Re: Why an Alfa?

[Simon Favre <simon@domain.elided>]

Excellent story, Wille R. I guess the moral of that story is, there's
never a blonde Scandinavian girl or a red Duetto around when you need
one. ;=) I'd say the two go together exactly like freshly grated
Parmesan cheese on top of red pasta sauce.

My "Why an Alfa" story isn't nearly as exotic. When I was in college,
a friend of mine had this friend who was foolish enough to let him
borrow HIS red Duetto for a weekend. Three of us used to pile into
this guy's car and go bombing around Southern California in it. We
mostly terrorized the streets of San Marino in the middle of the night.
I was more into motorcycles at the time, but a few nasty spills were
convincing me to give up the bikes. What impressed me about the Alfa
was the magnificent sound of the motor, and the almost unheard of
preciseness of the steering. I was used to Dearborn behemoths with
30-60 degrees of play in the steering. Of course, the looks of the car
were also pretty enticing.

So, a few months after leaving Southern California for the greener
SF Bay Area, I was reading the Classified Flea Market paper and I saw
an ad:

Alfa Romeo, not running. $100 ###-####

I went to see the car. It was a banged-up white '62 Giulietta Spider 
with no engine, no tranny, no top, and 3" of water in the car. I was 
really hoping it was a red Duetto, but it was love at first sight. 25 
years and a few thousand dollars later, I still have the car. It still 
gives me that ear-to-ear grin every time I take it out. I used to drive 
it to L.A. on the Coast Highway, or to Mendocino county, but I prefer 
the 67 GTV for longer trips now. (wife, luggage, etc.) I'm a middle-
aged married stiff now, and the Giulietta Spider still gets me cat calls
from girls saying, "Nice car!" Fortunately, my wife doesn't care to ride
in the convertible. Being the understanding sort, she also doesn't have
the heart to ask me to sell it. ;=)

Simon

P.S. Warren Nicholson was kind enough to send me a few JPGs of the Spider
at the recent ARA autocross. I'll upload them to the team.net FTP server
and post a URL shortly.

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