I lost my Dad this afternoon. My brother and friends have had a heavy influence in my passion for cars, but it all started with my Dad. He’s always been a Mercedes guy – but I learned to drive in his Nissan 200SX. When I turned 16 and got my first car (a Honda civic) – he picked up a Mitsubishi 3000GT. I remember him getting into my car and seeing me “gangsta” leaned back in the drivers seat and asking “what, are you going to sleep now?” LOL. He saw a fire extinguisher in my brothers car (all raced out) and then asked if he wanted to be a fireman LOL. He always had the best one liners…and he loved cars. When I lowered the first car he bought me and he noticed it, I told him that the tire pressure was just low (yikes!) – I’m sure he knew, but he never got mad about it. Quite some time later, he got one of the first gen SLK’s that came out. We always used to call it the “statue” because he never drove it, I used to tell the grandkids that I could pull the engine and he’d never know – a few years later, he picked up an SL500 and that became “the statue” – a 2004 SL500 that up until last year, had less than 20K miles on it. I love you Dad, I know you’re in a better place and I hope you’re driving fast. 🙂
