An eventful weekend for the poor little Midget.=20
First, on Friday evening I'm driving home from work, sky looks very =
threatening. I put the top up and the passenger side sidescreen in. =
About 5 minutes later all hell breaks loose. Horizontal rain, 3/4 of an =
inch in 10 minutes, lightning strikes within a few hundred yards, 50+ =
MPH wind, of course this is coming at me from the drivers side and the =
sidescreen is in the trunk. I bailed off onto a side-street to present a =
more-protected side to the brunt of the storm when suddenly =
inch-diameter hail begins hammering down. I know what it feels like to =
be inside of a drum. Good thing these old cars are made of pretty stern =
stuff, as I only picked up a couple of dings, the storm passed, then I =
dragged my dripping self home.
Then on Sunday, the local MG club is out for a rally. My lovely wife is =
navigating, the sun is shining, I saw many friends at the start, seems =
like a good day. Then an unpleasant, all-too-familiar noise starts up =
from under the bonnet. Sounds like a generator bearing. The metallic =
dust on the housing confirms this. This is the replacement for the one =
that earned me a mention in Simon Bosworth's running report in MG World =
issue #3. Less than a year old and it's got to fail publicly again, how =
humiliating. It's only noisy at low RPM, so I drop out of the rally and =
elect to hop on the freeway for the four-mile run home. Well, I've been =
considering an alternator conversion anyway.=20
On the freeway, Darcie suddenly, yells "look out!" An Altima, obviously =
oblivious to my presence, is doing the "high-speed-three-lane-change" =
and is about to crunch me into the guardrail. I jerk the wheel left (bad =
idea, especially when applying brakes) and before you can say "snap =
oversteer" I'm travelling backward on the interstate in the middle of =
Minneapolis on a Sunday afternoon. Fun! I'm moving in the same direction =
as the rest of traffic, I'm just facing the wrong way. The car is in =
fourth, clutch is to the floor, so I back off the roadway, intact. Now =
I'm parked in the 4ft wide shoulder between the leftmost lane and the =
guardrail, facing traffic. Since a Midget is a bit wider than 4 ft, I'm =
a little more in the path of the onrushing trucks than I'm comfortable =
with. I'm flicking the headlight toggle switch on the dash to alert =
people that I'm there, and thankfully a large break in traffic finally =
came up and I was able to make a U-turn into a more conventional =
highway driving attitude. Yikes! Got to get out and Autocross a bit =
more, letting it get away from me like that almost got us killed.
The REST of the weekend was without incident. : )
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