Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Somebody asked me the other day "Why do you love cars so much?". And I was lost for words. I didn't know why.Yes, it's easy to see why I like them. Cars are useful and give you freedom, but I don't know why I love cars. My life has always been all about them, and always will be. They're just a part of me, there was not a single occasion which got me hooked...My obsession was just always there. My work involves cars. When I'm not working I'm reading about them, driving one, playing videos games about them, reading about them, looking at models of them...I could go on. I mean why? They are machines. I'm sure I'm far from unique in this place! It struck me at the XJ40 Rally...people coming from as far as Finland for it. That is love and dedication right there. Love is irrational after all.... Food for thought, eh! Mirkin, sheffcortinacentre, Jim Bergerac and 6 others 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
overrun Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Someone once drew a cock and balls in the dirt in my bonnet.I didn't love that. Partridge, brickwall and 500tops 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eddyramrod Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Partridge: I have nothing to contribute beyond total agreement, your story sounds exactly like mine. Partridge 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnthonyG Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 My first word was 'car'. Start as you mean to go on... Partridge, eddyramrod and brickwall 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 The first word I wrote correctly was "Volvo"...And apparently when my Mum showed me a letter "V" flashcard to the health visitor woman when I was a toddler I said "V for Volvo". Maybe I'm half Scottish? Banger Kenny, Shep Shepherd and eddyramrod 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Split_Pin Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I have no idea. My dad is a keen golfer and football fan and none of my friends are interested in them. They cost money, I hate seeing a new road being built across countryside, they are dangerous. In spite of all that, I think about cars, buses and trucks all the time, I love researching them every spare minute I have, fixing them, driving and spotting them. I still have several hundered model cars too and the collection is growing again after last year's major purge. So no idea why. Partridge and eddyramrod 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brickwall Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 My Mum and Dad said I never went anywhere without Dinky Cortina or similar in my hand. Lord Sterling, theorganist and Partridge 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dollywobbler Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I have no idea. I just do. The obsession started young. I know that much. Made worse by the fact that we didn't own a car at all for a few years of my childhood. Which is perhaps why I slightly like buses. I'm nowhere near as obsessed with them as I am cars though. Stuff fiction. I spent most of my formative years reading reference books about cars. mercrocker, Partridge and rml2345 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 Stuff fiction. I spent most of my formative years reading reference books about cars.Same here! And there can't of been many 11 year old who read The Jaguar XJ Story. mercrocker 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rml2345 Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I've been asked similar things before and I just haven't got an answer. I like lots of things which can be justified for people who don't understand it. Even Marmite can be explained.But a love of cars, buses, lorries and all sorts of other things can't be explained, it's just sort of there. Partridge 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mercrocker Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Family legend has it that my first word was "car". I still have my first, now very battered, Corgi Consul Classic and indeed, not 5 minutes ago I turfed out a set of Veteran car books to check on the pre-war ID thread car - these books were given to me at the age of Three, no less! Lots of people say they prefer dogs and cats to people but I sometimes think I actually prefer cars to people. Certainly I have lavished more money on mine than any wife, daughter, parent or even lovers that have been in my life. Its nothing to do with the materialistic, Ferrari kind of worship - cars mean something deeper than that to me. Craig the Princess, eddyramrod and Jim Bergerac 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meshking Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Same here! And there can't of been many 11 year old who read The Jaguar XJ Story."AA book of the road" for me! catsinthewelder and holbeck 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 Lots of people say they prefer dogs and cats to people but I sometimes think I actually prefer cars to people. Certainly I have lavished more money on mine than any wife, daughter, parent or even lovers that have been in my life. Its nothing to do with the materialistic, Ferrari kind of worship - cars mean something deeper than that to me.I understand that. There's something magical which happens every time you fire a car up, even if you're just going to the shops, which nothing else can *quite* match. Craig the Princess and Lord Sterling 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 "AA book of the road" for me!Was that full of 70's paintings of BL stuff? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rml2345 Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I understand that. There's something magical which happens every time you fire a car up, it runs on two and then cuts out forcing you spend the rest of the fucking day trying to sort it, which nothing else can *quite* match.EFA catsinthewelder, Partridge and vulgalour 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SambaS Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Obsessing over the data pages in Top Gear/ What Car magazine, I am no stranger. Obsessing over obscure makes and kit cars in magazines, and then when the internet came out my god. Jim Bergerac and Partridge 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pillock Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I had the AA Book of the Road as a 5-year-old, the hardback landscape book with the silver cover? I also used to take out random Haynes manuals from the library at about 7 or 8, stuff nobody in my family had but looked cool. I'd read them front to back in a few days. I love cars because they are mechanical. They work, and if they don't work there's a reason that can be fixed. I suppose I like lots of things in that respect, I'm very scientific, but cars are accessible and available where I can't just buy a Deltic or a Volvo F16 and lob it in the garage. Partridge 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dollywobbler Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Funnily enough, I was looking at the book '101 Great Marques' earlier today. Bought for me by a relative when I was 10. I could also study the same brochure for HOURS. If there had been a GCSE in options fitted to the 1985 Vauxhall Cavalier, I would have aced it. mercrocker, SambaS, AnthonyG and 2 others 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SambaS Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Riding in the back of Dad's Sierra with Dire Straits on the tape player. Watching the world flash by at night, the endless streetlights. Craig the Princess 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minimad5 Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 The end result - All the hard work trying to get it running right / Welding etc.Not sure what "it" is, but it certainly makes me grin like some crazy drugged up yuppie, when it all comes together and works The Moog, SambaS and Craig the Princess 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sudsprint Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 A red and white Triumph Herald pedal car that was traded in on Christmas Day in 1965 for a Blue E Type. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gordonbennet Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 For me it was lorries, other chaps at school read car or music magazines, i read Commercial Motor and Headlight. All i ever wanted to do was drive lorries, not this living the dream bollox with tasseled curtains and rows of bloody spot lights over the front, but actually driving proper British built machines that required skill strength and nous, sadly all now in the past thanks to the age of computerised shit lorries, i now attend a steering wheel. One of my favourite lorries of all time was Scammell Crusader, a wild motor they could be, something to enjoy, take a pride in controlling and grin like a Cheshire cat.. I like cars too, but not the typical shopping trolley, my first car was a Volvo Amazon, nothing i'd hate more than have to drive a boring cloned modern eurobox, rather bloody walk. oman5 and eddyramrod 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobthebeard Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 A tricky one that.In my case, my love of cars started way back. Cars were needed as transport, pure and simple. They were repaired/botched/hand painted etc just so that the family could get to places. Dad or Grandad to work, Mum or Grandma to the shops and all of us to go on holiday now and then. Tinkering with the car was something that needed doing and was enjoyable. A more simple life without the pretensions and showboating that is car ownership today. My love of (older) cars is just a simplistic way of recreating that way of life in some ways. Lord Sterling, gordonbennet and mat_the_cat 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parky Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Growing up near Dagenham Ford plant was important. Friends dads worked there, Grandad worked there, but no-one had money so all drove a succession of old Fords which they worked on every Sunday. Growing up consisted of riding along my street seeing what everyone was doing to theirs. One guy, Kevin, had a red mk1 Cortina 1500 GTwhich he loved liked a child. Kevin was 18 and a proper Rockabilly who was happy to let a fat 6 year old hand him spanners and wrenches while he did stuff. Kevin showed me how stuff worked and as far as I was concerned he was a God because he was cool and talked to me. Transistor radios playing Jerry Lee Lewis or Ska would fill the street on Sunday. Neighbours would be consulted on how to fix a certain issue, someone ALWAYS had a glass topped fuel pump lying about or half a gallon of Esso Uniflo spare and to me the car united the street. Except Judas across the road who had a Marina Coupe and an MGB. We were Ford town and proud. So why am I into cars - dead simple. All the people I wanted to be drove cool old Fords and one day I wanted to be just like them. Sadly I can't afford an old Ford but the car still represents Lord Tanamo crackling out of a blue plastic radio while a neighbour dropped spanners, clunked about under the car and muttered things like "fuck it" or "sodding thing" on a summer Sunday...... If Kevin had said "piss off fatty" I probably wouldn't be on this site this evening! mat_the_cat and Bobthebeard 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asimo Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 It's in my genes: Dad was a ’shiter, no money and if there was any it went on bikes but there was almost always something car like that still moved, the cheaper the better. Uncle Frank was a " dealer", Uncle John was a racer (TR3, mk 2 Jag) and then a BL agent, Grandma and her sister were driving from before WW1 until the end, and Great Grandma before that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
holbeck Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 For me, my parents had a double garage and inside one half, next to family Triumph 2000 was an old Mini van that had been parked up some years before. The ten year old me used to sit behind the wheel and 'drive', running the wand gear lever through the gears, making the right noises - hours of fun. I had visions of getting it back on the road. Sadly, my older brother got hold of it..... it didn't last long. Sudsprint 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 Funnily enough, I was looking at the book '101 Great Marques' earlier today. Bought for me by a relative when I was 10. I could also study the same brochure for HOURS. If there had been a GCSE in options fitted to the 1985 Vauxhall Cavalier, I would have aced it.I was like that with one of those 80's "World's Fastest Cars" books, which my Mum got for me for 80p in a charity shop. I spent bloody ages drooling over the XJ12 HE in it...Wish I still had that book Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theorganist Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I remember taking the 1987 motoring which car buyers guide everywhere and reading it constantly. I could recite the exact cc and trim levels of every car in it. I then found a load of second hand ones from the 70's and early 80's and a school fete, I was around 14 at the time and then started doing the same with them! I think I had an interest in cars well before that though but I can't remember why or how it started! Craig the Princess 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Felly Magic Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 Well, I was mad on cars from a very young age, and could name most cars on the road by about aged 4, not sure why. Dad isn't really much of a petrolhead, but one of my uncles was. I was always fascinated when my uncle or my dad worked on their cars as well. Grew up with an assortment of makes, Ford, Rover, Lada, Datsun/Nissan, MG... Partridge 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Partridge Posted September 21, 2014 Author Share Posted September 21, 2014 Weird...It's just something that has to be "there", and it's either there or it's not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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