Beep Beep! Burnt-Orange Smart Car Hits The Road

By Lynn Freehill in Association, Blog, TXEX on December 13, 2010 at 10:47 am | No Comments

Keep your eyes peeled on I-35 today — the Texas Exes’ neatest contest prize, a burnt-orange Smart Car, is cruising up the highway.

Raffle winner Mary Lou Fleming, Life Member, is driving the diminutive car from Austin home to Garland after picking it up from the Alumni Center this morning.

Twenty dollars netted Mary Lou the car of her dreams, complete with longhorns attached. As soon as she heard about it, she wanted it. “I just thought it was so cute,” she says.

She and her husband, Forney, BA ’65, Life Member, bought two $10 tickets, one in each of their names. They had a one-in-947 chance of winning, with 1,894 raffle tickets sold during the fall contest benefitting the Student Opportunity Endowment.

Mary Lou had been charmed by Smart Cars ever since she first saw one in Paris 10 or 12 years ago, she says. When the vehicles arrived in the States, the Flemings checked them out at a dealership and even went so far as to put $100 down on one. Luckily, that purchase never went through.

The Flemings said today they were a touch nervous about how the Smart Car will handle in the wind, but otherwise gunning for an exciting ride.

“I don’t think the semis are going to see us,” Forney says, “so we’re going to turn the lights on and dodge them.”

Thanks again to Round Rock Auto Group for donating the custom-painted car and helping a dream come true.

Photo by Lynn Freehill/The Alcalde