Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads...

I’ve been wondering lately just when it became socially acceptable – the norm even – for people who aren’t farmers, veterinary surgeons or military personnel to drive 4x4 vehicles on England’s roads?  The standard turn of phrase nowadays seems to be, ‘We’ve got children, so we really needed a bigger car’.  I’m sorry? Just how many children do these school-run Jackie O’ wannabes have running laps of the back seat?  14?  I’m surprised they manage to have just a couple, let alone the hoards that must be required to fill the behemoth-on-wheels that’s blocking exit/entry slip-roads every morning.  Surely they don’t have any time? Judging by their appearance, they obviously spend a fair amount of each day applying lashings of make-up (some of it with a trowel, by the looks of it) and adorning themselves with more gold jewellery than Eric B & Rakim.  Then there’s the fact that they must have to spend time removing all of this muck & bling come the end of the day?  Assuming, that is, they’re not all from the town of Stepford...

Earlier this week, as I and the rest of the morning commuter-cum-battery hens listlessly crawled along the A329, my enervated gaze settled upon a truly hilarious diamond-shaped sign suckered to the rear window of the shiny 4x4 in front of me.  You know the sort of thing, ‘Princess on Board’ or ‘Dad’s Taxi’ – the kind of witty comedic prose that causes your sides to split with laughter as you exclaim, ‘Good Lord! Why – just why – haven’t I got one of those in my vehicle?! I must get one immediately – they really are so droll!’ Incidentally, perhaps the worst of these plastic proclamations is the one that reads ‘Babe on Board’.  Because – and really, are we that surprised? – there never is a ‘babe’ behind the wheel; you’re lucky if it’s someone with all of their own tobacco-stained teeth most of the time.

This particular laminated gem read, ‘Mummy, are we there yet?’ in a font obviously designed to mimic that of a (probably spoilt) child (no doubt called ‘Tamara’, ‘Tequila’ or ‘Paris’) using crayons.  Well, sweetheart, no… we’re not there yet.  We’re not even near.  This is partly because of your Mummy straddling two lanes and impeding the flow of traffic.  Perhaps if Mummy were to take you off-road in her shiny BMW Audi Cruiser QX5 then you – and the rest of us who drive vehicles designed for on-roading – would get there a little bit quicker.  Go on, live a little!  At the very least you’d have the excitement of getting (gasp!) a bit of dirt on that white-elephant of a vehicle that you’re currently strapped into.  You might even get to inadvertently swallow a crayon or two.  Now there’s an incentive for you.

I grew up in a family of five.  As my parents, along with my two younger brothers and I, travelled the length and breadth of Britain – trundling along from one Little Chef to the next - in a succession of cars over the years, we never once thought, ‘ooh, you know I wish we had a 4x4!’  No.  We were happy in our little Triumph Dolomite with its stylish rusty roof-rack and over-excitable windscreen wipers that used to wag deliriously (if a little ineffectually) in the driving rain.  More than comfortable in the Morris Minor Traveller with cracked red-leather interior; smug in the knowledge that here was a car that wouldn’t just rust like all the other boring cars on the road.

No.  Here was a car that, thanks to the stylish exterior, could just as easily suffer from woodworm as well...