Vice Squad

A long drive to Norfolk and back this weekend presented the ideal opportunity to indulge in an array of in-car treats.


I first used to drive to Norfolk when my boyfriend (later Husband No. 1) was doing his PhD at UEA. I would travel from work in London on a Friday night, crawl out of the City, crawl up the M11, crawl up the horrific slow, narrow, interminable tree-lined A11. I was convinced I would die on that road, attempting to overtake yet another tractor on a blind bend. And all the while watching, watching the temperature gauge, just willing the car not to overheat.


My first car was red Austin 1100 selected with the assistance of Steroid Steve, the boyfriend of the moment (I was on the rebound, and he had an immaculately restored TR6).  Reverse gear had packed up, so it was very important never to take a wrong turn. Luckily I'm a good navigator so I was ok on that one. The radio and the heater had also packed up, and there was a little hole on the floor under the carpet where it had rusted through, so the carpets were soggy and smelled of pond-weed.


When I traded upmarket for a boyfriend, I also ended up with a better car.Husband No 1's mother sold me her white Honda Civic. It was a tough bargain (my father in law was a bank manager) and it had a Hondamatic gearbox. Driving always reminded me of pressing the electric treadle on my mum's sewing machine.  We got 110,000 miles out of that car, although the last 20,000 were very fraught.


Next came an Escort, bought from someone at work (the sly cow). It had an automatic choke, and starting it up in cold weather was as delicate an operation as micro-surgery. Don't turn it far enough, and nothing doing. Turn it a tiny fraction too far and the engine would flood and it would take ten minutes to clear it and try again.  The bodywork was a dark orange colour that most of us would call rust. That was fortunate as it hid a multitude of sins.


After a number of missed trains, meetings, films and so forth we bit the bullet and bought a better (more expensive...) car, the latest model Honda Civic. After all, the last one had done us proud, even though it felt like driving an overlocker. It was a smart navy blue, and he got custody of it when we got divorced. I got the cat, though.


I was by that time in charge of my own company car scheme, and for around nine years until the tax regime changed I had a series of ever more decent motors. A red MX-3, a big long-nosed Jag, a couple of Beemers, a Merc. After a series of Freelanders I'm back to a BMW again; and after a series of silver cars, I've gone back to an eye-catching shiny bright scarlet.


People who drive mediocre motors don't get it. They think that good cars just aren't worth the money: I used to think that too. But you never see people who have a nice car going back downmarket. Once you splash out, you realise that you were wrong all those years, and that you spend hours in the car every month, and that your journey is utterly transformed when you are listening to your favourite CD on a crisp, deep Blaupunkt stereo whilst you nip easily past all the caravans in smooth, swishing, swanky comfort.


So what are my in-car treats? One of my favourites, me being Little Miss Type-A and all, is to set my destination on the satnav, note the estimated arrival time and then try to beat it, through superior route selection and faster driving.  Another is to try and achieve the minimum possible fuel consumption (hurrah for my digital gadgets). But the best one is really, really bad. Why pick your nose or ring sex chat lines on the hands-free, when there's a more satisfying, more secret vice to be visited?

On journeys on my own, I sing. Not just a little bit of humming along now and again, I'm talking about full-on, know-all-the-words singing every single song on the CD. And the really bad part is, sometimes I'll choose CDs purely because they are really hard or funny or catchy to sing.  I like to be challenged by something too low (Right Said Fred, Crash Test Dummies, George Michael), an impossible vocal range (Hall & Oates, Eurythmics) or something sung beautifully but as dripping in cheesiness as an apres-ski fondue. For this, one can't of course surpass The Carpenters. 


My favourite Carpenters songs to sing along to are:

•  Yesterday Once More
• For All We Know
• We've Only Just Begun
• Mr Postman

It doesn't mean I'm compromising my taste in music. On no. You know how discerning I am. It's not about listening: it's about singing.  And it's one of the things I like to do when there's no-one else there. Some of the other things might compromise my driving.