It’s also my birthday. Considering that my dad bought this car around 3 years earlier,
and that my siblings are 10 – 15 years older than I am, it’s a fairly safe bet that I was a “whoops!” Especially since my father accused my siblings of giving my mother an ulcer. So she went to the doctor, the rabbit died, and it was time to turn the “den” back into a nursery.
I’m as old today as my father was on the day I was born. Happy Birthday to us!
My dad is 94. You can do the math if you really want to.
I'm drooling over the car! And happy birthday!
ReplyDeleteHappy belated birthdays to both of you! Your Pops had an awesome old Triumph TR-3! A car like that'll teach you about Lucas electrics!
ReplyDeleteJust finished reading an account of cadet service by a WWII bombardier who flew out of England - Charles Stevens - it made me appreciate bombardiers more. He signed my copy while the planes were visiting us.
I also have his other book, "An Innocent at Polebrook" from the year before last when we went up in the B-17. Mr. Stevens is still quite spry.
A family friend who piloted a B-24 over Italy just passed away, we're losing them daily.
I've been through a B-17 a couple of times, but sadly not in the air. Those crews were (and I say this with the greatest respect) were nuts.
ReplyDeleteNow I'd love to take a TR-3 for a spin just to see how it fits. I've got a 36" inseam like my dad, so if he fit, I probably would, too. I remember riding behind the the seats as a small child. There was sort of an upholstered area in the back where I could sort of stand up. Yeah, that was safe!
DirtCrashr - even funnier was that my dad was a radio engineer. At least he was until after the war when a buddy of his told him to come down to DC where a new television studio (WRC) was hiring.
ReplyDeleteAs a kid, I thought everybody's dad had an oscilloscope on thier workbench. And I took the Heathkit stereo system (tuner and amp) he was working on when Kennedy died to college with me 18 years later. It was full of tubes and it was HEAVY.
The B-17 seemed really small to me, reports from guys at the time called it immense. OMG, I've been working with a guy from MA who makes oscilloscope software and he wanted the use-and-feel stuff re-worked, that's my skill. My dad's nephew - my older cousin had a Austen Healey, he was a detective in San Jose, now retired. God bless 'em all. My dad's 84 and went to Annapolis, he was on a ship transiting The Canal when the war ended.
ReplyDeleteDirtCrashr - Okay ... I thought it was just me thinking the B-17 seemed small for what it was designed to do, but then I don't have a lot to compare it to.
ReplyDeleteI remember my dad showing me that a whistle made pefect sine wave on the oscilloscope. Odd, the things that stick with you.