Directions (continued)
brakes to major surgery of Kyle Kruszewski's transmission (he brought in his beautiful 1970 Pontiac Le Mans) and Cowboy's chili gets better every year.
Saturday the 20th was our first Oil Change Day for the clients of Journeys from PADS to Hope, the homeless in the Arlington Heights area. We serviced 12 cars at Dave's Auto Clinic in Prospect Heights. If you ever need a place that will take good care of your vehicle, please consider Dave. Dave and his mechanic Juan assisted us with good advice, warnings, oil, filters and all kinds of other help throughout the afternoon. The cars we saw where not in the best of shape. All but one of them had several serious problems, ranging from broken stabilizer links to missing exhaust system and lack of front brakes. We advised the owners of the safety issues with the cars but it doesn't seem very likely that they can afford proper repairs. Further to the inspections, we changed oil and filter, topped anti-freeze, windshield fluid and put air in the tires. We had about 17 club members carry out the work but I am inviting all of you to let me know if this is a good thing to consider again, in the spring or next fall. If so, I already know of a couple of changes to make it a better day for the participant, both club members and clients. But the most important thing is that we made 12 people very, very happy. I know because I talked to all of them. And at the same time I am sure that all oil-changers were happy that they did something good with their Saturday afternoon. I am a proud Driving Events Coordinator, thanks a lot.
The Cruise to the Rock was the last driving events of the 2010 season. The points are not yet included in the standings for the driving trophies yet. The final and official winners of the Moss Motors and Victoria British Cups will be known by the next issue.
For now, Happy Holidays from your 2010 driving Events Coordinator.
“The more you drive, the more you smile”
-- Reinout Vogt

Halloween Run October 31, 2010

What a great day for a rally! We donned coats and had the top down all day to enjoy the sun, and of course good viewing for the rally route and the search for clues and ghosts. We all met at Carribou Coffee on Rt-59 near I-90 in Hoffman Estates. The rally started a little late when the rallymaster set his clocks back a week early, but no problem there as the ending time was simply extend by one hour. I believe the contestants were twelve MGs and one Porsche.
The rally instructions were a bit different this time as we were given several pages of color photos of every intersection where we were to make a turn. Each photo held an image of Emma, Reinout's 1931 MG M-Type, making the turn in the appropriate direction, so all we needed was to follow Emma. Piece of cake. Mixed in with route photos were more photos of signs along the way with some word(s) blocked out. We were

to find the missing words and fill in a very simple word puzzle with scoring for correct answers. Result of the puzzle was a one-line question to be determined by the found answers. The answer to this question was to be something creative to be judged by the rallymaster for some additional points.
Along the way we would encounter up to five "ghosts". These ghosts were cars, one each MG M-type, MGA, MGB, a Ford Mustang and a Toyota Prius. These cars were to be bearing an MG Ghost logo front and back for identity. When seen en-route we were to follow and flash lights, give chase a bit if necessary to prevent the ghost from escaping, and collect a signature to show we had caught the ghost. Up to four catches of each ghost would be scored. Not knowing what these cars were in advance, the three MGs were easy enough to spot. We stumbled onto the Mustang early on. We chased a Porsche for a bit to find out it was not a ghost, but one of the rally cars. The MG M-type was not so easy to catch, quick to flee and somewhat evasive. In the end we managed to catch four of the five ghosts, three of them four times and the other one three times. We never noticed the Prius for the whole rally and had to ask at the end what the fifth ghost was.
I think we found all of the required signs to fill in the word puzzle. The question was, "Where is the ghost of Emma going"? Most of the answers were something like "To the Onion Pub for a beer". We got a little creative and wrote "Over hill, over dell, going away like a bat out of hell". Apparently that qualified for additional points if needed. In the end we won the rally by one point without needing the extra question.
Ending point was the Onion Pub and Brewery in Lake Barrington, nice place for a Brit car club meet on a Sunday afternoon, drinks as desired and very good food. A few newcomers to rally were happily impressed at the fun event and the social at the end. All jolly good fun. Y'all come out an play again sometime.

-- Barney and Teresa Gaylord 1958 MGA