Driving My Car

Michael has cast aspersions on my driving, and he cannot go unchallenged. As a further insult to my US readers, he has suggested that driving an automatic is for "beginners". Here is a run-down of the manual (stick shift) cars I've owned and driven since I passed my driving test in 1978.

First there was the Ford Cortina Estate. It had its gearstick on the steering column. I had the same set-up some years down the line with a Renault but couldn't find a picture of one on Google.


I sold the car to my neighbour and bought a Hillman Imp from a colleague. These cute cars were tiny, with a rear engine, but the rear window flipped down and turned them into little estate cars. I loved it, but it never got over being stolen and having the gearbox burnt out by boys doing handbrake turns.

The Renault had to go back to the dealer after a couple of weeks, as a repair to the cylinder head by the previous owner had not been checked and the engine died.

Then my car maintenance tutor wanted me to buy a Morris Marina. My only ever accident involving another vehicle happened not long after, and I broke the car outside my house for spare parts.

I bought my tutor's Ausitn 1800 for a small amount of money, but it really was a big, lumbering bus, so 6 months on I decided to buy my first brand new car.
I opted for a Ford Fiesta, which was a lovely little car. I kept it for years, till I took a job which provided a car, and then I acquired a much larger five-door hatchback. It was a Vauxhall Cavalier. Six months after acquiring it I changed jobs and had to give it back.
So then I bought my second new car, another Ford Fiesta, which I kept for about 12 years. It cost me very little in repairs and was extremely reliable. But it was getting to the stage where it would fail its MoT test (a roadworthiness test taken by all UK cars over 3 years old).

This time I bought a 3-year-old Rover 25. It was a luxury car compared to all the other bog-standard basics I'd had before. I loved it. But the gearbox was dodgy, and when the garage found a problem with the sump, I decided to trade it in. Many years ago, on holiday in France with the father and step-family of Rat Scabies (the drummer of The Damned), I was a backseat passenger when John came out of a town high up in the Massif Central mountain range, and found he needed to change down to first gear. He had an artificial left hand, having played with fireworks as a child, and used to put the car into gear by leaning over and using his right hand. He couldn't do that in motion, so with the clutch depressed, we were rolling backwards down the mountainside out of control, till his wife whacked the car into gear.

I was left with a growing panic when changing gear on hills, and decided to go for an automatic after trying one out in the saleroom (not because I can't drive manuals, Michael, but because I wanted an easier life after nearly 30 years behind the wheel).

That's when I bought my lovely little Nissan Micra, which has just lost its reverse gear and is getting a new gearbox as we speak.

But what I really want is this neat Micra C+C - preferably NOT in this sickly sugary pink!
Thanks to Google for the pictures.

And Michael - when I took car maintenance classes, I drove my tutor's taxicab and his 1951 Humber Super Snipe. Can you beat that or ARE YOU A PRIZE WUSS?