My Story
When I was five years old, I remember that Christmas eve. It was 1961 in Brooklyn, New York. Why? Well, for one thing I have a rather good memory. There was a toy car, my toy car, in gift wrapping paper I couldn’t wait to unwrap and play with. It was a beige plastic 1:18 scale model 1960 Plymouth Valiant. This was decades before I realized I was a car guy. I remember getting tucked into bed and forcing my eyes closed so I would go to sleep. Then, when my eyes opened it would be morning so I could run to the tree and open my present. This memory lives inside me like it happened yesterday.

My very first car was a 1967 VW Bug. I was 16. I wanted a cool car like a jacked-up Mustang Fastback with fat rear tires. Living with my mother and sister in Huntington Beach, CA and being a sophomore in high school, I was just a kid with no money. With help from my mom, I found a car my $400 could buy. I hated VW Bugs and didn’t know how to drive a manual shift. I didn’t tell my mom that. When she drove me to the buyer and left me there with my new car, I had to figure out how to shift on my first drive home. Second and third gear took a bit of a beating, but nothing too bad. Over the next six years I learned to appreciate my venerable VW and even learned how to change the oil and do a brake job. Back then, we used Chilton’s Auto Repair Manuals referring to those small black & white drawings to figure things out. I was petrified to drive my VW after completing the brake job fearing I did something wrong. These thin curved pads stopped my car?! Fortunately, my penchant for detail and being a perfectionist led to a job done properly. The new brake pads stopped all 1700 pounds of my Bug just fine.

Fast forward to 2008. I had money saved and was tired of always doing the financially responsible thing—save and invest. That didn’t seem to be getting me where I hoped to be anyway. So, I decided to buy a dream car I could afford. Months later and after much thinking and research one car remained on my shortlist… the Acura NSX. I ended up buying a first year car, a slightly modified 1991 repainted in pearl yellow. It was love at first sight! That was when I became a bonafide car guy!