Jana and I just returned from a driving trip to Arizona, via my home town of Shawnee, Oklahoma where we visited my old haunts and met with a childhood and neighborhood friend and his wife. Still no leaves on their trees either, but the friendship was still very warm! I saw an MGB driving around in Oklahoma City and also saw one in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Thought we would see one in Phoenix, but we did not. We saw the Cubs play the Angels and also the White Sox play the Indians in Cactus league play. We root for both teams. It was nice to be hot and put on sun screen. When we returned home, we were glad to see the weather had warmed up from when we left in early March, it would just be nicer if the temperature was at or above the normal averages for this time of the year. My B is ready to get out of the garage and that is the plan for tomorrow!!

We are expecting a good swap meet as I am writing this before the meet, and there should be some current results posted in other parts of the Driveline. I hope that I ran into you at the swap meet. Since the timing for the meet is different this year, we would love to have your feedback on what you thought of the event and please pass along any thoughts that you might have on improving the event in the future. It is an important event for our club.

We are still looking for a person to head up our e-bay/e-commerce sales effort. If you have any interest at all, please ask about this. The accounts are already set up and it is just a matter of posting the item to be sold, pictures of the item and then mailing out the item when it is sold. This could be a team effort, with different people doing parts of each job. We can be creative. Just let us know of your interest.

For our April meeting we will have Steve Skegg hosting a tech session on getting your car ready for the upcoming driving season as well as topics of your choice. Just let him know what you would like to have for a topic. This should be an informative meeting as we get our cars ready for the warmer weather. We will keep the business meeting short to give Steve plenty of time.

-- George Phariss

The Steering Column Right Hand Drive

WOW! April already… It feels like only a few days ago I was lamenting about all the snow drifted over my poor neglected MGB outside.

Snow’s gone, air is warmer and my car doesn’t seem to be any worse for wear. I am glad the Spring Tune-up is scheduled soon so I’ll be able to check out the car thoroughly before hitting the road on the many scheduled events.

The 18th Annual All British Car Swap Meet is now over and soon the numbers will be tabulated to see how we did this year. As many of you know, this year we moved the event from February to the end of March. It looks like it was a smart move. We were sold out of booth space and had to be resourceful in admitting walk-in vendors that arrived early Sunday morning. Our vendors have noted that they like the later timeslot and of course the weather was much nicer. We had a good turnout of buyers and the feedback so far from vendors - sales were good. At first glance it looks like we had over 780 buyers attending this year’s event. I want to thank all the many volunteers that assisted in the many tasks that were needed to make this event a successful one. Thank you.

Getting back to April. When I think of April I think of the end of college basketball competition (ho-hum), taxes, (ugh!) and the start of DRIVING SEASON (yea!). Reinout Vogt, with the help of a few dedicated members, has been preparing our Driving Events for the year. The results of this effort are available on-line on our club website and also in color on the inside back cover of this issue of Driveline. Check out the many events listed and mark your calendars to take part in these club events. Some events are day drives, others require an overnight stay and others can be a week long venture. Your choice! There should be something that would satisfy your wanderlust for driving the MG on the open road.

-- ~~ Victor L’Heureux