Shifting Gears

Hard Lessons in the BaT Game

A friend recently sold his 2000 Ferrari 360 Modena. In classic red over black, with 31k miles, it was a driver, but it had the desirable gated 6-speed manual. The CARFAX was clean and a recent belt and fluid service meant it was ready to use. This was his third try […]

From Sporto to Tippy

Over the past six years, I’ve been on a journey through the land of collector cars with two pedals. I can no longer comfortably operate a manual transmission but didn’t want to give up driving classic sports cars. I have discovered that while an automatic may not be as engaging […]

A Different World

On September 15 of this year, I’m going to watch the taillights of a fully laden vehicle leave our condo garage, head west on SW Market Street and eventually merge onto Interstate 5 south. I know what taillights they won’t be. They won’t be the iconic rear of our Land […]

Modern Times

“Dad, next year let’s take the slow Porsche.” Those were my son Bradley’s first words when he hopped out of the 2024 Porsche 911 Carrera he had been driving. We had just finished a leg of the NW Passage, the biannual tour put on by the Oregon Region of the […]

Driven to Dance

“Dad, is there any way we can see you dance?” My kids have asked me that many times. Sadly, my short-lived but meteoric career in dance occurred in the era before even VHS camcorders were around. I have no visual records. But here is the written version of the tale. […]

Adventure Time

Seaside, OR, is just 78 miles from Portland. The route there, out Highway 26, is a relaxing mix of 60-mph roads traversing the Coast Range and 80-mph straightaways through Tillamook Forest. It is one of my favorite “Sunday drives” and I like to make it as often as I can […]

Wheel of Misfortune

This whole thing started like many of my adventures, behind the wheel of an Alfa. As my stroke-weakened left leg responds to physical therapy, I have begun to be able to drive a manual-shift car again, though in a limited fashion. I took our 1965 Giulia Spider Veloce around the […]

Cars vs. Cash

We live in changing times. Which makes the passing of classic cars from one generation to the next a complicated issue. One of my children wants my Lotus Elise; the other, the narrow-body Porsche 911S. As a 1975 model, the 911 is already a classic, while the 19-year-old Elise is […]

In the Year 2525

In July 1969, I was selling stuffed animals, helium balloons and other souvenirs at the San Francisco Zoo. That’s the month “In the Year 2525” zoomed to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, where it remained for six weeks. One of the most famous one-hit wonders in recording history, […]

Weather-Worn and Waterlogged

We met at Lewis and Clark State Park, at exit 18 off Interstate 84. It was a drizzly, overcast day, with the temperature in the 40s. This was a weekly tour put on by the local region of the Porsche Club of America, ORPCA. There were 13 cars in all: […]