Hi, y'all ... My name's Troy Davis, and I live in NW Atlanta.
I bought a 1953 USMC M38A1 a few years ago - you can read that story here:
http://troy-m38a1.blogspot.com/
Haven't done that much work on it lately.
But here is maybe a more interesting story:
It all started (doesn't it always?) drinking a beer with a buddy in a bar in St. Louis. I had been eyeing the Jeep on e-bay ever since it was posted and I was getting the itchy trigger finger. I knew the auction ended at 8pm and I was tracking it closely on my iPhone.
Five minutes to the close - still no good bids and not yet up to the reserve. Maybe I'll just throw in a lowball bid. See what happens. This thing will go way above that. OK. Talked myself into it. No way I'll win it ...
I won it. Oh crap. How am I gonna 'splain this? Already got one Jeep WIP and she complains about that one. AND IT'S IN LA! (and I do not mean Southern Alabama nor do I mean Louisiana).
OK - think ... think .... quick. Ummmmmmm. OK, maybe I'll sleep on it.
<next morning>
Ummmm, that was a dream, right? I didn't do that, no way. Log in. Yep, it's true, I own a 1966 CJ5.
With the beer cobwebs clearing, a plan hatches.
"Honey ... what are you doin' on such-and-such date? My mom will keep the kids ... nope, not gonna tell you ... it's a SURPRISE!"
Book the tickets to California, and the big day comes ...
"Where we going? Oh, just wait, you're gonna love it"
"On the plane ... OK, sweetie, I love you."
"I love you too, this must be real bad"
"OK, ummm you know how we've always wanted a cross country adventure? Well, guess what! Look at the map, look at all these places we can go! Aint it awesome!"
"Wow, that's great! What's the catch?"
"Oh, no catch ... just ... well, I kinda bought this Jeep ..."
"YOU WHAT??????"
"It's a really nice one ... I mean it's perfect ... your gonna love it!"
<Wife crosses arms> "We'll see"
Plan lands, take a taxi to the guy's house ...
"There it is! Isn't it perfect!"
It's really loud - headers with little short under door side pipes.
It looks like she's gonna cry.
Big smile "It's an adventure!" No smile back ...
Maybe 150 miles down the road ... I can tell it's either the Jeep or the wife ... one of them is leaving. Luckily, I had my laptop with a wireless card. Log in, check vehicle shipping ... get a bid immediately, can come get it today. Hertz rental car place a few miles down the road will come pick us up and rent us a car back to Atlanta cheap(er than I thought it would be) ...
Marriage saved (at least for now) ... trip turns out awesome ... saw the GC, Durango, Santa Fe ...
Jeep shows up the next weekend. Wife forgets the awesome trip and starts trying to figure out how much money is going to be dumped into this new one (already had an accounting reserve set up for the 53).
Pics:
