"All But My Life" - Stirling Moss (book)

Stirling Moss is one of the most colorful and successful Formula 1 driver ever.  "All But My Life" is his autobiography as told to Ken Purdy and that's where I learned he has electrically-heated toilet seats in his home and he originally abstained from sex for a week before a race but he finally decided that discipline was too harsh and he relented to the demon of lust.  (WIKI:  Stirling Moss)

Note:  that's not a D-type Jag but rather an Aston Martin DBR1.  Said Moss, "Better to lose honourably in a British car than win in a foreign one."

Here's the D-type Jag Moss drove in the 1954 running of Le Mans.  He thought the sprint to the car at the start of the race was ridiculous so he blatantly jumped the gun and sauntered over to his car.  Graham Hill wore sprinting shoes for it and when he saw Moss, he screamed out, "Damn you, Stirling!"


Stirling Moss was cool but he's eighty-seven now and some of his thoughts show him as kind of crank:

Moss had said he would not want a "poofter or anything like that" to play him on screen, and added that he thought "it would be difficult for someone of the other persuasion, who is homosexual, to take on the part, as I have spent my life driving cars and chasing girls."

There's no reason to believe a gay driver would be any less talented than a straight one but that wasn't his point since he didn't believe a gay actor could portray him well.  There's no reason to believe that's true either but the only reason for casting a gay actor is the director is trying to make some point and, on that basis alone, I would not watch it.  The other extreme was when the director cast George Hamilton to play Evel Knievel and that was one of the most ridiculous movies ever made although Sue Lyons wasn't hard on the eyes.

Another one sure to tickle the cockles of all femmes was this one:

Women "lacked the mental aptitude" to compete in Formula 1.

There's no reason to believe that's true except women only rarely compete in Formula 1 and hardly ever in Indy or NASCAR either.  Right now lack of opportunity is the biggest impediment to female racing and there's no sensible answer to whether women can do it unless that changes.

One of the most successful women in racing was Denise McCluggage, an Australian who was extremely good at racing sports cars.

To my great surprise, I found the book on Amazon for seven dollars.  Then I noticed the Kindle price is the same and, wowzer, they sure found a gravy train in that.  It's a high-value in the ability to drop a book when I start falling asleep reading it without any worry of damage to the book.  I don't need to follow any machine's bullshit procedure to fall asleep and fade out but thanks for offering it ... for exactly the same price as the book.


Note:  there was another book entitled "All But My Life" and it was written much later by Gerda Weissman regarding her time in a NAZI concentration camp, all of which was a never-ending horror in which she lost everything but was finally liberated.