess the number to be just one.

Now, I cannot be 100% certain, but all the research I've done since buying this car indicates at about a 99% chance, that this car is indeed, the very same car I chose not to buy nearly 25 years before.

Coincidence or fate? No matter, I just think it's pretty cool.

 

[SpeedRacerX]

About 2+ years back, my wife and I were touring Napa for a couple days when we decided, almost completely off the cuff, to stop and eat an early dinner at some restaurant nearby. We're at dinner when my wife hears the woman sitting 2 feet from us at the next table talking about things and she could tell she had that local-to-us Philly-Jersey accent. Long story short, they know each others' cousins. Ok. Sort of coincidental.

Then, I get to speaking with the guy with her and ask him where he works. He tells me the company. I am floored. He is in Sales at one of my primary competitors. I can't count all the connections we have. First time I met him. Across the country, on this day, at this timeframe and in this restaurant.

Gets better. We stay in touch and I see him at various tradeshows 2 or 3 times each year. I start a new job 7 months ago, he gets ousted from his job, I need a Sales Rep in NJ for my larger team, he's available, we meet for breakfast, etc, etc. He now works for me and has for about 3 months.

If we had not decided to stop on that day, around that time, in the that part of the country, at that restaurant, and sit where we sat; this gentleman would not be working for me today.

Crazy.

 

[TurboTGuy]

About 2+ years back, my wife and I were touring Napa for a couple days when we decided, almost completely off the cuff, to stop and eat an early dinner at some restaurant nearby. We're at dinner when my wife hears the woman sitting 2 feet from us at the next table talking about things and she could tell she had that local-to-us Philly-Jersey accent. Long story short, they know each others' cousins. Ok. Sort of coincidental.

Then, I get to speaking with the guy with her and ask him where he works. He tells me the company. I am floored. He is in Sales at one of my primary competitors. I can't count all the connections we have. First time I met him. Across the country, on this day, at this timeframe and in this restaurant.

Gets better. We stay in touch and I see him at various tradeshows 2 or 3 times each year. I start a new job 7 months ago, he gets ousted from his job, I need a Sales Rep in NJ for my larger team, he's available, we meet for breakfast, etc, etc. He now works for me and has for about 3 months.

If we had not decided to stop on that day, around that time, in the that part of the country, at that restaurant, and sit where we sat; this gentleman would not be working for me today.

Crazy.

Funny,

I now work for a guy that has heard the story posted above about the little white TR at least a hundred times. He knows it's true.

I gave him his first job when he came to Phoenix in 1990.

We met at the drag strip when he walked up to the GN that was stolen and complimented it. We developed a friendship and we kept in touch.

In 2002 he called and asked if I was looking to change employers, I wasn't, but I heard him out. We've been working together and having a ball ever since. Ask Nick Micale, he will verify this story.

How crazy is life?

 

[Dennis Kirban]

Here is another coincidence on a sad note however:

I had an Uncle who like me was into cars. He would buy and sell used ones on the side. We would often meet at a 24 hour diner for a late snack. Grew close to him as he got older....at family dinners I would sneak him rasinets when he was not supposed to have candy....when his health began to fail I would send him fruit and magazines almost weekly.

He would later enter a nursing home and then at one point he was rushed to a hospital with breathing issues. His one daughter called us that fateful morning and said we should get down there to say our goodbyes. It was about an hour drive for us. As we were on our way
about half way there a chill came over me I looked at my watch it said 11:15 I told my wife I think we are too late. When we got to the hospital he had indeed died. The time of death was 11:15......

He was buried with his car keys in his pocket and the burial plot was closest to a four lane highway......a fitting location....

true story....

denniskirban@yahoo.com

 

[Frederickdav]

It's amazing how much about death we don't understand. I do believe a person's spirit/soul visits people who were close to them in life. The night after my wife passed, she came to me while I was in bed trying to sleep. She informed me that just going to church isn't good enough, we have to truly believe in Jesus Christ in order to get to heaven. I know this isn't politically correct but, that's the way it is.

 

[BuickMike]

Funny story here. Back in highschool I dated this girl for a short time named Wendy. We were friends long before and still friends afterwards. She met a n older guy at the end of our senior year and married him within a couple months. After the reception, my buddy and I were at a Denny's and were talking about her. This voice from behind says "did you say Wendy Cooper? I dated that chick." I turn around and this stalky ginger kid is standing there. We start talking and chatted about her and whatnot for quite awhile. He did not go to my school, so I had no idea who he was. She was a mormon girl, but she got around lol. That was in 1994. Fast forward to 2012 or so. We hire a new storage admin named Alan. Alan is this pretty hefty guy who is balding, but has red hair. Dude is funny has hell and messes with everyone. We called him O'Doyle (referring to the redhead bullies in Billy Madison). Alan and I were working closely together and even started carpooling. Something about him always made me feel like I knew him. As I got to know him, I learned he was mormon and lived in Tucson for a short time as he was going to U of A for a year. All of a sudden it hit me!!!! I walked into his office and sat down across from him......just staring at him for a moment. Alan finally says, "what?" with this odd look on his face. I just smile and say "Wendy Cooper". The look on his face was priceless. He says, "what?? I dated that girl a long time ago. How did you know that?". My reply was "Denny's....May 1994....around midnight." "That was you?" he says. I told him how I put the pieces together. It was too funny.

 

[achalmersman]

At the house I grew up in / my parents still live there, its an older farm house / property. It has a small cemetery from the late 1800s early 1900s but I dont remember the exact date range. Roughly 20 graves. My church only has 1 grave on the property.

My last name is Cooper. The church I go to is "Manship Chapel". There is a civil war soldier grave at the church and the soldiers last name is Cooper. At my parents there is a grave with the name "Manship". Heres the best part. There is one grave with a date of death exactly my Moms birthday (Christmas btw) and a grave with a death date exactly my Dads birthday.

No trees were harmed in the sending of this message, however, a significant number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.