So, John has his sporty little (yellow) Solstice that he bought brand new back in 2007 (and promptly beefed up with uber-power). Cute lil’ thang, but did I mention that it’s little? I’ve never driven it. Waaayyy too much power for me (I picture doing an unintentional wheelie in it), plus I haven’t driven a standard shift in quite a few years. But when he isn’t hauling crap in the pickup (which he does 99% of the time), he enjoys spinning it around the curvy roads here on the island.
We actually took a trip in it shortly after he got it, with the dogs, down the Oregon coast. In pouring rain. How we really managed that—with the dogs—is beyond me.
All this time, including the time Before Tonya, John has had another little yellow car buried in the bowels of his garage/shop at the Des Moines house. I’ve only seen partial glimpses of it since it was tucked far in the depths and was always covered with a myriad of shop debris (and sawdust). It’s his 1972 Lotus Europa, which he used to drive everywhere (back in the early 1980s) until the motor blew a rod (or something very dire) and died the big bad death. He kept it as a “retirement project,” you know, “way-in-the-future” when he’d have the time to rebuild it.
Well, today was the day that it finally emerged from it’s decades-long dungeon and was hauled on a car trailer from Des Moines to Harstine! Our friend, young Lee (who did our siding and a bunch of other work on our house, plus is John’s gold prospecting buddy) and Lee’s father, met John in Des Moines and they loaded it up on the trailer.
Here it is after they pulled it off the trailer and were about to ratchet it down the driveway to its new home:
Isn’t it odd looking? The engine is in the back! (Actually, it has no engine; John pulled it long ago). And it is much smaller than his Solstice and extremely light. (It can pretty easily be manhandled by two guys). It’s British (Series 2), and only 800 of them were imported to the U.S. Lee said that during their drive down here, lots of people were slowing down and taking pictures. “What the hell is that?”
And now it’s in the Harstine garage:
There are still lots of house projects (right now the driveway retaining walls are a huge ordeal), but eventually when John really IS retired, he’ll start working on this thing. Over the years, he’s accumulated a bunch of engine parts for it so he’s got a good foundation when the time comes.
Why yellow? Well, he likes the color, for one thing (not high on my list…), but it’s also important for these little cars to be SEEN on the roads so a bright color helps. In fact, there’s a dent on the passenger door caused by a guy in a truck moving over a lane right into John (he couldn’t see him).
Something tells me that in the interim, the car will once again be buried in garage debris. Much like the boat (which is beside it) already is.
On another note, John also hauled my old 10-speed bike down here, circa 1979. I hadn’t ridden it all that much, so ultimately it should be in pretty good shape, aside from needing new tires and gone over with chain oil, etc. And WASHED. Yep, I got it brand new in 1979!
God, when was the last time I rode a bike? You never forget how, right?
