An Introduction: Why "The Inside Curve"?
Picture this: an 8-hour car ride in a late 80's station wagon with an 80-year-old grandpa who would constantly remind me: "Take the inside curve!" "Why the inside curve?" I said knowingly. I just wanted to hear is reasoning. Sometimes it was funny. "You'll save miles on your car - racers do it all the time!" Much of this road trip was grandpa letting out an "Ahem!" followed by grandma's "RAAALPH, you're teaching him to drive like a maniac, make him SLOW DOWN!!!" And my mother? Well...I'll just say this: like mother like daughter. This was Julius Raphael Landini - "Ralph" as family and friends called him. He was full of advice for the ways of the road: "You don't need to fill up now! You'll just be hauling gas!" (It makes sense, actually!) "Don't stop at that station - the tanker's refilling it! You'll be pumping dirty gas!" Whether that last one was true,...