Contemporaries

Spent much of the day trailing round coachworks to get estimates for repair to my car, which my neighbour bumped into at the weekend. He'll be presented with a choice of four and will settle up rather than call upon insurers.

This suits me as I spent an hour or so on the phone yesterday speaking to a company I didn't know existed - they were not my insurerers, they use a repair company more familiar with Ferrari and Porsche than Volkswagon and who are situated 15 miles out of town - and haggling over whether or not I needed a 'replacement' car (which would not be a courtesy car but one hired by them on my behalf), and the unanswerable questions (what would be my daily mileage, is there another car I could use?) and complex conditions that would apply. This would include giving them my credit card number 'in case there is damage to said car on return'. What, give them carte blanche to invent a fault and debit me? Phooey to that! I only phoned for a claim form and ended up totally frazzled.

Anyway, at one of the coachworks I saw this beautiful old Austin 7 being inspected by these enthusiasts with a view to purchase. The owner told me that it was registered in 1935 and apart from the tyres, which had been replaced according to modern regulations, every single component is original, even the wiring loom which is particularly rare. In fact fewer than 10 of these vehicles remain in the world.

It wasn't so different from the old Morris 8 we had as I grew up, with running boards and trafficators and when 40 mph was 'whizzing'. It reminded me how much more comfortable motoring is nowadays. I think I'll stick with the Golf.