Yes... yes... you've written well and turgidly about Norfolk! Not turgidly, exactly.
Well, it was just, that time, the first - well, not the first time I went there, but I can remember, not that long ago, driving along a main road, filled up with petrol and I gave the bloke in the cashpoint my credit card... he just put it in the till! "No, no... no, no... you're supposed to swipe it..."
This is the home of Lotus! It's an advanced, sophisticated county!
Now, you see, that was a bad example.
Well, there were the - all right, but it's a... it's a mysterious county. There are - you go through a beautiful Old World village with a sort of mullion-windowed rectory with ivy over it and the squire's house and a beautiful old church, and then a sign saying, "HOT RODDING".
The reason the Porsche, I think, is the best car is, you know when you drive some cars, you get a, a sense that the car is smiling, when you're driving?
What on Earth are you talking about?
[on the Bentley Continental GT]
There's no way the aristocracy is going to buy this car. I mean, these days they have to burn their children just to stay warm, and all their furniture's held together by the moths that ate it.
[...]
It's like doing 5000 miles an hour in Douglas Bader's sponge bag.
[criticising the armrests]
They are completely pointless. Speaking of which: this button here allows you to adjust the hardness of the suspension, like so. Why do you need that? Why would you want to make your Bentley more uncomfortable? It really is as useful as a snooze button on a smoke alarm.
[...]
The old four-door Arnage is a symphony of pomp and circumstance, hope and glory - absolute power corrupting absolutely. Oh, it isn't very good, but there's such a sense of occasion when you drive it. This is the other way round: brilliant, sensationally fast, handles beautifully, and it'll almost certainly be reliable. But it leaves you feeling... just a little bit cold.
[on the Jaguar R-D6 concept car]
But the bit I really like is the inside. Have a look at this. Now have a look at that black leather and all those shiny bits, and those red lights down in the footwell. Now clearly a Jaguar designer got completely lashed at a vodka bar and thought, [in drunken voice] "Uhh, I'll make it look like thish then." So obviously there'll be a bouncer on the door, telling you you can't come in 'cause you've got trainers on.
It's a gorgeous-looking thing, I think it's fab. But here's the thing I don't get about Jaguar concept cars. Two years ago, about then, they showed us XK180, and there it is, that was to show us what Jaguars of the future will look like. But then last year, they did the R Coupé, to show us what Jaguars of the future will look like. And now they're back again with this, to show us what Jaguars of the future will look like.
Now look, Jaguar. You have made your point. Just make the car.
[interviewing Rob Brydon]
You have had the most wretched car history of anyone I've ever, ever met. We start off, where were we, radio DJ...
RRob
[DJ voice] BBC Radio Wales. Good morning!
You bought yourself a Volkswagen Polo.
Brand new! Things going well. Your next car... is a third-hand Vauxhall Carlton. What in God's name possessed you to do that?
RRob
You know, my dad came across it, you know, it was reasonably priced... it was a big, brown Vauxhall Carlton -
RRob
Wait, let me finish. It was a big brown Vauxhall Carlton, the inside was a kind of creamy sort of biscuit colour, it was velour, the seats. It was a nice car, it got me from A to B, that was not the worst of my cars.
What, you're trying to say the green Sierra you had was -
RRob
That was the worst, yes.
What possessed you to do that?
RRob
Um, my dad came across it, you know, it was a good price...
Did you branch out on your own for the 1992 Ford Escort?
RRob
Now! The 1992 Ford Escort, I thought, and I don't know anything about cars -
RRob
- was quite a sexy little car. I quite liked it, actually.
Have you ever actually watched Top Gear? 'Cause you might...
RRob
I've never seen a whole one, no. [Jeremy looks dismayed, audience applauds] It clashes with Heartbeat, OK, which goes against you.
I know! But I do make a special effort to watch Marion and Geoff. You should try to watch one all the way through. Because after the Escort... you're not going to believe this, ladies and gentlemen...
RRob
Oh, I know what you're going to say now, yeah. OK.
... a Mitsubishi Carisma. Why on Earth did you buy one of those?
RRob
Well, my dad came across it... [audience laughs]
