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- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Family & Friends
- Subject: Comedy / Humor
- Published: 12/21/2015
Hawkish.
It was New Year’s Eve; we were recently married and had just moved to the North Yorkshire Moors. The established locals took pity on the hard up young man and his pregnant wife and we were asked out round the houses. To be followed by ‘first footing’. I have always been tone deaf so have to mime all the songs!
My current car had just expired and I was commuting by motor cycle. During the evening the local plumber offered me his Humber Hawk for a fiver. Not long after midnight I bought it. The next day, not early, I went to see my new acquisition for the first time.
It looked really impressive from the outside, black and shiny with chrome that was not too far gone. But the first glimpse inside started a growing feeling of insecurity. A rope washing line was tied between the two central door pillars across the back of the front bucket seat. This meant that the back doors couldn’t be opened.
“The bottom of the door pillars has gone, but as long as the rope’s tight you’ll be OK.”
That’s about as good a line as any I’d heard from a second hand car salesman - but more was to follow.
“What’s the smell?” I said when I got in the driver’s seat.
“Oh just paraffin, I’ve been running it on paraffin during the summer. But it’s a bit difficult to start now it’s colder so I’ve had to put petrol in. The batteries no good now it’s colder either, but when you give it a swing it goes first time.”
So we got out the starting handle and he showed me the knack for starting the big engine.
“Get it over on to compression first, then you stand on the handle and put all your weight on it and it always goes, first time.”
And it did.
“What happens if it back-fires, though?”
“Well I reckon you’ll arrive at work early, by air, or you’ll break a leg.”
The fun didn’t stop there though - at one side of the front the tyre was a bald ‘Town and Country’ retread, at the opposite side was a Michelin ‘X. This tyre was quite new, though it did have a different balloon size to its opposite number. On the back the same trend applied - one bald corded retread and one quite good radial.
Despite all of this it handled well.
“If you put a bag of potatoes in the boot when it’s snowing, it’ll go anywhere.”
I was quite reassured at this because we had steep banks both into and out of the village.
I gave him the fiver and went to work in it the next day. My wife was still working and unfortunately we came upon her boss waiting at a bus stop.
“You’ll have to offer him a lift,” she said, “We can’t just drive past.”
So I pulled over next to the crowded bus stop and he accepted the offer.
In order to get him in my wife got out then he had to get in the front seat and climb over. He dropped unceremoniously into the gap behind the big bucket seat. The bus stop queue hadn’t had so much entertainment all year so we drove away quickly. I had then to explain to the unfortunate passenger what the purpose of the clothes' line was. When we got him to the office he had to climb back over into the front to get out - he was a bit flustered.
Years later we were to bump into the same man many times and the first thing he always started with was;- “You remember that old Humber Hawk you had.......”
On the way to work at Birk Brow was a long downhill bend, followed by a long straight length of road that also sloped, more gently for about a mile.
When I was alone and the strange desire of speed grabbed my soul then I used to love this bit.
Come out of the steep bend leading onto the long straight as fast as you dared. The huge black bomber would be healing over and starting to pick up a Samba motion in the boot. The nose would hold firm and as if the old car was looking forward to the next bit, it seemed to hurl itself off the bend onto the straight. The right foot would be on the floor now, in top gear, and as the rev’s got to their peak came the absolute orgasmic moment. A flick of the tiny switch on the steering column that activated the overdrive.
The rev’s eased gorgeously and a surge was felt as the huge car accelerated along past the garage and away -- away to the stars. I enjoyed it so much that I never once stopped at that garage, it was definitely in the wrong location for me (and the car would have agreed!).
On other occasions, though, the opposite desire affected us (me and the car - you did realise). I would give it a polish and the black came up well then we, (the wife and I - you did realise) would drive sedately about on a Sunday afternoon. Just as if I was the Vicar and had just finished the sermon to all those sinners.
It was possible to pack enormous numbers of friends and family into the Hawk for trips to the seaside.
During one of these there was a colossal explosion and the silencer box exploded. There were a few skid marks about in the back after that but nothing came off the car. It just sounded a bit louder now.
In fact for one whole year nothing at all ever went wrong with it. The floor at the bottom of the door posts was now so rotten that my Dad could knock his pipe out on the road without opening any windows.
The whole thing was now wobbling in a rather alarming manner when it came off the bottom bend on to the fast straight. The car seemed to be saying ‘I’m all right, really I’m all right.’ But the time had come. It would never pass the MOT test now. With a heavy heart I left it at the scrap yard.
They gave me a fiver for it.
Hawkish(Ossie Durrans)
Hawkish.
It was New Year’s Eve; we were recently married and had just moved to the North Yorkshire Moors. The established locals took pity on the hard up young man and his pregnant wife and we were asked out round the houses. To be followed by ‘first footing’. I have always been tone deaf so have to mime all the songs!
My current car had just expired and I was commuting by motor cycle. During the evening the local plumber offered me his Humber Hawk for a fiver. Not long after midnight I bought it. The next day, not early, I went to see my new acquisition for the first time.
It looked really impressive from the outside, black and shiny with chrome that was not too far gone. But the first glimpse inside started a growing feeling of insecurity. A rope washing line was tied between the two central door pillars across the back of the front bucket seat. This meant that the back doors couldn’t be opened.
“The bottom of the door pillars has gone, but as long as the rope’s tight you’ll be OK.”
That’s about as good a line as any I’d heard from a second hand car salesman - but more was to follow.
“What’s the smell?” I said when I got in the driver’s seat.
“Oh just paraffin, I’ve been running it on paraffin during the summer. But it’s a bit difficult to start now it’s colder so I’ve had to put petrol in. The batteries no good now it’s colder either, but when you give it a swing it goes first time.”
So we got out the starting handle and he showed me the knack for starting the big engine.
“Get it over on to compression first, then you stand on the handle and put all your weight on it and it always goes, first time.”
And it did.
“What happens if it back-fires, though?”
“Well I reckon you’ll arrive at work early, by air, or you’ll break a leg.”
The fun didn’t stop there though - at one side of the front the tyre was a bald ‘Town and Country’ retread, at the opposite side was a Michelin ‘X. This tyre was quite new, though it did have a different balloon size to its opposite number. On the back the same trend applied - one bald corded retread and one quite good radial.
Despite all of this it handled well.
“If you put a bag of potatoes in the boot when it’s snowing, it’ll go anywhere.”
I was quite reassured at this because we had steep banks both into and out of the village.
I gave him the fiver and went to work in it the next day. My wife was still working and unfortunately we came upon her boss waiting at a bus stop.
“You’ll have to offer him a lift,” she said, “We can’t just drive past.”
So I pulled over next to the crowded bus stop and he accepted the offer.
In order to get him in my wife got out then he had to get in the front seat and climb over. He dropped unceremoniously into the gap behind the big bucket seat. The bus stop queue hadn’t had so much entertainment all year so we drove away quickly. I had then to explain to the unfortunate passenger what the purpose of the clothes' line was. When we got him to the office he had to climb back over into the front to get out - he was a bit flustered.
Years later we were to bump into the same man many times and the first thing he always started with was;- “You remember that old Humber Hawk you had.......”
On the way to work at Birk Brow was a long downhill bend, followed by a long straight length of road that also sloped, more gently for about a mile.
When I was alone and the strange desire of speed grabbed my soul then I used to love this bit.
Come out of the steep bend leading onto the long straight as fast as you dared. The huge black bomber would be healing over and starting to pick up a Samba motion in the boot. The nose would hold firm and as if the old car was looking forward to the next bit, it seemed to hurl itself off the bend onto the straight. The right foot would be on the floor now, in top gear, and as the rev’s got to their peak came the absolute orgasmic moment. A flick of the tiny switch on the steering column that activated the overdrive.
The rev’s eased gorgeously and a surge was felt as the huge car accelerated along past the garage and away -- away to the stars. I enjoyed it so much that I never once stopped at that garage, it was definitely in the wrong location for me (and the car would have agreed!).
On other occasions, though, the opposite desire affected us (me and the car - you did realise). I would give it a polish and the black came up well then we, (the wife and I - you did realise) would drive sedately about on a Sunday afternoon. Just as if I was the Vicar and had just finished the sermon to all those sinners.
It was possible to pack enormous numbers of friends and family into the Hawk for trips to the seaside.
During one of these there was a colossal explosion and the silencer box exploded. There were a few skid marks about in the back after that but nothing came off the car. It just sounded a bit louder now.
In fact for one whole year nothing at all ever went wrong with it. The floor at the bottom of the door posts was now so rotten that my Dad could knock his pipe out on the road without opening any windows.
The whole thing was now wobbling in a rather alarming manner when it came off the bottom bend on to the fast straight. The car seemed to be saying ‘I’m all right, really I’m all right.’ But the time had come. It would never pass the MOT test now. With a heavy heart I left it at the scrap yard.
They gave me a fiver for it.
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