Sunroofs some more...

[Will Owen <nashwill@domain.elided>]

Hey, kids -

For the first 12 years my wife and I were together,
she had a '75 BMW 2002 with a nice crank-open sunroof.
We used this only once in a while, though I found it
very handy when I was supplementing my income by
delivering newspapers - MUCH easier to fling'em out
the top than through a side window. Anyway, shortly
after we'd had a rebuilt engine and NOS tranny
installed, some kid went and interposed his Jeep
between where we were and where we were headed: R.I.P.
2002. The BMW mechanic happened to have a nice
non-sunroof '75 with a bad drivetrain, so for the
$2500 the insurance paid us he plugged our components
into this car, and Bingo! We had a new one. 

Better than a new one, actually: while the old car had
handled adequately (though nowhere as sure-footedly as
my Berlina), the non-sunroof car was significantly
lighter on its feet, more stable, much more eager to
play silly games on rural blacktop. The feeling of
structural rigidity was like the difference between an
egg and an egg-carton, and we agreed that the source
of the difference had to be the sunroof...

Alfa content: so after a couple of years, one day
another moron ran a red light and totalled this BMW.
When Tania asked her mechanic to find her yet another
2002, he flatly refused. They're all rusty and
worn-out, he said. They're yesterday's news. Let me
find you a nice 3-series. Well, Tania has about the
same respect for those as she does for SUVs, and THAT,
boys and girls, is more or less how we wound up with
our Milano.

Will Owen
Pasadena, CA
Yahoo! Movies - coverage of the 74th Academy Awards.
http://movies.yahoo.com/

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