slidefighter
Junior Member
- Messages
- 52
Elderly, retired, multiple gun/car/motorcycle/airplane owning, unapologetic social dinosaur, and new (to me) 2002 4200GT Coupe/CC owner in South Carolina seeking model specific Maserati owner tips and knowledge! Great web site; hat's off to the site owner for all his considerable efforts and that of the moderators. Late comers like me need all the help we can get especially since I'm really more of a motorcycle and airplane than car guy. Saw an ad for the Coupe on the internet at a dealer (traded in on a Porsche GTS) in Chicago. On a lark and $350 later I'm on Delta and getting off at Midway Airport. Picked up for the ride to the Dealer (Joe Rizza Porsche) in a Cayenne. Rode around the block once and then out the door for South Kakelaky (slang for Carolina). 350 miles the first day (Indiana Interstates are worse that combat) and a nice enough motel just north of Louisville. No Owner's Manual so I'm flying blind (and in "Auto" at the suggestion of the Porsche salesman). Next day at the "free" motel breakfast, the morning TV news says all roads through Louisville are totally jammed up. Just then a guy who looked five minutes from the grave staggered in and sneezed. "God bless you" I said cheerfully as he collapsed in a chair two tables away. Everyone else was pointedly looking away as he said "thanks".
"You okay?", I asked. "No", he said "but thanks for asking. Had open heart surgery a couple of months ago and it's still kicking my (back-side) pretty good". "Well, I don't know you, but God bless you pal and best of luck", I said in my usual talk to anyone, happy-to-be-here mode (I meet the most interesting people that way---I could tell you stories...). Anyway, we both went on with our breakfasts with me wondering out loud how the heck to get through Louisville safely with my new "prize". Death-man pops up and tells me exactly which exits and highways to take. Best start to a 750 mile day in a car I didn't know anything about (including where the gas cap release was)---ever. This thing is more complicated than an F-18, but I have the Owner's Manual now, so some of it's mysteries are no longer---mysteries. Anyway, 9:00 am to 6:30 pm (including an adverse time zone change) and I was home. Through Tennessee and North Carolina and down the Saluda Grade (you could look it up), I was nearly always in the lead! No runs, no hits, no errors (sorry, U.S. baseball analogy). Sweetness has been achieved. Great car---everything works. Everything. Wow...
Anyway, great to come across such an enthusiastic owner's affinity group. Hope to contribute a little and to learn a lot.
Warm regards,
Lee...
"You okay?", I asked. "No", he said "but thanks for asking. Had open heart surgery a couple of months ago and it's still kicking my (back-side) pretty good". "Well, I don't know you, but God bless you pal and best of luck", I said in my usual talk to anyone, happy-to-be-here mode (I meet the most interesting people that way---I could tell you stories...). Anyway, we both went on with our breakfasts with me wondering out loud how the heck to get through Louisville safely with my new "prize". Death-man pops up and tells me exactly which exits and highways to take. Best start to a 750 mile day in a car I didn't know anything about (including where the gas cap release was)---ever. This thing is more complicated than an F-18, but I have the Owner's Manual now, so some of it's mysteries are no longer---mysteries. Anyway, 9:00 am to 6:30 pm (including an adverse time zone change) and I was home. Through Tennessee and North Carolina and down the Saluda Grade (you could look it up), I was nearly always in the lead! No runs, no hits, no errors (sorry, U.S. baseball analogy). Sweetness has been achieved. Great car---everything works. Everything. Wow...
Anyway, great to come across such an enthusiastic owner's affinity group. Hope to contribute a little and to learn a lot.
Warm regards,
Lee...