Now I Remember!

[Mattt123]

I was driving my recently purchased 1981 spider home from work the other night.
The temperature had dropped quite a bit while I was inside so I eagerly moved
all the levers to their proper positions, hit the fan switch and got a nice strong blast of
"NOTHING". Nothing but fan noise, no actual air moving of of any kind. "Well, (I thought,)
the vent under the cowling is probably stuck. I'll fix it later."

So I continued on and pretty soon it began to rain. "Better turn on the wipers".
Well, the wipers made one or two agonizingly slow passes so I moved the switch
and the rheostat to the "fast" position, whereupon the wipers promptly stopped moving all together.
Luckily I had Rain-exed the windshield and the downburst was short lived.
"What Have I gotten myself into?" I thought.

I continued along shaking my head when the sun suddenly came through and shone
on the gleaming hood of the car. Traffic had begun to spread out a bit and I downshifted
and shot through a gap into the fast lane. The five speed sang and the 2 Litre grumbled
and popped through the exhaust as I slid up behind a lumbering SUV. I shifted
again hit the blinker, (which actually blinked) bumped the wheel right and shot past the
behemoth in front of me.

As I looked to my left I saw three or four kids in the back, faces pressed against the glass,
smiling at my car and all giving me a "thumbs up". I laughed, returned the gesture,
shifted again and proceeded on home dancing through the traffic and having a blast.

"OK," I though. "Now I remember". You don't just ride in this car. You have to be
engaged and if you are, you will be rewarded. It won't let you have it any other way.
It reminds me of one or two high maintenance girl friends I had when I was younger.
They could be difficult, but boy "what fun."

[autotransgression]

this car (1980) gets WAY more attention than any other vehicle i have ever owned, with the possible exception of the 1972 bmw r75/5 i had. and the only reason i got rid of that is that the crazy-wide engine with its boxer cylinders would not fit in the garage in front of my spider.

i couldn't justify an additional 150/month for another garage, and was not about to keep either vehicle on the street. so, i chose the motorcycle with four wheels, courtesy of fiat. drop the top, and the feeling is reasonably similar.

but i know what you mean about having to get into it; the car seems upset if you don't get the revs up.