{"id":509,"date":"2011-11-07T16:37:50","date_gmt":"2011-11-07T23:37:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/?p=509"},"modified":"2015-02-16T13:51:27","modified_gmt":"2015-02-16T20:51:27","slug":"kevin-collins-was-a-great-guy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/kevin-collins-was-a-great-guy\/","title":{"rendered":"Kevin Collins was a Great Guy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kevin Gene Collins was a great guy. Always kind, happy, generous, fun, gentle, quick to laugh and even wise. He lived his whole life in Pacific Grove except for a few summers at his cabin in New Mexico. <\/p>\n

Mechanical Wizard: Kevin enjoyed fixing things; especially working on cars or trucks. He could take apart anything and fix it — from vehicle engines, to trucks to electric devices. We’d sometimes kid him about the fasteners left over when he put it back together, but we knew that whatever it was – when he was done it always worked – and usually better than before he showed up. <\/p>\n

In his last years he cultivated an interest in wind generators. He put up a couple in his backyard to learn how they worked. I tried to explain the theory of them, but he was a solid empiricist and never quite believed my explanations. He had to see it working to believe a principle.<\/p>\n

We met because we were neighbors growing up and shared an enjoyment of racing slot cars and exploring our area on bicycles and hiking. Once, while we were racing on a time trial in the woods, he “lost” his bicycle over a bank. <\/p>\n

Hal and Alan Williams and I walked back to help him but we couldn’t find it either. Kevin went back the next day and found it down a steep ravine in a tiny creek hidden in some overhead high rushes\/weeds.<\/p>\n

Generous: Once I needed a carpet in my home, Kevin did a great job installing it and then refused to take any money for it. He also would often “lend” us valuable tools and then would pretend he didn’t recognize them when we’d bring them back – so he wouldn’t take them back. I’ve got a carburetor vacuum gauge that always I’ll honor as a memory of him.<\/p>\n

Kevin was also a cagey snooker player. We often kidded him about making up rules on the fly (probably because we didn’t know any rules) and he really was a better player than the rest of us, obviously better than I was – no matter what rules we were using that particular day.<\/p>\n

Musician: I remember him learning to play the electric guitar (with an amp) and an acoustic guitar as well. He got fairly good at it; as in his songs were recognizable and genuinely melodic. He even taught me a few short songs, for which I am grateful.<\/p>\n

He recently married Laura Collins. They lived in his parents family home on Beaumont avenue in Candy Cane Lane.<\/p>\n

It has been a great honor to know you Kevin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kevin Gene Collins was a great guy. Always kind, happy, generous, fun, gentle, quick to laugh and even wise. He lived his whole life in Pacific Grove except for a few summers at his cabin in New Mexico. Mechanical Wizard: … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fabulous-friends","category-fun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=509"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":637,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509\/revisions\/637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}