Mountain Cat - I hear you on the car story. In 1992, we were in the UK, just arrived, and needed to buy a new car for the wife.
For Americans living overseas, there's the option of buying a European car in US dollars at a good price via diplomat sales. They had a little lot with maybe one or two each of Volvo, Saab, BMW, etc cars and a sales rep from each company, who had a full list of cars available, just not on property.
The first car we looked at was the BMW, and the gentleman stepped out of his little sales shed, asked if he could help, and my wife cheerfully said, "Hi, yeah, we just arrived and I need a car."
He looked at her like he'd just stepped in dog crap, then turned to me and asked how he could help. Over the next couple of minutes, she'd try to ask a question, and he'd completely ignore, at one point getting between us and turning his back to her face.
That's how far that went. Both of us immediately turned around and walked away from him without even looking at the car.
As far as your dad, and I'm not even saying this in a negative way, some people don't care so much about "the principle of the thing" as long as the end result is beneficial to them. Maybe as far as your dad was concerned, that was a good car at a good price, so who gives a crap if the guy's sexist or rude or has body odor or any other number of negative things, you're getting the car you want at the price you like.
I'm not like that, though, and neither is my wife. Maybe it's a little kernel of spite that lives in me, but I'd have been damned before I let that ass of a salesman make one penny off us. We ended up buying the Volvo from a woman who looked like Maggie Thatcher!
