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I know this is a long one but I thought it too great an LBC story to not
send it out to the list.
Carl F
67B
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Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1998 22:40:39 -0500
From: BFrench <bfrench@nh.ultranet.com>
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To: rjakcl@erie.net
CC: bjfrench@hopper.unh.edu, cfrench@cybertours.com
Subject: Sera'
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Sera'...it will be!
This is a great car story, and I have held off the telling because it is
difficult to do justice to it.
When we finished restoring Ben's '74 MGB (last of the chrome bumpers), I
said "I'm ready to do one of my own now. I'd like to restore a 1967 (my
favorite year) MGB-GT, because Ben and Carl have nice roadsters, and I
like the looks of the GTs. I had recently started a new business, and
you know how that goes...There was no way I could do such a thing for a
year or more.
Time passes, and the sales list on the web site for Brit-Bits (our local
LBC store) shows a 1967 MGB-GT for about half the price of a roadster.
It came at the "trough" of the starting-your-own-business-cycle, and I
was unable to buy it, but I began to enjoy the idea of it.
Curiosity got the best of me, and I drove over to inspect the car. I was
completely taken by it! It was the car of my dreams! "My" '67 GT! I
wrote the VIN number on a bank slip and carried it around in my pocket.
I began to write about it. I began to read about it. I began to talk
about it. I virtually "owned" it, in my imagination!
I began to visit it .... three or four times a week!
My brother, Carl, and my older son, Ben both have MGBs, and the began to
wonder about ways to make this happen for my birthday, a month away. You
offered the encouragement to just "go in like you were 17 years old and
offer what you can." Carl, his fiance, Judy, Carl's kids, Dan and Amy,
Ben, my wife, Susan and son Brandon, and my father all got together and
went to see the car. (Several of them had accompanied me on my little
visits, before.)
They poked, they probed, they went over it with a magnet....They all
went inside...
I wish I could have seen them surround our friends at Brit-Bits in Rye,
NH! Eight of them (I think) around the counter with envelopes of cash
contributions, rolls of quarters, you get the idea. "How can I refuse an
offer from a crowd like this!", or words to that effect, and the deal
was closed! This family consortium owned "My" 1967 MGB-GT for real!!!
They owned it for three weeks...The conspiracy became huge!
I continued to visit it, and dream that things would work out. That it
would wait all winter for me on the back row at Brit-Bits until I could
own it. My family was supportive..."If it is meant to be, it will
be."..."You should make them an offer after the holidays, We support
you!"
The folks at the dealership were all in on it..."If Brad asks, it is
still available, but if anyone else asks, it's sold." I enjoyed the
fantasy of "owning" it (in my imagination). I shopped for '67 GTs on the
internet. I carried the VIN in my pocket...
The day of my birthday was as well orchestrated as a major military
campaign! I was kept occupied for lunch, and frozen yogurt, and errands
to the store (So my wife could call in to Ben and Carl's command post
for the latest report!)
Sam and Mark, from the dealership, convoyed to the car to my house, with
Ben and Carl and his family. They hid it in the garage...Then thay all
fled the scene!
Susan delivered me precisely on schedule, and the whole family began to
spontaneously arrive. Packages came through the door. We began to visit,
and they gave me my first gift...I opened it to find a new MG/Safety
Fast baseball cap...
The little MG key was attached and they handed me the garage door
opener! "You'd better go outside, Dad"!, they said.
We were all pretty choked-up at that point, as I hit the button on the
garage door...
There she was...All MINE!!! The biggest red ribbon was completly
wrapped around the car and a five-foot bow was on the top of the
windshield, cascading down the hood!!!
It was really magnificent. I wept, I talked, I told the whole story of
my infatuation. Ben said "Fire it up, Dad!" I turned the key, and
drove her out into the fading light. She was originally white, then dark
"Mineral Blue". Now she had oxydized to a sort of dull plum color.
...Didn't matter, She was the car of my dreams!
I have had her for about a week. My arms will look like Popeye's after
all of the rubbing that I have done! Her dark blue paint is coming
back. The windows are clean. The black w/ red piping interior will need
a lot of work. Carl wants to restore the wood-rimmed Moto-Lita steering
wheel. The wire wheels will clean up with the special brush my wife
bought me this weekend! I have Antique plates and a beach sticker for
it. She gets her inspection sticker tomorrow!
Is this a great life or what? Your friend, Brad French. Hampton, NH
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