== british-cars at autox.team.net supported in part by Fat Chance Garage
== http://fatchancegarage.com
I think this is the highest volume I've seen on this list in years. Well, I
won't go into how I became snake bitten, 'cuz that probably pretty obvious and
a story onto itself. But I do recall pretty vividly how I became interested in
British cars. In the early 1950's my dad and a work friend decided to goon a
skiing trip in the Sierras and I was invited to tag along. I think I was
about 12. I don't recall the reason, but it was decided thatwe would go in my
dad's friend's car, a Singer, I think it was a '51, even though my dad had a
much roomier car. I'm not familiar with the different Singer models any more,
but this was kind of an MG T-series looking 4 seat roadster. I got to ride in
the back with all the gear. I recallnot being overly comfortable, but was so
overwhelmed by the shear coolness of the car, that I didn't really notice that
too much.I was at an age when cars were becoming the focal point of my
interests. What a ride through twisty mountain roads, accompanied by throaty
exhaust notes! I don't remember a thing about the skiing part of thetrip, but
I sure remember getting there and back. And the conversations was mostly car
related, rather than ski related. My dad'sfriend was going to be getting
married shortly and was going on about this neat little German car he wanted
to get for family use- a VW.But my interest was totally focused on his Singer.
A few years later when I got my license, I tried to talk my dad into letting
me buy a Singer, but he refused. Not practical enough. I waswilling to
compromise on a Morris Minor convertible, but he wouldn't give in on that
either. Of course, by this time what I really wanted was an MG TD,but I knew
there was no way I could pull that off. I didn't have the bucks to even
broach the subject. I finally ended up with a rather warn '48 Ford 4 door
sedan. Oh well, better than no car. I took many a "hard" corners on that old
Ford's skinny tires pretending I was in a sports car. My next car was more
interesting, but just as ratty- a '47 Crosley. That car literally fell apart
around me. After a couple of years I ended up selling to a guy who used what
was left of it to build a trailer. Finally, at the end of my college sophomore
year, I got my TD. Again, a really ratty car, but a real sports car, finally.
The agreementwith my dad was that I couldn't take it to school. For some
foolish reason he thought using money for college rather than for car
insurancewas more important. In those days, you could completely drop your
car insurance for part of the year. And when I graduated, I hada pretty neat
car to drive to work in. But as I said, it was in pretty bad shape. I ended
up buying something more dependable so could I workon it at my leisure. It
didn't take long for reality to kick in. It was going to cost far more to get
the car in reasonable shape, than it was worth, even ifI did all the work
myself. I ended up selling it to someone who wanted to put a Volvo motor in
it. Don't know if he ever did, though. By then I could afford something
better than a ratty old car, so I went shopping. I looked at some TR3s and
some Porsches, but finally settledon a Austin Healey 3000 with about 14k miles
on it. That served me well until I came down with snake fever. Roland
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