Clarkson on Cars.

by Jeremy Clarkson.

Part 1

Dear Diary

I do not wish to regale you with tales of my movements towards the end of this month, for two reasons. Firstly, you would be unutterably bored; and secondly, I will miss most of the engagements involved anyway.I will miss them because I have not written them down anywhere. People have rung to invite me for a weekend's skiing, for a two-day trip to Scandinavia, for dinner, for whatever.Not being used to such popularity, I have said yes to everything, without really knowing whether anything clashes or, to be honest, when anything is.It is a minor miracle if I ever manage to get anywhere in the right decade, let alone on the right day.The reason for this shortfall is that I have never kept a diary. Oh to be sure, I've started many a year with every good intention, filling in my blood group in the personal section and entering things that happened a week ago so that if anyone peeps, they'll be gobsmacked at what appears to be a gay social life.By February the entries are getting pretty spa.r.s.e. By March I've lost it or Beloved, in a flurry of domesticity, has fed it, along with the odd airline ticket and several cufflinks, to the washing machine. You may be interested to hear that I have the cleanest cheque book in Christendom.Most of my time on New Year's Eve was spent dreaming up all sorts of resolutions. This year, in among things like a four-weeks-and-already-broken ban on alcohol, and a fairytale promise to get fitter, I vowed to keep a diary.The question was, which one? In the run up to Christmas, any number of motor manufacturers sent such things. And, as they say in Sc.u.n.thorpe, very nice too.Slimline and quite capable of fitting in a jacket pocket without making me look like an FBI agent, they do however face some stiff compet.i.tion.First, there's the Peugeot 405 Fil-o-fax-u-like. Now, these things are of enormous benefit to the likes of Beloved, who has simply millions of absolutely lovely friends and needs to remind herself when my Visa card needs a wash. But to unpopular people like my good self, they're rather less use than a trawlerman in Warwick.With just five friends and, on average, two party invites a year, there's no real justification for me to be strolling around the place with something the size of a house brick under my arm.Besides, it has a section for goals, which I presume refers to ambition rather than football. I have several ambitions but writing them down won't get me any nearer to achieving them. I want to be king, for instance, and being able to see tomorrow's racing results today would be pretty useful too.Then there's my Psion Organiser. It's advertised on television as a sort of portable computer that fits neatly in a briefcase and acts out the role of diary, alarm clock, address book and calculator all rolled into one.As far as I'm concerned, though, it is of no use whatsoever, because I can't be bothered to learn how it works. The instruction booklet is bigger and even more boring than the Iliad and anyway I think I've broken it by getting into edit mode and telling it to b.u.g.g.e.r off.Casio do the Data Bank which is disguised as a calculator. It can even be used as one but beware, those who even think about entering an address or an appointment will screw up the innards good and proper. Well I did anyway.These electronic gizmos are all very well but I want to know what is wrong with a good old pencil and a piece of paper?I mean, if someone rings up (chance'd be a fine thing) and asks me to a party next week, I could have it written down in what; two, three seconds? I would need a team of advisers and a fortnight's free time even to turn the Psion on.The advantage is that it does have an ability to remind me audibly when I'm supposed to be going somewhere. This is where Pepys's little tool falls fait on its face.It's all very well remembering to write something down but this is about as much good as cleaning your shoes with manure if you don't look at the diary on the day in question.Even so, I'm a man of my word and, consequently, I'm keeping a diary like a good little boy.Choosing which book to use was not easy. I have the s.e.x maniac's diary, which tells me where in the world I can have safe s.e.x, how to apply a condom and on what day of the week I can indulge in what they call the Strathclyde m.u.f.f dive.I also have the Guild of Motoring Writers' Who's Who diary but it is full to bursting with bad photographs of people in brown suits.The International Motors' diary they're the people who import Subarus, Isuzus and High and Dries is a convenient size and has all the usual Letts schoolboy stuff in it about temperature and time zones and Intercity services.But I do not urgently need to know when the main Jewish festivals are. Nor, frankly, am I terribly bothered about when Ramadan begins.Toyota's diary begins with a lovely shot of their Carina car in front of the Pont du Gard in the Ardeche, skips blissfully over the Letts schoolboy behaviour and gets straight on to page after page of slots for the parties.But far and away the most tasteful offering for 1989 comes from those Italian chappies at Fiat. Largely, the editorial section at the front of their book is taken up with a list of decent restaurants.It doesn't say they're decent though, which should make for some fireworks when a trainee Fiat mechanic from a dealer in Bolton comes to the capital on an Awayday and gets presented with a 60 bill at Poons.You can tell Fiat have aimed their diary at men near the top. But this one is no good to me either, because the allergies section on the personal page is far too small. I am allergic to cats, penicillin, pollen, house dust, nylon, trade union leaders and that man with the Tefal forehead who masquerades as Labour's health spokesman.Ford's gives no s.p.a.ce at all to allergies and is full of all sorts of stuff I never knew I didn't need to know but this is the one I've selected. Instead of giving each week a page of its own, Ford have crammed an entire month on one double-page spread.This means I can do my shoelaces up on 4 April and feed the hamster on 16 May, and those who peek into the book will think I'm as busy as h.e.l.l.

Golf GTi Loses Its CrownAt this rate, the weightlifting gold at the 1992 Olympics will be won by a paperboy from Basildon. And apart from having arms like the hind legs of a rhino, he will believe the world is full of cars that can go faster than 300 mph.Since the advent of what the publishing industry calls new technology, it has become a great deal cheaper to produce the printed word. This is why one now needs the anatomical properties of Kali to read the Sunday Times, and why the shelves at your local newsagent's are groaning under the weight of perfect-bound, laminated forestry.You may have wondered how the producers of Successful Cauliflower magazine make any money. The answer is, they don't, but seeing as it costs naff all to make it in the first place, n.o.body's complaining!Not so long ago, people bought their favourite magazine for a decent read on the bus. It would be st.i.tched together from shoddy paper and when it was finished, it could be hung on a clip by the lavatory. Not any more.Take Country Life. Full of ads for houses that no one can afford and no one wants; you don't rad it, you arrange it on the coffee table as you would arrange a bunch of flowers. You may even feel the need to iron it occasionally.It is not a magazine. It is a statement. It says that while you may live in a neo-Georgian semi with a purple up 'n' over garage door, you are fully conversant with the delights of hopelessly expensive manaor houses in Oxfordshire.Or Horse and Hound, with its nonsensical line, 'I freely admit that the best of my fun, I owe it to Horse and Hound.'Nowadays, there are a million country-house and interior-design glossies full of curtains which cost 8000 and would look stupid anywhere but Castle Howard.Two luminaries in this domain are Tatler and Harpers and Queen, which are read a bit, but only by the middle cla.s.ses scouring 'Bystander' or 'Jennifer's Diary' for photographs of their horrid, frilly-dress-shirted friends.But the best of all are the car magazines.There was a time when they treated the car for what it was a device which used a series of small explosions to move people around. But now, it is an artform. The days when you could get away with a front three-quarters shot taken in the office car park are gone.Then there are the front covers. How many times has the Golf GTi lost its crown? To my certain knowledge, the Escort XR3 was the first to steal it, yet when the Peugeot 205 GTI came along a couple of years later, somehow, the Golf had got it back again.And therefore we read in 72-point bold that the Golf GTi had lost its crown again, this time to the 205 GTI.So the Vauxhall Astra, you might imagine, would have to pinch it from the 205; but no, at some point Peugeot had given it back to VW who reluctantly had to hand it over again, this time to Vauxhall.Then in no particular order it has been worn by the Peugeot 309 GTI, the Astra GTE 16v, the Escort RS Turbo, the Delta Integrale and the Corolla GTi. But for some extraordinary reason, the prized headgear never gets handed directly from one winner to the next. It always goes back to VW in between times.For now, it is being worn by the 16-valve Astra but you can bet your bottom dollar that VW will have it back in time to lose it to the new 16-valve Integrale.The Quattro has been through a similar series of machinations. The Delta Integrale pinched its number one slot but had to give the crown back to Audi shortly afterwards because it was wearing the Golf's at the time.Audi held on to it for a bit but only a couple of months ago, relinquished it to Porsche's 911 Carrera 4.And aside from dispensing crowns on a weekly basis, headline writers have become obsessed with speed.'WE DRIVE THE 220-MPH JAG THEY DARE NOT BUILD' is the latest game. Not to be outdone, a rival publication, you can be a.s.sured, will drive a 230-mph Jag that can't be built the very next week. And so on towards infinity perhaps.We smirk when we read that Freddie Starr ate someone's hamster, yet we are expected to believe that some scribbler has driven a Jaguar that no one has built at a speed that current tyre technology won't allow anyway.I have driven a BMW 750iL at an indicated 156 mph on the autobahn and believe me, it is a bowel-loosening experience I do not wish to relive. Sure, I enjoy going quickly, but the notion of driving something like a Porsche 911, which has been tuned by a foreign grease monkey, at the speed of sound in a Welsh valley, appals as much as it amuses.The thing is that if you have a magazine on your coffee table that talks on its front cover about a car that hasn't been built doing 300 mph on the Milton Keynes ring road, visitors to your home will be impressed.If you leave motoring publications lying around which talk about how seatbelts save lives, those same visitors will drink their coffee very quickly and leave.Business-speak impresses too. Honda have smashed Porsche 48 times and Toyota have bludgeoned BMW to death on a weekly basis for two years. And all this smashing and bludgeoning has resulted in every move a manufacturer makes being seen as utterly crucial.As in, 'ON THE LIMIT IN ROVER'S LIFE-OR-DEATH MAESTRO'; or how about this recent gem: 'LOTUS'S MAKE-OR-BREAK ELAN.'Lotus are owned by General Motors, who are one of the world's biggest companies. Their R&D department is universally revered, with lucrative contracts from such financially secure outfits as the MoD.The Elan, successful or otherwise, will neither make nor break the company. It might on the other hand pinch the Golf GTi's crown. Clarkson Decides.

Dishing It Out.i.t ought to be safe to a.s.sume, I thought, that if 60,000 Brits go to France and sit in a field all weekend, BBC news editors would be intrigued. They would, I was sure, despatch their best available crew to find out just what had driven so many people to do such a thing.After all, when twelve women with short hair and dubious s.e.xual preferences camped outside an Oxfordshire air base for a few days, they were besieged by TV reporters.When a couple of hundred Kentish ruralites wandered down to the village hall to hear a man from British Rail explain why their houses must be pulled down, they emerged two hours later, blinded by camera arc lights.When one man set up shop on Rockall, both the BBC and ITV hired helicopters at G.o.d-knows-how-much-a-minute to film the weird beard's flag-waving antics.And the South Ken emba.s.sy zone is permanently full of film crews, furiously rushing between the two people who have turned up to protest about the treatment of badgers in North Yemen and the half dozen who think the Chilean milk marketing board is overcharging.So, how come when 60,000 Brits formed part of the 200,000-strong crowd at the 24 hours of Le Mans, it didn't even get a mention on the BBC News?Rather than turn up for work on the Monday morning and face ridicule for not knowing who had won, I set aside twenty minutes on Sunday evening to find out.I noticed with glee that the newsreader chappie hurried through the usual bits on China and the Maggon's opposition to European monetary union and I fully expected the saved time would be used to show us how bronzed men and true had thrilled the crowds in what is easily the world's most famous motor race.But no. We had an interview with a cricketer who had hurt his cheek and couldn't play. Lots of people hurt their cheeks and can't do what they want as a result. I rubbed a chilli in my eye last night and they didn't send Michael Buerk round to find out how much it hurt. When they beamed us back to the studio, there was the presenter with the Refuge a.s.surance Sunday League cricket results.We heard how Mohammed from Leicester had scored 72, how Gary from Ess.e.x had bowled out six people and how Yorkshire were top of something or other.I kid you not. They devoted more time to cricket than they did to the slaughter of 2600 people in China. And, of course, there was not one word about Le Mans. In the next day's newspapers, it was the same story, with page after page about cricket followed by a brief paragraph that said, 'Merc won Le Mans and Jag didn't.'Now, the argument that cricket fans trot out at times like this, and we can safely a.s.sume that the BBC's news editors are fans, is that cricket has a bigger following in Britain than motor racing.Bull. The Test and County Cricket Board tell me that in 1988, 137,583 people turned up to watch Sunday league cricket. That means the seventeen teams each have an average weekly gate of 1074. They get five to ten times that to watch a Formula Three race at Donington.A Test match at Lord's can pull in about 80,000; the British Grand Prix manages almost exactly double that number of spectators.The Cricketer magazine has a circulation of 35,000 a month. Motoring News sells 78,000 copies every week. And then there's Motor Sport and Autosport.Those who claim cricket has a bigger following than motor racing are the sort of people who claim that fish are insects and that the Pope is a water buffalo; they should be made to live in rooms with rubber walls, and to wear suits with the arms sewn on sideways.You will never convince the old boy network that runs things round here that cricket should be banished from television and replaced with motor sport; but you could buy a HAL 9000 satellite dish. Mine is sculpted into a two-fingered salute and pointed at Broadcasting House. The reception is awful, actually, but it amuses all the neighbours.Quite apart from the fact that Sky is prepared to show us b.r.e.a.s.t.s and bottoms on a regular basis, it has two sport channels which devote a proper amount of time to the world of motor cars.Now, you know about how the satellite dish and the scrambler and the installation will cost you 350, and you probably know that Rupert Murdoch runs the whole show, but you probably don't know that, at any particular time of day, there will be some sort of motor sport being broadcast on the box. So when you're bored with Mickey Rourke and Kim Basinger sweating their way through another game of tonsil hockey, simply hit the force and watch Al Ulcer and Mario Androcles Jr slogging it out Stateside.Tonight, you will go home for a diet of cricket, interrupted briefly at 7.00 p.m. for Terry and June and again at 10.30 p.m. for Little and Large. After The Terminator, I will watch some Indycar racing followed by a bit of in-car action from the CRX Challenge.If you want to protest about the Beeb's apathy on the motor-sport front, then for heaven's sake, do absolutely nothing. Stay at home. Tidy your sock drawer out. Grade your gra.s.s clippings according to length. Do anything, but certainly do not form yourselves into a chanting, 60,000-strong mob or else the news crews will choose to ignore you.Fear not though because I know exactly how to get coverage. Tomorrow, the six of us who have been converted to USS Enterprise s.p.a.ce television will become h.o.m.os.e.xuals and make camp outside Broadcasting House. We will have our heads shaved and refuse to eat anything except almonds and watercress.The day after, if the TV crews start to look bored, we will set fire to David Gatting.

Cars in ReviewVauxhall Belmont SRiOn the basis that children should neither be seen nor heard, it seems absurd that airlines and other people movers do not provide soundproof boxes into which they can be inserted.There are even people out there who, when buying a car, actually consider the well-being of their offspring. Manufacturers like Mitsubishi and Volvo use them as active selling aids even.But why on earth should you worry about the comfort and safety of something that will do nothing on the entire journey other than fight with its sister, vomit and make loud noises?When I produce children, I shall buy a Vauxhall Belmont. In order to fit in the back even half properly they will have to screw themselves up like one of those magician's foam b.a.l.l.s. Even then, they will not be able to see where they're going because the Vauxhall has headrests like blackboards.There are more comfortable fairground rides than the Belmont.Eventually, they'll beg to be put in the really rather commodious boot. Which is where they should have been in the first place.Toyota Camry V6This time next year, if someone were to ask if I've ever driven a Toyota Camry V6, I will look gormless for a minute or two. Then I will say no.This will be wrong because I have driven a Toyota Camry V6 the Bob Harris of motordom.Turn on the engine, there is no sound; press the accelerator and still the only noise you can hear is a chaffinch, 50 yards away, rummaging through some discarded fish-and-chip papers.In a temper, you engage D on the purrundah gearbox and bury the throttle in the pleblon carpet. The chaffinch looks over to see what the chirp was and goes back to his rummaging.You could drive this car round a library and no one would look up. I live twelve miles from Heathrow, yet the sound of jets on their final approach is enough to warrant the evening TV being turned up. When Concorde is bringing Joan Collins's hairstyle over again, a full-scale Judas Priest concert is unable to compete.What I want and want now is for Toyota to buy Rolls-Royce, Pratt and Whitney and that French outfit that doesn't know its left from its right.I want them to show Europe and America that it is entirely possible to build an engine that doesn't make any noise at all.Volkswagen Pa.s.sat 1.9 DieselIf you need to get from A to B in a hurry and the only car at your disposal is a Pa.s.sat 1.9 diesel, then might I suggest you try jogging.We are talking here about a very slow car indeed, o to 60 is possible, but only just.At its launch VW talked at some length about how clean the new engine is. They used graphs to show what they were on about but these looked only like Luftwaffe air traffic in the 1940s.They were at pains to point out that the new engine has not been designed with speed in mind but glossed over the fact that it's barely capable of independent movement.And to cope with the power it gets two first gears, a third and two very high fifths.Mark my words, the trees'll love it.Proton Saga 1.5 SLXThis is how the steering in a Proton works. You twirl the wheel as quickly as possible and two whisks attached to the end of the column stir up a sort of box full of yoghurt. When the yoghurt is spinning fast enough, centrifugal force rotates the box and the wheels turn.Volkswagen CorradoThe brown-suited wise men of the motoring world have been saying that the new Corrado should have the 200SX's cha.s.sis, the Celica's equipment, the Piazza's price, the Prelude's engine and the 480 turbo's computer.But their opinions go for nought because in the coupe market, it is style that counts.Which of the following answers would you like to give if an impressionable young lady were to ask what sort of car you drove? a) a Nissan b) a Toyota c) a Volkswagen d) an Isuzu e) a Honda f) a Volvo?She equates VWs with Paula Hamilton and Nissans with zero per cent finance; thus the Corrado is bound to be more sought after than any j.a.panese compet.i.tor, no matter how many horsepower are entrusted to their rear wheels.

Big Boys' ToysIt seems to me, Sir Isaac Newton could have been more gainfully employed. Any man who has the time to sit around in an autumnal orchard wondering why apples don't float around in s.p.a.ce once they part company with the parental bough, ought to be out looking for a proper job.Maybe it was in the hobbies section of his c.v. or maybe employers in the seventeenth century were a trifle anti-Semitic, but either way, Isaac never did get a proper job and went on instead to design what was marketed ten years ago as the Ballrace, or Newton's Cradle.It set the scene for a host of so-called executive toys and relied for sales on the premise that the average high flyer doesn't have anything better to do while at his desk than sit watching a load of chrome b.a.l.l.s bash the h.e.l.l out of each other until it's coffee time or the phone shrills a cheery message that his wife's burnt supper again.Newton's thingumijig is, however, confined to page seven of yesterday's news now its headline grabbing antics of yesteryear fulfilled, in these days of war, hunger and crisp packets without little blue salt sachets in them, by a veritable myriad of toys all of which are jostling for pole position by the blotter.My rare sorties to the world of big business and, rarer still, my visits to the offices of those that control it, have revealed a constant.Whether the executive has plumped for red walls, white s.h.a.g pile and chairs shaped like mattress springs or traditional oak panelling, leather seating and standard-lamp lighting, the centre-piece of his room is always an absolutely ma.s.sive desk... a desk that's as uncluttered as a hermit's address book.To the right, there's the telephone; to the left, an intercom. Dead ahead, beyond the equally uncluttered blotter there are dog-eared photographs of his wife, taken in those salad days when she didn't burn supper, and his children, taken when they were angelic rather than punk.Somewhere, though, there will also be a toy not an Action Man or a Care Bear. An executive toy has to be more than just fun to play with. It must also be an attractive, decorative item which doesn't look out of place in a professional setting.You have to understand that the street cred of a top businessman would be seriously impaired should anyone bodyswerve his personal secretary, make it into the inner sanctum and catch him playing with a Scalextric set.But if you broke in and found him struggling with a Puzzleplex jigsaw, all would be well. These jigsaws are extraordinarily beautiful objets d'art which, almost incidentally, happen to be infernally difficult puzzles.Each one of these three-dimensional, wooden jigsaws is handmade, each is completely different from anything that has gone before and, best of all, the manufacturer, an eccentric called Peter Stocken, will create your puzzle in any shape you like a car, a Welsh dragon, an artificial lung, anything.You need an afternoon to complete a simple one and about 50 to buy it. For the more difficult variety, extend the time allowed to a day and start adding the noughts.I must confess I was hugely tempted to invest but had I succ.u.mbed, I fear you would not be reading this and that my superhuman, week-long struggle to give up smoking would have been thwarted.Another great puzzle is the much cheaper Philosopher's Knot, the idea being that you have to extricate a larger gla.s.s ball from a surrounding web of knotted string. It looks even trickier than that Hungarian cube thingy from last year.But the interesting thing about it is that were the ball made from shoddy plastic and the string from something of inferior quality, sales to businessmen would be sluggish. It looks good in between the telephone and the blotter on an executive's desk.Similarly, I noticed Fortnum and Mason are selling a twisted length of black and white plastic tubing for 35 in their gift department. I spent many minutes poring over this most unusual creation hoping an a.s.sistant would overcome any prejudices my tatty jeans were instilling in him and volunteer an explanation.None was forthcoming and because I always feel so foolish when asking such people what various things do, I kept my mouth shut. If I were in their shoes and such a question were fired at me, I should want to know why someone would be considering the purchase of an item without knowing what it was or did.Thus, I reserve behaviour of this kind until about 5.25 p.m. on Christmas Eve when, in desperation, I have been known to spend a week's wages on a device for melting the teeth of dead okapis merely because 'it looks nice'.The upshot of all this nonsense is that my notebook says 'funny plastic tubing. Fortnum's. 35'. If it is merely decorative, then it works well but costs rather a lot. If it has a function, then I should enjoy being enlightened.I'd actually gone to Fortnum's in search of a truly great executive toy an 18-inch-high suede rat in a blue leather coat and a felt hat. It is supposed to be Reckless from the Captain Beaky gang but he seems to have died now the hype has all quietened down as no one seemed to remember the item in question or from whence it came.I recall it cost close on 40 but, believe me, as a desk centre-piece, it had no peers.Unless, of course, you're a gadget kinda guy in which case 1986 holds much more in the way of excitement than dear old suede Reckless ever could.Take telephones. Quite why an executive needs the 15-memory variety with built-in answerphone, hands-off dial facility, digital read-out, supersonic turbo recall, optic fibre laser and led handset, I know not.Especially when I consider all he ever does is pick the d.a.m.n thing up and say to his secretary, 'Get me whatsisname of doodah limited.'Hands up all those who are familiar with the wide-open secretary who's all set to transfer you to her boss until she finds out you've got something to do with his work when all of a sudden she will announce, 'He's in a meeting.'Is he h.e.l.l. He's playing with his Philosopher's Knot and wanting to know why his wife has burnt supper for the eighth successive night.Or else he's sitting back, eyes half closed and fingers steepled enjoying the strains of Beethoven on the mini compact disc system with twin ca.s.sette auto play reverse and solar powered volume k.n.o.b. Oh, and it can play music too.This is usually located in the bottom drawer a s.p.a.ce which, in that bygone age before floppy discs (which I will not spell with a 'k') and cursors, was taken up with things called files.These stereos fascinate me. The smaller they are, the more expensive they are to buy. I don't see what's wrong with my simply enormous Rotel, Pioneer, Akai circa 1976 set up but evidently, it is miles too big and judging by some of the prices these days, it didn't cost enough either.Having said that though, I was staggered to see a Sinclair flat screen telly in a dusty corner of the Design Centre selling for just 99.95. As is the current vogue, the screen was the same size as your average sultana but the wiry bit round the back was encased in a washing machine-sized sh.e.l.l. No wonder old Clive had to sell out.Doubtless, he'll soon come up with a television so small that you won't be able to see it at all.When the days of invisible gadgetry are upon us, I may well take my place on the bandwagon and reap the benefits of being able to cover my desk with everything from a sunbed to a nuclear power station without my work s.p.a.ce being pinched.At present though I have just three executive toys, not counting my telephone which is a straightforward British Telecom Amba.s.sador and therefore doesn't count.Behind the Citroen press release to my left is the Waterford Crystal aeroplane I was given for Christmas by someone I didn't like very much until I found out it cost more than 50.Lost in the vicinity of a half-eaten packet of McVities dark chocolate biscuits remember, I'm trying to give up smoking and the designer-label notebook is a half-inch-high, hand-painted pig. Always have loved that.And occupying pride of place is my helicopter a stunningly good toy made by Mattell in the 1970s and foolishly dropped from the line-up a couple of years back. Tough luck you can't buy one these days.The machine, which is genuinely powered by its blades, is connected to a central command post by a wire and flies round in circles with a hook dangling underneath poised to pick up empty matchboxes and old c.o.ke cans.Such precision flying requires 100 per cent Chuck Yeagerish concentration so, when I'm airborne, little thought is given to burnt suppers or indeed any of the rigours encountered in daily life.What lunchtime? What meeting? What Citroen press release?

Mobile Phones'Yes darling. I'll pick you up at eight... No this time I promise... Well, I know, but last night was different... Yes, well the night before was different too... No, standing around on Fulham Broadway isn't much fun... OK listen, if I'm late tonight, I'll buy you dinner at San Lorenzo. Bye.'Gulp. I've got an appointment in Twickenham at six.San Lorenzo costs twenty quid a head and that's without going bonkers on the port and brandy. Then there's the taxi and they don't take credit cards so I'll have to get some money out and the banks are closed.Now, my autobank's a dodgy little blighter. Sometimes it enjoys Gettyish generosity and will plunge wads of Harold Melvins into the recipient maulers but on other days, for no apparent reason, it's tighter than a Scotsman on holiday in Yorkshire and won't hand over so much as a d.a.m.n penny.'I wouldn't mind if the green screen was polite and said something like, 'Sorry old chap but your overdraft's a little excessive and it'd be more than my job's worth to hand over the cash at the moment.'But 'insufficient funds available' is so terse; so final. And the queue behind, already exasperated by my inability to remember my code number on the first attempt, is reduced to a giggling mess as I shrug nonchalantly and, fighting back the tears of humiliation, stroll away as if it doesn't matter.But with the threat of an 80 experience among the stars at San Lorenzo hanging wearily about my person, there is no alternative and I find myself approaching the d.a.m.n thing, dripping like ageing cheese in an old sock.Inevitably there's a queue. Inevitably a gang of screeching Hoorays fall in line astern of me. Inevitably I programme in the wrong number twice and inevitably I'm told, to the accompaniment of a crescendo of shrieks from the Ruperts, that I'm a miserable pauper.Boarding the tube at Sloane Square, I consider my predicament and weigh up the consequences of a late arrival at Fulham Broadway. They are too dire to contemplate. Eighty quid is a lot of money for a pauper. Oh G.o.d, please help.Now I bet you didn't know that G.o.d works in Volkswagen's press office. Because after my return to the den of iniquity that afternoon, Charles, who is VW's effervescent delivery driver, wandered in brandishing the keys to a 16-valve Scirocco I was due to test that week.And joy of joys, nestling in that sombre but tasteful interior was nigh on two grand's worth of Panasonic Vodaphone. Better still, VW would pick up the tab for any calls I made.If the meeting in Twickenham dragged on and I found myself in the kind of snarl-up only the A316 can muster, it was a simple question of ringing the beloved and thus avoiding an 80 outlay that would mean I'd have to live on a diet of small Macs and stickleback and chips for the forthcoming decade.Sure enough, the meeting did go on and on, despite endless tutting and continual references to Omega's finest. And sure enough every Cherry this side of Chern.o.byl was on the 316, misjudging approach speeds and getting confused by roundabouts.At ten to eight I realised there wasn't a hope in h.e.l.l of getting to the Broadway on time and resorted to the Vodaphone. 'h.e.l.lo sweetheart... no, don't shout at me... no, listen... I wa... Becau... No, I'm using a car phone and if this Nissan gets out of my way I'll be with you in about twenty minutes.'That simple message cost VW 10p and saved me eighty quid.This phone-in-the-car business was definitely worth looking into. I had at my disposal a Panasonic EBC1044 with hands-free facility which retails for 1774 excluding VAT. On top of this outlay you are faced with a 50 connection charge and a monthly fee of 25.Calls made between 7.30 a.m. and 7.30 p.m. from Monday to Friday cost 25p per minute but at all other times the cost is a mere 10p per minute.Any one of VW's 350 dealers can fit the hardware, which is broken down thus: 1375 for the handset and a complicated-looking box which was in the boot, 290 for the hands-free facility, 28.95 for the mounting kit and a whopping 79.95 for an aerial which would have to be replaced every time Chelsea played at home.Hands free, for those of you who've just returned from a sightseeing trip on Voyager Two, is a wonderful innovation which allows a driver to hold a conversation without taking his paws from the wheel.You simply dial up the number you wish or, if it's logged in the set's memory, press the appropriate code number, and hey presto, the job's done. A couple of seconds later you'll hear the ringing tone from a speaker located near your right ankle. The microphone into which you speak is attached to the sun visor.Trouble is, those without cars are unwise in the ways of modern automotive technology and, on one occasion, I noticed a few raised eyebrows from the inc.u.mbents of a bus queue as I sat in a traffic jam shouting at my sun visor.Because the Scirocco GTX 16v is a left hooker, they were that much closer and consequently their surprise turned into uncontrollable mirth as I went on to tell the visor I would meet it in the pub in ten minutes.Then there was the instance when I called a friend to ask about the availability of tickets for a ball I was due to attend.He said that I could bring along anyone I liked except 'that balding so-and-so' a mutual friend.Unfortunately, the gentleman in question was in the car at the time and heard every word.I did notice that the unit's performance is impaired to a notable degree when the hands-free facility is employed, so that the vocal chords of both conversationalists have to be strained to be audible.It's actually worse for the driver because whenever I used the device, I was invariably alongside a 3,000,000-hp Volvo tractor unit.And drivers of 3,000,000-hp tractor units don't like squirts in bright-red Sciroccos with telephones, so they rev their engine up to a point where the pistons are moving faster than a Beirut window shopper and it's making more noise than Pete Townsend on a Gibson pile driver.This effectively blots out conversation to the point that on many occasions I had to resort to the dangerous and potentially illegal practice of using the handset like a normal phone.Anyway, after saving the day with regards to dinner at San Lorenzo, I figured a call to dear old mother, who's utterly bemused by anything electronic, would be in order.I did, however, make the mistake of giving her the unit's number, which meant she rang at all the wrong times to find out a) where I was and b) how fast I was going.Three days later I found myself using every reserve of concentration as I tried to overtake a speedily driven 200 Turbo Quattro on a delightful stretch of A road in Hampshire a manoeuvre made even more difficult by my seating position and the Scirocco's 139 bhp against his 182.Quite the last thing I needed was a telephone call from the dear old soul up North and the resultant lecture on the dangers of driving too fast. I still think she believes I was doing 100 mph with one hand on a phone. Hands free is a difficult facility to explain when the Quattro up front is gaining ground and the sun roof's open.Besides, the Audi had a 79.95 aerial poking through the rear windscreen and I was busy plotting a means of finding out his number so I could call him up to say something dastardly like 'Your rear tyres are on fire'When I finally lost him I let my mind drift into scenes where the car phone could be even more useful than for warning womenfolk you're going to be late. Like if I saw a bank robbery and gave chase to the villains. I could call up the police and tell them what they were up to. I could be a hero. I'd be on the front page of the Sun.I know the manufacturers of these phones harp on about lost business and sales reps and traffic jams, but half the value is encased in their fun and sn.o.b value. Otherwise why is it everyone begins their conversation by saying, 'I'm on the car phone'?And why is it everyone who rode shotgun in the Scirocco that week ignored the technical sophistication of its 16-valve engine, ignored the fact it was left-hand drive, ignored the admiring glances from GTi pilots and said 'Ooh, it's got a phone'?I could have picked them up in Thrust Two or the s.p.a.ce shuttle. They wouldn't have been bothered so long as they could play with a device that when placed on a hall windowsill is readily available courtesy of the DHSS.Two grand is a lot of dosh for someone whose autobank regularly says 'insufficient funds available', but if I spent a great deal of my time in one car rather than a very little of it in several, I'd be hugely tempted to invest.

Last Year's ModelYesterday, a great many things went wrong. The girl at Suzuki said I couldn't drive a new Swift until next year and she'd call back when she knew precisely when.This, past experience has taught me, actually means get lost toerag.Moments later, I had the most awful row with two security guards at Earls Court because they wouldn't let me back a BMW twenty yards down a ramp. Sadly, the issue became personal as I enquired of them why it is that small people in peaked caps are always so d.a.m.ned intransigent and they, of me, why BMW drivers are always so ??$*!ing pushy.Eventually a bossy woman with a loud and hectoring demean-our came but I couldn't understand what she was saying to me because she was holding one of those walkie-talkie affairs that seem to emit nothing but white noise punctuated with people saying 'Roger' a lot.I finally managed to squeeze past the music teacher lookalike and her SS sidekicks when a charming man stepped from his Volvo Estate to ask them why it is that the working cla.s.s always vote Labour. I didn't actually see what bearing his line of questioning had on the issue but his suicide antics diverted the heat for just long enough for me to win my battle.Sadly though, my war with the day was far from over. My Fiat test car ignited warning light after warning light until its interior began to resemble a Jean Michel Jarre concert, my doctor warned once again that if I didn't have a week off, my eczema would envelop the last vestiges of skin and Barry Reynolds rang up from Ford to say the Cosworth I was due to get next week would, in fact, be an XR2.Now, I have many weak spots my face is perhaps the most apparent but I do pride myself on an ability to maintain an even strain when the adversity is piling up.Some people, I know, reach for the paraquat if the sponge cake doesn't rise correctly. Others weep for weeks upon finding out their son's motorcycle isn't taxed. But I do none of these things, not least because I don't know how to make a sponge cake and don't have a son.What I do in times of crisis is try to put my predicament in perspective. As I sat on the phone listening to Mr Reynolds explaining why the Cosworth would not be winging its way to Fulham, I merely thought about that time when my sister ripped the last page from the Famous Five book I was reading and I was smacked for beating her up. And those dreadful tea-time visits to Aunt May's a sizeable woman who always sat with her bandaged legs wide apart and began all her toothless monologues with 'Do you remember when...'I even summoned up from the memory bank's deepest recess that incident when a load of town boys stole my school cap and put something a dog had done in my satchel.Still though, the pain of not getting a Cosworth hurt it hurt in the same way a Sherman tank would hurt if it ran over your legs. What I needed was to recall something so terrible, a moment that produced so much anguish, that not having a Cosworth would become joyous in comparison. I thought about the red mullet I'd eaten on the BMW 7-Series launch and how sad it was that I'd never again enjoy this, the best piece of food created by any chef anywhere, ever before.But the pain didn't go away until I remembered that moment on 10 October 1969 when I crashed my brand-new Buick Riviera into the coffee table and one of its four gleaming headlights dropped from the grille.This was the pride of my d.i.n.ky/Corgi fleet because it sported mirrors in the front and rear windows which, when covered up, dimmed the head and tail lamps.It cost 5/6d and was the envy of everyone at school. Once, Gary Needham offered to swap his Mercedes Pullman with the dirty front windscreen for it, but I refused. He even offered to throw in his Batmobile but I already had one of those even though Robin's window was broken after my sister trod on it. I beat her up for that too.She also lost the little yellow pellets you could fire from the boot-mounted mortars and I was the school laughing stock because I had to resort to matchsticks instead.I've still got my entire collection and am told the earlier variety with detachable rubber wheels will one day be worth a few bob.But I somehow doubt the ones I Humbrolised with all the finesse of a charging rhino will ever be worth more than the 5/6d I paid for them. The paint seemed to go everywhere except on the bodywork and because I usually did the red stripe down the side before the green job was dry, it all ran. If anyone out there will offer me 30p for a sludge-coloured Citroen DS Safari with a fingerprint on the bonnet I'd be willing to consider a trade.The best Citroen I ever had was a Citroen Pallas coupe finished in a metallic cherry red. That is still in perfect condition as are all the models I bought when rubber wheels were being phased out to be replaced by the plastic variety. There's an Alfa Pininfarina and another white Alfa with a gold spoiler and no roof. Looks like something from Thunderbirds but at least it enables me to trace the roots of my current love affair with the GTV6.I suppose my trips to Youngsters in the high street every Sat.u.r.day ceased in the 1970s when die cast went out of fashion and d.i.n.ky died. An Esso oil tanker was, I believe, my last purchase.I was once given a plastic kit of the MR2 by Toyota which I tried fashioning into something resembling a car but the disaster which ensued convinced me that model-making is an avenue I should not pursue. The finished article is a bloodstained mess that visitors to my house think is an aubergine.In recent years my preoccupation with cars has centred around the variety that are too big for my sister to tread on.However, as she is now a solicitor and presumably responsible enough not to smash up her brother's belongings, I have recently begun wondering whether a foray into the world of toy cars might be a good plan.On a recent trip to Sicily I noticed every shop window was full of die-cast toy cars made by Burago. They're a good deal bigger than my d.i.n.ky and Corgi collection and, even allowing for inflation, they're a good deal more expensive too but I swear on my Buick's lost headlight, they really are superb. And you can buy them here.Foolishly, I went all the way to Hamleys to check on prices only to discover that my local filling station sells them. In case you're interested, set aside around a tenner for the best examples.There's a ma.s.sive range encompa.s.sing all kinds of models and all kinds of sizes but having scrutinized the line-up, considered my age and the use to which I would put them, I reckon those which are produced to a scale of 1/18 are best.For sure, an eleven-year-old who has a penchant for Hum-brolising his toy prior to racing it through a sandpit would be better off with the tinier, and therefore cheaper variety but the bigger ones are so beautifully crafted, they don't look out of place among the Lladro and leather-bound Britannicas on your bookcase.Without question, the best of them all is the Testarossa which is mounted on a lovely piece of wood. Now, I don't like the look of full-size Testarossas with their Vauxhall Astra front ends, their silly door mirrors and boot sc.r.a.pers down the side but in model form, they look superb.The bonnet, boot and doors open to reveal faithfully scaled-down copies of the car's innards even the tyre treads are accurate. Another masterpiece is the 250GTO which comes with chromed bonnet catches and the E-type a proper one from 1961 can't be ignored either. Others are the Mercedes SSKL, the Bugatti Type 59, the Jaguar SS100, the 250 Testarossa, the Alfa Romeo 2300 Spider, the Mercedes SSK, the Lancia Aurelia Spyder, the Bugatti Grand Prix, the Mercedes 300SL and the Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 Monza, drool drool drool.There's also a model of the Rolls-Royce Camargue though I swear that if you painted it pink, it would look just the same as the car Parker used to chauffeur for Lady Penelope. Also, the windscreen wipers look like a pair of silver telegraph poles sprouting from the bonnet.Burago's best sellers are now sitting in moist soil at home receiving a daily dosage of Fison's Make It Grow fertiliser.

Watch ItI suppose if one were to weigh up all the pros and cons, one would probably decide that it is a good idea to wear trousers while out shopping on a Sat.u.r.day morning.If one were to peruse the pots, pans and Pyrex in Boots, for instance, wearing nothing below the belt except socks, shoes and underpants, one would feel silly and, well, really rather naked.Builders spend six months of the year with no shirts on and people from Islington wander around in bare feet, but no one aside from pupils at a strange public school in North Yorkshire, women, and Scotsmen would dream of venturing from the confines of a homestead without strides.Bearing this argument in mind, it would be all too easy to a.s.sume that trousers are the most important item in my wardrobe but believe me, they're not.I would rather go to a Buckingham Palace garden party clad only in a pair of day-glo 'Willie Hamilton for Prime Minister' Y-fronts than spend so much as ten seconds of my day without a watch.With nothing around the left wrist, my whole arm feels like one of those Birds Angel Cream Delight blancmange thingies you see floating around in telly ads.Take my watch off and I begin to get some idea of what Alan Shepard must have felt like when he became the first American to do something the English hadn't done before.Not knowing what the time is makes me more miserable than missing a premium-bond jackpot by one digit. More angry than I was the other night when I discovered the reason why I'd been stationary on the M1 for three hours was because some buffoon with his bottom hanging out had dumped a pile of gravel in the outside lane and gone home.And right now, I am miserable because the watch I was given on my first day away at school has developed a tendency to stop every few minutes and my replacement, a twenty-first birthday present, is so exquisite I daren't wear it for the everyday hustle and bustle one encounters when waging war with a wayward word processor.And anyway, its strap's broken.This has therefore meant that as I sit here writing, I do not know what time it is. It's dark so that means it's way past six o'clock. If it's later than eight, it means I've missed my weekly game of snooker. If it's later than ten, I'm not being paid enough.Today, I've been out and about trying to find a stand-in timepiece.The local watch emporium does some very natty lines but somehow, I don't see myself in a pink see-through number. Nor am I particularly interested in those chromium washing machine sized things that tell you what the chairman of Suzuki had for breakfast that morning.Being of a weedy disposition, I would imagine I'd be allergic to metal straps so the watch of my dreams has to have a hide strap none of this namby-pamby plastic for me. I like people who disembowel lizards.I want a circular face with two hands, numbers and the date. That's it. No alarm bells if you forget to wake up. No Mickey Mouse noises. No colour-coded laser-optic workings.Everything in the shop either fitted the bill perfectly but was far, far too expensive, or was correctly priced but made by somebody called Swatch or Crutch or something.There was even one horrid white thing with the legend 'TURBO' writ large all over it. To call an aftershave 'TURBO' is fair enough. To call a vacuum cleaner 'TURBO' is fairer enough still, but a TURBO watch is plain ridiculous.Turbo in my book means nasty lag and torque steer, which are unwelcome in a car let alone a watch. I mean how useful is a timepiece if the hands dawdle their way past midday with all the alacrity of a damp log and then explode through the afternoon like an F-14 on combat power with excess torque making the minute hand go backwards?If I were going to write something about cars on a watch, I'd be inclined to go for the economy angle. Surely no one buys a watch because it goes fast, but there must be people around who would like the idea of one that needs winding infrequently on account of its aerodynamic cogs or whatever.Yes, when Omega come to me for the name of a new watch, I shall suggest 'spoiler' or 'thin tyres' or maybe 'fuel cut off on the overrun'.After a good deal of huffing and puffing I stormed out of the shop. It's not that I object to having things written on the strap or face but I can't abide some of the words dreamed up by blue-spectacled berks in marketing departments.One of the finest watches I have ever clapped eyes on was designed to commemorate the launch of the Mark Two Golf and given by Volkswagen to every journalist in Britain from the newest trainee on the Rotherham Advertiser to Ian Hislop.Sadly, at the time, my worth in the eyes of the powers that be at VAG amounted to little more than it would if I were a scuba diver for the Galapagos Islands Turtle Preservation Society, so I did without. Which a) was a shame and b) explains why I called them VAG and not Volkswagen Audi as they now prefer.Thinking that the same designer who came up with the GTi timepiece might still hold sway in VW's good offices, I made enquiries about other watches they market.Evidently there's just one, for those who have a Quattro or those who want us to think they have a Quattro, but it's awful. The sort of thing a second-division footballer would covert. You can't see the watch for all the dials and I'd like to bet its weight is somewhere in the region of eight tons. Besides, it costs 345 plus VAT.Equally exorbitant is the Ferrari Formula collection which is made up of a wide and delightful selection. Leaving aside those with allergenic straps, you're left with the Marine Collection with their racy two-tone straps or the City Collection with an ease of style that reminds me of Anthony Hopkins's performance in Pravda.They're perfect in every respect except one. I can't abide Ferraris. I don't like the way they look, the noise they make, or the people who drive them. What I'd like to know is how on earth can the same people who sanctioned the aesthetic abortion called the Testarossa possibly be responsible for a collection of watches that are an equal of Kim Basinger in the beauty stakes.It all came to nought though because they had Ferrari written on them and things with Ferrari written on them are pricey.Things, at this stage, were beginning to get desperate. BMW don't do watches at all and I didn't dare ring Jaguar because they were too busy being smug about their new XJ6 even though the one I drove was of marginal merit. The boot clanged. The steering was too light. The glovebox didn't fit properly and I didn't like the dashboard. Here speaks the only man in Britain who prefers, by a mile, the new 7-Series BMW.I know it's possible to buy Aston Martin or Lamborghini or Rolls-Royce watches but quite frankly it's also possible to go bankrupt. And wearing one of those is just another way of saying in the most ostentatious way possible, 'Hey everyone, I'm very rich.'Which I'm not.And this is why the watch I have finally decided to buy only costs 30.It doesn't meet one single criterion I'd laid down except price, but I was so taken with the idea, I don't care that it's plastic or that its face looks like Joseph's dreamcoat or that it is made by the Swatch empire.Marketed by Alfa Romeo and sold through their dealer network all seven of them it has a navy-blue plastic strap, a navy-blue surround and a great big Alfa Romeo cross and serpent on the face.It doesn't sport any numbers and in the words of the girl at Alfa, the winder is gold but it isn't gold.It's got a date hole, it's got heaps of character and because it bears the Alfa badge, it says to those who see it, 'I'm someone who appreciates Italian style but not to the extent that I'm going to pay 4 billion for it.'Those prepared to read even further between the lines will notice that it tells people I'm also the kinda guy who hasn't lost sight of his youth, who has a devil may care att.i.tude to inst.i.tutionalisation. Well that's what some idiot with blue spectacles told me last night. I reckon the most important things it tells people are the time and that I like Alfa Romeos.The chairman of Suzuki can have black pudding and treacle in the morning, the Dow-Jones index can collapse and the sugar-beet price in Albania can go through the roof but I will have no way of knowing.And I will not care.

JMC NOThe bungalow itself warranted little merit. The bay windows played host to a selection of bull's-eye gla.s.s, carriage lamps illuminated the neo-Georgian front door and gnomes with fishing rods frolicked among the horribly organised front garden.There is little doubt that I would not enjoy the company of whoever had chosen this mish-mash of tasteless addenda. People with carriage lamps are people who have children called Janet. And children called Janet aren't allowed to eat sweets between meals or wear jeans.Ordinarily, I would not concern myself with this sort of house or the people who occupy it, but in this instance I am sorely tempted to write them a letter explaining why they are the most ghastly individuals this side of anyone who indulges in tactical voting to oust the Conservatives.You see, nailed to their teak gatepost is one of those polished tree-trunk slices with the legend 'Olcote' picked out in Olde Worlde York Tea Shoppe script.That's bad enough but to make matters much, much worse, I have learned that this quaint mnemonic stands for Our Little Corner Of The Earth.Point one: if your house is numbered, don't mess up the postman's schedule by giving it a name. And point two: if you insist on making everyone wait two weeks for their letters, at least give it a name with some credibility.If you have an awful bungalow with a ning-nong illuminated doorbell, you should call it 'The Foul Little Bungalow That's Equipped With Every Nasty Piece Of DIY Kit I Could Find At Alabama Homecare'.You should never call it 'Olcote'. I can think of some pretty unsavoury corners of the Earth to which I would despatch people who do: Beirut for those who do it by accident, West Thurrock for persistent offenders and Basrah for those who see nothing wrong with it.Out there it would be a case of calling your AK47-pock-marked shack 'Olcote Babama'. This, for the uninitiated, stands for Our Little Corner Of The Earth's Been Annihilated By A Mig Again. And given half a chance, I'd be the pilot.It's all to do with taking the art of personalisation to extremes. You can make your house more comfortable by fitting central heating and thick carpets or you can distinguish it from those up the road by painting it day-glo lime green. These moves are fine; they make life more comfortable, more aesthetically pleasing. More of a statement.But do tell, what are the advantages of changing your address from 22 Laburnum Drive to Sunny View, Laburnum Drive? Do you really think you should command any more respect from people who are writing to you simply because Sunny View might conjure up the mental picture of a Baronial Hall perched atop a cowslip-thronged hillside meadow, whereas number 22 sounds like it's just part of a vast neo-Georgian estate?It's the same with motor cars. Speaking personally, I don't much care for after market add-ons like spoilers and floodlights and rear speakers the size of Wales but if such paraphernalia are your bag, then go ahead.Similarly, if it riles you to spy 2000 other guys driving around in identical Ford Sapphires every day, go on, get the spray can out and give it one of those paint jobs which hippies lavish on their ageing Bedford vans.But, for heaven's sake, stop there. Do not invest in a personalised number plate or else the next fully operational jet fighter that whistles toward your frolicking gnomes will have me at the helm and my fingers on the Sidewinder release mechanism.I do not understand what appeal a cherished registration plate has unless it says something funny like DEV 1L, or ORG45M, or PEN15.I have spent, oh, it must be close on fifteen minutes now, desperately trying to think of one reason why I should spend many hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds just so those within the vicinity of my battered CRX would know my initials are shared with Mr Christ.If I were so intent on relaying this information to all and sundry, why couldn't I simply put up big notices in the windows? Or buy one of those electioneering loud hailers?I was once forced to spend a week behind the wheel of an FSO which sported a registration plate that said FSO5. This was more embarra.s.sing than the time when I spent an hour d.a.m.ning the dreadful Shake 'n' Vac advert on television only to discover I was sitting opposite the copywriter who'd written it.You see, FSO5 is probably worth well into four-figure territory and I could see the drivers of neighbouring cars howling with Pythonesque laughter at me, the buffoon they thought had spent so much on a number plate, he couldn't afford anything better than a Polonez.Worse are the idiots who spend a fortune on numbers like 316BMW for their BMW316s.We all know it's a 316 because the badge says so and anyway, had the buffoon not bought the number plate, he could probably have afforded a 325i.While I object in the strongest possible sense to those who simply buy their initials or those of their car and to h.e.l.l with what number comes in tandem, I have been amused in the past by various stories and sightings.There's the tale of a chap who lost a retina in World War II and now drives round in a car which bears the registration number, 1 EYE.Then there's a friend of Beloved, called Tammy, who has TAM1 69. I've been dying to meet her but, so far, various endeavours have ended with stern words and threats of no morning coffee for six weeks.According to the autonumerologist's bible, called Car Numbers, Jimmy Tarbuck owns COM1C but unless he drives a black Mini which is parked in a very seedy part of Fulham every night, I suspect an error has been made.Other celebrities to own cherished plates are Max Bygraves who, it is said, turned down a 30,000 offer from Mercedes Benz for MB1, Kevin Keegan with KK A1, Jimmy White with 1 CUE, Bernard Manning with BJM 1 and Petula Clarke with PET 1.Notice any similarity between these characters? Well I'll tell you. They are the staple diet of TV Times profiles and ITV quiz shows which have purple and orange backdrops, question masters in brown suits and lots of inane innuendo about bottoms.In short, they are working-cla.s.s heroes, the televisual nouveau riche, beloved by the kind who live in gaudy bungalows called Olcote.And don't think I've been through the book looking for people of this ilk. I searched in vain for mention of gentlemen like David Attenborough and Michael Palin but I fear they are not the sort to advertise their arrival.They are the sort who would invest in a cherished plate only if it were likely to shock or amuse. And there's plenty of scope. Michael Palin would, I'm sure, shy away from PAL 1N but if you offered him TAX1 or TUR8O, I'm sure he'd take the plunge. I know I would.The thing is that when the registration system changed from suffixes to prefixes in 1983, the chances of any more cherished plates emerging from the DVLC evaporated.In a bid to cut the pressure on staff who were forever being pestered by dealers for decent combinations, they no longer issue plates bearing any number less than 21. So it's tough luck to all you Dianas and Nigels out there who were waiting with bated breath.However, it is still possible to buy numbers that were issued when civil servants didn't mind spending a few minutes each day acting the role of their job t.i.tle.If you wish to buy a registration number, it must be from a vehicle that is currently taxed or has been taxed within the past six months.No longer is it any good to find some old wreck in a farmyard with the plate you've always wanted. And anyway, in 1983, the Swansea computer erased all knowledge of any car which hadn't been taxed within the previous two years.Providing, however, the donor and recipient vehicles meet with the approval of those inscrutable chappies at your local vehicle-licensing office, all you have to do is obtain a V317 form from your LVLO, fill it in, hand it, along with the two requisite tax discs and registration doc.u.ments to the inscrutable chappie, give him 80 and head off back to your little corner of the earth.Alternatively, you can ring up one of the endless cherished-number-plate dealers in the Sunday Times' Look Business Personal Finance News, section 24, and tell him what you're after.They keep details of what's on offer and who wants what and are normally able to help, providing your request isn't too parochial.However, if you wish to take the plunge, I should do so in a hurry because when I win the football pools, I shall buy up every number I consider tasteless and throw them into the Marianas Trench.Then, I shall bomb all numbered houses with names and if there's anything left in the kitty, I will erect kart tracks on every cricket pitch in Christendom.

Big BikesI do not hold with the decision to hold Britain's premiere motor race at Silverstone for five years on the trot, because it is a very boring circuit indeed, but at least if you're important, like me, you can camp out in the middle and run into nice people who say even nicer things, like why don't you come and have a spot of lunch?The big ha.s.sle is that if you wish to run into a lot of these people you must be in several places all at the same time.Which in turn means you have to forge expeditions that make Ranulph Fiennes's Transglobe jaunt look like a Sat.u.r.day cycle ride to the shops.The last time I spent a few days at Silverstone I had a motorcycle at my disposal which, in theory, is the ideal tool for the job but (and this may come as a surprise to those of you who know me as a devil-may-care kinda guy who thinks nothing of hanging upside down in stunt planes) I do not know how to ride things with two wheels.I had a go but after I'd engaged the clutch and applied full throttle, I found myself spinning round in a rather noisy circle.This, I learned later, was because I'd forgotten to release the front brake. I also learned that the onlookers would have been immensely impressed with the stunt had they not caught a glimpse of my countenance, which, instead of bearing a proud and c.o.c.ky grin, registered only abject terror.And that was the end of my brief encounter with motorcycles, which, I have decided, should be left to those with acne, no imagination and a penchant for wearing rubber clothes.Not being someone who readily goes back on his word, I found myself facing something of a dilemma as the Grand Prix weekend loomed ever ne