Road/Car Stories!

[rabbit16v@attbi.com (Dave Ewing)]

Sorry to bore but after reading Patricks story I felt I should dive a little
deeper into the origin of my Rabbit.  I, like Patrick, had never had a
european car (except for aircooled VWs) until I got a 79 Volvo 240DL and
really enjoyed the dependability and the styling even though it was older.
Before my wife and I were married I lived next door to her and her cousin
lived with her and her parents and drove a 77 Rabbit that he had tricked out
a little with suspension parts/exhaust/wheels/tires/TB/etc and was always in
awe of it.  After we'd been married a while and the Rabbit had been parked
for a couple years because of a bad timing belt or something my wife's
cousin gave it to me and all of his parts and tools that he had collected
over the years.  THIS is what got me started in watercooled VWs.  Over the
years I have had a couple scirocco 2's and various other VWs but the Rabbit
car (which was it's name by everyone but my kids came up with it) was the
focus of my addiction.  After replacing almost every part on the car
(pushing 180hp from a modded 2.0L 16v NA motor) the paint was the last thing
to do which was planned this summer but, again, someone else had bigger
plans for it (totaled by a Z3).  The car was in the family since it was new
and I have every receipt, even the window sticker securely tucked away (for
some reason).  I was never beaten on the street and only once on the strip
(3rd in the NIRA Nationals at SIR!!) except for the big V8s on import VS
domestic drags (beat quite a few but not much of a contest against those big
rear-wheel drive hp monsters).  Everything was upgraded from the suspension,
swaybars, stressbars, brakes, headlights, bumpers, to the gauges and shifter
knob.  I guess people wondered why I was so into my Rabbit so much, and
sometimes I even wondered myself, but I guess it was mostly the comfort that
it seemed to give me (never left me stranded like the aircooled VWs would on
a regular basis) and the sentimental value.  Now, it pains me to take parts
off of it knowing that it will never be on the road again except to make the
trip to the crusher.  Oh well, it's just metal right??  I think the worst
part is that the car that is to take it's place is having such a hard time
getting here.  If I could sit in the future VW hotrod of mine it wouldn't
seem so bad, I think!

Dave