Sports cars

Well I am sorry to say that I have a beautiful MX5, 2 litre, and it is a total joy. Unlike my DH's very sensible car, it is a delight to drive and makes me feel twenty years younger. Top down on a sunny day and life feels really good. I know I will have to give it up eventually but just seeing it glowing in the car park gives me a thrill. I will now get my coat, bend my head, and shuffle off Gransnet before I get too many rotten tomatoes thrown at me!!!


PS : please let me know when it is safe to come back in............

I just like having a car that is a bit unexpected. I have run three sports cars in my time, none of them gas guzzlers, and I never drove them at excessive speeds. By the time I bought them they were all elderly and run down but fun to own and could be guaranteed to catch people by surprise because the image of middle aged professional woman with spouse and two kids didnt match the car, or vice versa.

My most 'successful' car was a Saab, not a sports car, that was 15 years old when I bought it, and which I owned when DS was at secondary school, a private school, where quite a number of fathers had fairly upmarket company cars. The novelty of the car, its dilapidated condition and elderly registration number, did, so my DS told me, give him considerable street cred and status among his peers.

I used to have a car (Morris 1100) - totally unsuitable for the terrain in Kenya - which kept on dying on me. I discovered that the battery terminal was coming detached from its connection. I leapt out of the car on a roundabout in the middle of Nairobi (risky!), shoved a bit of silver foil from a bar of chocolate onto the terminal and reconnected it. That improvised repair lasted for months. The Elastoplast I used to fix a petrol pump lead lasted a year and was still on when I swapped the car for a much more suitable VW 1300 Beetle. If I hadn't got married when my contract in Kenya ended, I had plans to buy a MG midget. Did I make the right choice?

Is it definately the battery? I'm only asking cause I had that sort of trouble with a car and it was the alternator and, one day it just died on me as I was going round a corner. I do think some cars are a thing of beauty [like aircraft]. And men so define themselves with their cars. I always think one of the worst things for a man as he gets older and his health fails is giving up his car; I've seen it happen to friends and relatives [I'm not referring to your DH when I say that Stangran]. Although I have a sensible old ladies car I do sometimes long for something like an old Citroen 2CV; we once travelled oop north just as they were having a Citroen Rally somewhere and every other car looked like a little dustbin [some with trailers]. It was like being in a Noddy book.

Well yes, but DH's old Capri can easily get up to 120mph (so he tells me!). For a lot of men I think it's the engine power that really does it for them, as well as the looks of course.

No offence meant folks - I was thinking of a brand new super high powered thing - like Clarkson acolytes drool over. I know someone who is getting one so it was on my mind...

It's all go, isn't it Nonu?

DH still drives a T reg 3ltr Ford Capri and is now spending a fortune on having it refurbished (not for the first time...). It eats petrol and is a devil to park, but he loves it and tinkering with it keeps him happy. As long as I never have to drive it...

Don't get me on this one!! Cars are for getting from A to B safely and if possible comfortably. They are not penis extensions.

I think it should be illegal to manufacture a car that has the potential to exceed the speed limit - if it is illegal to go a speed X, then what is the point of a car that can do speed X+?

We pay a huge price for this vanity - bereavement and disability; wrecked lives.

I have never understood what it is all about. Whatever gene it is that makes people enjoy moving at speed was obviously not one that I inherited - all I can see is the misery that it all causes.

I should rejoice in the flat battery stansgran and let the darned thing stay in the garage!

Too true Tanith .

Anyway , off for a nice swim at club .

Oh dear! I have had a Mazda MX5 for the last 10 years.
It's now 17 years old and I'm resisting all efforts to make me swap it for something more sensible until it falls apart, or I do, whichever happens first.
I love the feel of driving it - and it's just a beautiful, classically designed car

I had a sports car for years. I used it daily until I sold it for a 'grown-up' car last year. It was economical to run, didn''t guzzle gas and was cheap, eventually, to insure. Not all sports cars are status symbols and I certainly didn''t feel show-offy when driving it

Yes that is true. People of both sexes buy these pointless, gas guzzling status symbols. There is nowhere on public roads where they can be driven to spec.
I might be envious of those who have enough money to squander on one - but what are they for other than showing off?

My sister in law recently turned up to a family meal with a new sports car, very nice I was envious. I asked her husband during the meal if it was a present to herself , he said yes it was but she'd only driven it a couple of times as she felt too near the ground when driving and unsafe.. so he had to take it out for a spin now and then to keep the engine ticking over and he had no idea if she'd even try to get used to driving it or more likely sell it.

So its not only boys Nonu!!

Boys and their toys Stansgran !!!

What to do with them !!