Sunday drive, “it’s not a 260!”

I went for a drive this afternoon. I had no idea I would collect so many stories.

1. As i was sitting at a red light waiting to turn right at the intersection of the laguna Canyon Drive and PCH, an older man walking across the crosswalk says to the man he’s walking with, “that’s a great color!” as he gestures toward my car. I’m sure he continued to say something inaccurate about it being an original color.

2. I parked in a space near some stairs that went down to the beach just south of Geisler Park. when I returned to the Z after a short wave check, I took out my phone and tried to figure out exactly where I was. while I was googlemapping, an older couple walking home from the beach walked right by my open window and the woman asks, “what kind of car is that?”

Her husband, who was walking a ways ahead of her, looked back and said, “it’s a 260!” I leaned out the window as the woman passed and said “tell him it’s a 240 and I held up four fingers correcting his mistake.

He walked back towards the car and asked, “who made this car?” I replied “it’s a Datsun. It was made by Nissan when they were afraid to tarnish their name in the United States.” he walked on satisfied with that tidbit of info.

3. I was stopped for a red light on a very steep incline at the intersection of Cliff and PCH waiting to turn left, and some older guy waiting for the crosswalk wearing a floppy “beach bum” hat looked over and said, “nice car. 260?” “no, 240” he continues, “My buddy got one of those when they first came out, and we drove it on Ortega highway.” as he said that, he made the universal sign for crazy, twirling his finger around his ear. “that would be fun, sounds like you’ve got a great Z story!” i replied. now the pressure was on, when the light turned green, I took off with almost no 0 rollback.

there were at least 2 other Z stories prompted by my drive today. I know, because as I passed people, they would look back, watching me drive by, then turn to whomever they were with and start talking.

a sunday drive truly can change the world…by giving people something interesting to reminisce about.