And Finally….

Crashing the Sentra came at a price; I had to choose a car that The Wife wanted or at least liked. To put that in to context, The Wife is the reason I am here writing a blog… let me explain.

I’m that guy who walks down the street and comments on every car he sees;
“God the Fiat 500L is a mistake, I don’t know if I am more annoyed at Fiat for making it or the person that bought it”,

“I really like the BMW Z4, I think I’ll get one”,
“I really like the new Grand Cherokee, don’t you?”,

“that’s the 911 I want, the 993, last of the air-cooled. Don’t you love it? No? seriously I know you don’t like cars, but as an artist you must appreciate the aesthetic”,     “what about the current mustang, should we get one?”.

All of these, and many more, were treated with the same response: “I don’t care about cars, please stop talking about them”. Until one sunny day walking home along 4th Street in San Francisco she added “You have car ADHD. Why don’t you just start a blog and tell people that care”.

So here I am.

I have never considered writing. Anything (well apart from code). At school I scraped through with passing grades in English and even then it was thanks to a fantastic teacher who showed an interest and discovered that she could eek out reasonable essays by letting me type them on a computer, a really big deal in 1988 when only 6 of the 10 required essays could be submitted that way). I am also a confessed hater of books, reading one or two per year at best. I grew up with a family of obsessive readers and house full of books. I spent many a family holiday bored out of my mind as my family sat in the hotel and read, sat by the caravan and read, sat on the beach and (you guessed it) read. One holiday my brother read one book per day as we drove to the south of France in my Dad’s Marina that had its engine rebuilt only two days before we left, meaning a 30 mile an hour drive towing a caravan all the way to Biarritz… Of course you have to remember that this was long before iPods and portable games consoles… long before people thought it was culturally acceptable to ignore each other.

I grew up telling people that I hated books because they ruined perfectly good movies. I realise that most people think that books are better than the movies that they inspire, and they nearly always are, but I like movies and on their own (even average stories) can be quite enjoyable as long as you haven’t read the book first.

And they can make people pretentious: on many occasions I have met people who think they are more intelligent that me because they read. They aren’t, they are just better read! I have even been criticised for suggesting that a movie wasn’t exactly great because how could I know it wasn’t great if I hadn’t read the book??

Despite that I started writing. And people seemed to be enjoying it.

My original intent was to write something everyday or every week to tell people all about the car I wanted and why it was great. My favourite car changes nearly everyday, hence the title – Today’s Best Car. (BTW today it’s the Alfa GT – again)

As I started writing people started to say they liked it. The Wife was my editor (and boy did I need one) and my greatest supporter. And then others started to give me feedback. During those early days I occasionally used my blog to pour out my feelings. The story about my dog finally giving up her fight against cancer (This Morning…) and the impact a DJ had on my life over the 15 years he was on the air (Radio Musicola) and it quickly became clear that people liked the more personal stories. Cars are boring to most people but pain is universal. My blog has quickly transitioned to the story of my life from the age of 17 through cars, but not about cars. In each post I try to talk about what was happening in my life and why I was buying a new car. I like writing so much that I have even started a Novel (The Davis Layne Files).

So back to the search for a car….

The Wife was heart broken. The Sentra was her college car and held many memories. She had used it for trips home to Southern California, trips to parties and bars, road trips with her friends and now it was gone. I made some suggestions but she wasn’t interested and I quickly discovered that the only way this was going to happen was to take her out shopping…. The first car we saw was my old reliable favourite, the answer to any question about which car to buy – the Golf. I showed her a Golf GTi 1.8 Turbo. Just like the one I had bought twice before except this time a three door and an automatic… I really didn’t want an auto GTi but The Wife hasn’t driven stick since she passed her driving test. I liked the Golf because it was fun enough to drive, small enough for the city, and smooth enough on the freeway. She liked it because it felt like a rocket ship after the Sentra, a well built rocket ship.

So we bought it.

Our Golf needed a good service and the headlights needed polishing but otherwise it was a good clean car. Something we could keep until she finished her masters degree, and then I could buy myself something with a proper gearbox and she could use our little Golf. I poured hundreds into servicing and updating it, getting the headlight lenses clean and making sure it was in good shape and would continue that way for a long time.

But as always, when I make a plan, life changes…..

In the spring of 2012 I received a call from a head-hunter.  After 18 years in one company things had finally reached a point where it wasn’t fun anymore. I was working hard with very little recognition and feeling demotivated. Yes, I told him, I was interested in new opportunities but I couldn’t leave. Not yet. My Visa tied me to the company I was with, so until my Green Card came though I was stuck. I told him that it should only be three months because I had applied through marriage. He said it would probably take a bit longer, but that he would call back in a few months to check how things were going… which he did. The day after my Green Card was granted.

Four days later I was being escorted out of the company that I had been at for 18 years and branded a traitor for accepting a job at a competitor. It felt horrible. My friend said it was the saddest thing thing he had ever seen as he drove into the parking lot at work to see me unloading boxes from my car and passing them to the HR person. In California anti-compete clauses are worthless and there is no requirement to state where you are going when you give notice, but my industry is small and I new that they would find out so I decided to be completely upfront about it. It had been a tough decision but has turned out pretty well. I was upset at the time that my old manager decided to bad mouth me within the company, but it wasn’t as if he had tried to keep me.

The only catch with the new job was the need to own a car that was less than 4 years old or accept one of the company cars (Toyota Camry, Prius or Venza) And Finally….