Moo Car

My first car. Far from a dream car.A hand-me-down from Mom.It was banana Yellow.2 doorsRound headlightsI was a Ford Maverick.My aunt, rest her soul, passed away from intestinal cancer. It was a 1976 version, with AM radio and black pleather interior. Two venting back seat windows, and a small trunk. The engine was under a huge hood.When my aunt died, the car was passed along to my father, who in turn gave it to mom as our first 2nd car in the family. She drove it here and there for a few years until at the end of 1980 I received my driver's license. Then I started 'borrowing' the car.Vanity plates had just started being offered in NY a few years prior to my getting the car and my mother had the NY plate 'MOO' created and the car so adourned. It then became known as the MOO car.Moo - my fathers nick-name for my mother. The story behind this was that earlier in the 70's he was on a business trip to Japan for the launching of an oil tanker. While there, he purchased my mother a silk evening coat/dress thingy, a Moo-Moo. He brought it back and she loved it. She wore it day and night. Years went by and she continued to wear it after rising in the morning and just before retiring for the evening. She wore it to tatters.Because mom wore it so much and loved it (and frankly, wouldn't part with it even in its dish-rag ending state) Dad began to kid her about it and called her Moo as a joke. Another year went by with him calling her Moo. She wouldn't throw it away. Another year, then another. Finally, one day he slipped. He called her Moo when she answered the phone. That was it. The name had finally sunk into his psyche and became his pet name for her. To this day that name continues to be used.When I received the car, I drove it to school. Yes, I received a good bit of ribbing and admonishment, but hey, unlike many other kids in my grade, I was driving a CAR. They were driving a ..well....., they weren't, and needed to take a school bus. I on the other hand would pile my friend Doug into the car and we'd make a Taco Bell run (bean burrito's with plenty of hot sauce) or to BK (chicken cutlet sandwich) for lunch. Since they were both located a few miles away, we'd make it back in plenty of time.The first thing the car needed was a radio, a REAL radio. I went to Crazy Eddie's in Westbury (on Old Country Road). Doug (my friend - I'm not into referring to myself in the third person) knew Crazy Eddie's salesman trick. The SKU stickers on the shelves were coded in a fashion so that any salesman could walk up to any in store component, look at the sticker and immediately know what the base price was. Anything over that base price was additional commission in their pocket. Since we knew the 'system' we walked in and in my first buiying experience without my parents around, I began to haggle. (I settled at $1 over their base price). Hey this was a fun experience when you knew the system.Then Doug and I went home and began to read the directions. (For a few years, this was the last time I read any directions. For a male, this tends to be a big thing. I don't know what it is about directions (in any form), but men aren't programmed to read or ask for them. Then later in life I realized I was better prepared for things if I read directions, so that's what I do know, though admittedly, in a perfunctory fashion.)Cars in those day had a lot of room in them. They were built like tanks for the most part with heavy bumpers and plenty of room around the engines. In fact I remember this car because when opening the hood, I could actually see airspace around the engine. So much so that I could see the pavement below in 4 areas without even moving my head. You could have passed a small child through those spaces.Inside the cabin was no different. Under and behind the dash was so much space I could stick my head under and into that gap. Then I started removing knobs and screws. Back then, radio's were held in place by their selector knobs, which had threaded posts on each side, with nuts hold the entire radio unit in place from the front. The radio had to be fed into the dash from behind. A few snips of some wires that I had no idea what they did at the time, and the radio came out.After three days of trying and a few more trips to radio shack for testers, wire, a fuse, set if crimpers and some connectors, the radio blarred to life. I immediately turned it up as loud as it would go and summarily blew out the 2 door speakers. Off to Crazy Eddies to buy some speakers (4).Three more days of removing door panels and running wire and I had some kick ass sound from the doors and 2 new 6x9's in the rear deck. I must hve had a huge 10w per channel pumping through this sound system. It was beautiful. It was a $69 top of the line Kenwood. (Obviously the top of the line statement is relative to a 16 year old kid with mostly bare pockets. My top of the line purchase was part of Kenwoods bottom of the line 'consumer-priced-to-sell-millions-of-units' offering range.Once finished we cruised. Windows down (45 degrees outside) Foreigner pumped up on the new tape deck.Couple weeks later it was, hmmm, I think I ....NEED...fog lights. Off to the auto-parts store. Install fog-lights. These things were installed so effectively and with such care that the light beams they cast showed signs of every bump on the road by spraying the tree tops and the front tires with pointed beams of light. After about 10 seconds they'd settle down and finally point straight aimed at the roadway where they were supposed to be. (To my credit, the next version I installed after these fell off the car at highway speed about 2 weeks later, were very secure and needed to be cut off with a grinding wheeel a couple years later.)This car took us everywhere. (Mom had a couple brushes with deafness after getting in to HER car and trying to go to the market. I never could understand why she wasn't a fan of Blue Oyster Cult).In later offerings I'll get back to fun times had in the car with friends, road trips to Great Adventure, cruising, etc.That's the MOO car.