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Steve Orme

Trinity Mirror Regionals Driving Force columnist STEVE ORME gives his take on everything from the car with the biggest cup holders (Ford Edge, 20oz) to congestion charges and how your money is spent getting toads safely across the road. It's motoring but not as you know it ...

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July 2007 Archives

Opportunity knocks

Posted by Steve Orme on July 31, 2007 9:55 AM

We have all, I am sure, sat in front of a mean winter fire, clutching small beer and regretting not taking an opportunity that would have seen us cruising the Med in our own yacht instead of cruising to work in a 1985 Sierra.
Patio heaters are a bus that’s leaving the station and I’m not on it.
Since the cigarette ban, pubs and clubs have bought them by the thousand to keep smokers warm in the chill night air.
Thus the health fascists and government control freaks have, at a stroke, cranked up the levels of CO2 emissions, while earning millions for heater makers. Well done but obviously no cigar.
I would like to make my fortune from a wake up and smell the coffee spray. A kind of stimulant that stops people behaving like sheep and believing everything , no matter how contradictory or blatantly stupid (the tsunami was caused by global warming) they are told by ‘experts.’
Here’s one to watch out for. Increased mosquito activity is a sign of global warming.
No. Mozzies are not attracted by heat, they like carbon dioxide. If there are suddenly many more it will be down to the increase in patio heaters which they find especially attractive.
Save the whale, smoke indoors.

Just say no

Posted by Steve Orme on July 30, 2007 10:01 AM

From now until the kids go back to school don’t be alarmed to see drivers stood at the roadside on one leg. Or poking an eye out trying to touch the end of their own nose. It’s just a drugs test.
We can recreate black holes and live a life supported by technology our parents once watched in Flash Gordon films but it seems the only way to tell if a motorist is impaired by a bit of blow or the painkillers their GP suggested is by getting him to run through morris dancing for beginners on the grass verge.
Nottinghamshire Chief Constable Steve Green said this was ‘a crack down’. Er, yes, not the best choice of words to avoid giggles.
This is, frankly, amazing. Is there really no technology based roadside test? Even an average lawyer is going to have a field day in court defending a man accused of failing to adequately impersonate a seagull or accurately pick his own nose.

Music does not sooth the savage breast

Posted by Steve Orme on July 26, 2007 10:30 AM

It’s official, we are bonkers.
More than five million British drivers confess to a bit of extra marital road rage. Giving it large on The Queen’s Highway.
The Courtesy on the Road report reveals that 16% of motorists admit to initiating a road rage incident. Interestingly, nearly two thirds (65%) of drivers said they felt that music influenced their behaviour whilst driving. The same number believed that listening to certain types of music could cause road rage.
This is called the Mika effect and if ever see him driving along my road I’ll get out of the car and.....
images.jpghakkinen
This isn't him, this is Mika Hakkinen
images.jpgmicainibiza
This is the one. Look, his flies are undone

Ram raid on Halfords

Posted by Steve Orme on July 25, 2007 2:52 PM

This week I am feeling my age. It’s your fault, Vauxhall.
I’m driving a Corsa VXR and every under-21 year old is staring in rapt admiration for its body styling and street cred.
I, on the other hand, think it looks like it has been involved in a ram raid at Halfords.
At a time when most manufacturers hide their hot hatches under a cloak of, if not anonymity, then slight understatement, the Corsa mimics a little girl who has found mummy’s makeup.
It has driven through Bitz R Us and come out with every spoiler, air dam, silver plastic knick-knack and even a sooo tomorrow triangular tail pipe stuck to it.
All of which matters not a jot. I love it.The VXR is the stuff of ruptured spleens. It is hard-headed bare-knuckled adult driving that should only be sold in licensed sex shops. If you love motors this is why. It is, without a doubt, the sort of car that has the ox-cart tendency asking you to justify your very existence. Tell them to sod off.
Here’s the thing, though. With the irony of the old football adage that just when you learn to play the game your legs go, the VXR demands a high level of maturity. No, really, it does.
If you have mates you call Kenno, Johno and Ricado you will love the way Vauxhall has made the car in the image of a hooker’s fancy dress outfit. On the other hand if you do come from the generation that calls its sons Keanu you probably won’t be able to afford one. Not the £16,000 price, the insurance.
images.jpgcorsa%20outside
Flirt in a skirt
images.jpgcorsaarse
Yes,your bum looks big in this
images.jpgcorsainside
Inside the Corsa's knicker draw
images.jpgcorsa%20brilliantseats
Brilliant seats


Don't worry this warning's not for you

Posted by Steve Orme on July 24, 2007 5:20 PM

Last Wednesday there were several met office reports that, because of cold air over the eastern Pacific, we would be in for more than an egg cup of rain.
On Thursday BBC Radio Two issued several warnings that such was the danger of severe weather it might be a good idea to make only really essential journeys.
On Friday the heavens opened and half of Britain gleefully set off to get stuck on the M5.
It beggars belief. Especially the whingers and gobs on sticks complaining that not enough had been done by everybody from the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Kennel Club.
In comparison to many other European countries we have girlie weather. But we drive like clowns in fog, ice and light breezes, go ill prepared for the worst and arrive in deep mid winter without once having checked our lights.
Worst of all we are all so self important that travel warnings are clearly for someone else with a less critical role to play in world affairs.
I fully expect that should the four minute warning ever go roads will be blocked by people heading for the supermarket to beat the cockroaches to the beans.
rainsign
Geddit?

Hey man, what a cool car

Posted by Steve Orme on July 20, 2007 10:20 AM

Remember you saw it here first. After my exclusive, well ish, report last week on the dangers of being mown down by a grass covered car, Ford has unveiled plans to build models out of hemp matting.
Defra, Ford and Hempcore Ltd will put £500,000 into developing the first totally recyclable Rangoon car.
Hemp-based materials will replace panels and be moulded into shape.
Not that this is totally new to Ford. Henry Ford grew cannabis as part of experiments into bio-fuels in the 1930s.
Obviously Golden Gordon, Laird of Glen Britain, will be keen to lay down the law. They may be hemp cars but it will be illegal to smoke them.
canabisposter
A government poster from 2015 warns of the next social evil after road rage

Youth is wasted on the young

Posted by Steve Orme on July 19, 2007 10:38 AM

Just a quickie. I caught a story on the news this morning that MPs are wondering if one way to reduce road casualty figures among young drivers is to up the minimum driving age to 18.
Er, no. This will just reduce the casualty figures among drivers aged 17.
There was a good reason, before MPs saw potential votes from easily swayed, immature new voters, that the age of majority was 21. That’s an age when you might just have a head full of something other than Tweetie Pie and lager.
Not that I suggest that should be the driving age. Good lord no, that would only increase bicycle abuse among the young leading to sexual health problems in later life.
The truth is that before a certain age we take more chances. We do not miraculously come to our senses at 18. Otherwise nobody aged 19 would ever get married.
Sorry to say there is no real answer to this one. In our cast iron-breeked, fireproof, spring-heeled teens we take chances. It is the nature of the beast and a great boon to the auto body repair industry.
toribirthday.jpg
The girls couldn't understand why they struggled to get a lift wearing the latest teenage fashions

Turn left at the fork in the road

Posted by Steve Orme on July 18, 2007 10:33 AM

There was a lot to be said for institutions such as going to school, listening, geography, numbers and even the Boy Scouts.
Navigational and map reading abilities are generally so poor many drivers can get lost in their own underwear.
But who cares when there is the modern miracle of sat nav, available through Halfords, Motor World and often from some pikey looking bloke down the pub.
Tom Tom and the like have revolutionised navigation and car crime at a stroke.
However, the human race continually comes up with more inventive ways to prove itself daft as sausage cake. Apparently accidents are being caused by drivers staring hard at their navigator screens before manoeuvres because the can’t relate what’s on the map to the reality of the junction in front of them.
Oh please, suspend my stockings with silly string.
Right, well wherever there is a plant pot there is someone with a plant to put in it. Researchers at Manchester Metropolitan University have developed a video system that plays footage of up and coming junctions on screen so the driver recognises them.
This will clearly enable thickos to work out where they are going. Unless, of course, they are holding the navigator unit upside down.

a-fork-in-the-road-by-theboutons-com.jpg
What a fork in the road looks like. Turn left here.

Skool bouy Engerlandish

Posted by Steve Orme on July 16, 2007 2:28 PM

AS THE school summer holidays approach, breakdown service Autonational Rescue is appealing for motorists to observe a ‘go slow’ which could save upto 70 deaths and 4000 injuries resulting from children being hit by cars each year - Autonational Rescue are keen to point out that these statistics can be achieved through motorists decreasing their normal driving speed by just one mile and hour.............
So, if you could understand that little lot you could save a life. You could also test your sub editing skills.
But Autonational Rescue’s PR dept shouldn’t feel self conscious. Oh hell, yes they should, here’s another one!
MOTORISTS are being told that the countries roads quite simply create a picture of a ‘Blighted Britain’ with the traditional dropped crisp packets and chewing gum being joined by larger and more dangerous objects such as sofas, TVs, bathtubs and fridges; and even more incredibly abandoned cars at the side of main roads or in countryside lay-bys.
Hey?
MS_SCRAPE.jpg

Today I feel less of a man

Posted by Steve Orme on July 13, 2007 4:36 PM

I’m off for a few days. Mainly to get over the frilly-knickered pansy-pants paintwork of the Peugeot 207CC I have been driving. This car is only short of a huge door sticker saying no men beyond this point. It’s been a week long girly sleep over with extra marshmallow.
I felt less heterosexually oppressed being harassed by men from Manchester in that pink lycra Micra last year. At least that was for charity.
If you want a sub £15,000 convertible and love shopping at New Look this is the one for you.
It’s not very fast but the vanity mirror is brilliant for make-up repairs and there are lots of creamy corners for crunchy vegetables. If this car was a snack it would be Philadelphia cream cheese with a side order of Muller Fruit Corner and an Actimel chaser.
It only has a 1.6-litre engine so is very gentle but you can get a turbo GT version if you play ladies’ rugby. It also does 43.5mpg so won’t hurt the polar bears.
If you love shoes you will love the 207CC. It's cute. Like Toby Maguire. Or Ant and Dec.
It is also a very good, well equipped car in a cutthroat niche that includes the Vauxhall Corset CC.
On the other hand, should your son come home in one of these, thrash him soundly.
207cc
This does not do the colour justice but you see how well it would go with one of those funky 1960s style smocks. Not available in male.

How green is my valet parking? Lexus 600h facts

Posted by Steve Orme on July 12, 2007 3:48 PM

Hybrids, the cars not the fast-growing tomato plants, are becoming an emotive subject.
The problem, as with a lot of bandwagons, is that all sorts of people climb on to demonstrate just how right-on they are.
Once they are right-on enough it’s back to the first class Jumbo seat and stretch limo.
You see, it’s pious to be seen in a Prius
However, titter yee not and careful with the knockers because surely it is a sacrifice and one half for the likes of Diaz, DiCaprio and Hoffman to be driven around in what has to be said is a very ordinary, even slightly nasty, green badge of a car. We’ll leave Jenny Agutter out of this because after living in a railway tunnel it must have felt like the lap of luxury.
That is not to say that all hybrids are so blighted. The Lexus RX400h is a very good crossover 4x4 and there are hours of fun to be had watching the electronic drive schematic. Umm, yummy.
But this sort of acceptable low-emission transport comes at a cost. In this case £35k minimum.
Being a little planet pixie is about to get even more agreeable. And even more expensive.
In October the LS600h hits the road, or rather whispers onto it with the delicacy of fairy burps. It is a massively secure car, all wheel drive, V8 bloody fast and a hybrid.
Two versions will be on sale, the LS and the LS long which is essentially a limo. With a television for watching your own latest releases.
Great news for Geoff Goldblum, Harrison Ford, Billy Crystal and Calista Flockhart.
The cost? £81,400
A least you avoid the congestion charge.
imagesCA5XJI3T.jpgflowerpower
Flower power
imagesCAUEK1R2.jpggrasscar
The grass car brings a whole new meaning to mowing someone down

And now something about a car

Posted by Steve Orme on July 11, 2007 10:03 AM

Today's cars come with a vast array of toys and extras to relieve boredom.
Many happy hours can be spent, for instance, trying to find the button that switches off the traffic information. Or stopping the search from hunting down obscure radio stations that think Russel Brand is a comedian.
Elsewhere there is air suspension to play with, reversing cameras, computers that could have flown Apollo 13 without the need for Tom Hanks and, even though I have never met anyone who uses it, cruise control.
And if you get too distracted there’s a Citroen that wakes dozy drivers by assaulting them in the bottom with a pneumatic hammer.
But not in the Mazda MX5 roadster.
The MX5 takes harks back to good, old fashioned, two seater, missionary position motoring. Pass the cloth cap, Alice.
The original 1300cc MX5 was a phenomenon. It became the world’s best selling sports car and took us back to the days of MG Midgets and Spitfires without the premature death element.
It was also a tiny bit limp wristed, inclined to come over all hairdresser and fluffy.
Not the roadster. It’s been to the gym, flared its arches and developed some interesting bulges
Beneath the skirts there is a choice of six-speed two-litre or five-speed 1.8i. Neither are frighteningly fast but both are fun. Do you remember fun?
The 1800cc takes 9.6 seconds to reach 60mph but it is rock solid, suitably raucous open topped motoring. There is, you should be told no room inside for anything except two seats.
Oh yes, the top. How fast can you get it up? So simple and so quick, manual release and two button operation. Brilliant.
The Roadster does have some equipment. There’s a computer to tell you what century you are driving in, traction control and electric windows. But there’s no need for Citroen style buttock battering.You will feel the cats eyes if you cross them. All of them.
The thing is the technology is hidden behind good, solid engineering and non-digital styling that many techno-nerd drivers would see as poor value at £19,500.
Those who know will see it as simple driving pleasure.
imagesCAOWTCEL.jpgmaz
How quickly can you get it up?

Baa baa bus sheep

Posted by Steve Orme on July 10, 2007 9:13 AM

Latest crazy green fuel idea is to run a fleet of buses on sheep’s urine. As if public transport doesn’t smell bad enough already.
Besides the obvious problem of positioning the sheep over the filler cap, or indeed calling them from the bottom pasture in the first place, there is the impact on sheepdog resources to consider.
Historically someone has not done their homework here. If putting a racy tiger in your tank didn’t survive the 1970s, how do they expect something as dull and woolly as a fat ruminant to catch on?
I can see the RSPCA getting on their high horse too. Clearly it is wrong to take the p*** out of dumb animals.
images.jpgsheep
Formula One sheep racing will promote the new fuel

Singing in the rain

Posted by Steve Orme on July 9, 2007 1:43 PM

ON Saturday a load of Mercedes limo driven pop and rock artists, at least one ageing out of tune folkie and St Al Gore of Re-invent took to stages world wide and crooned on about their own green credentials.
At home millions with nothing better to do, tuned in and burned out on a wholly pointless and unnecessary energy consumption spike.
What is it makes popular musicians think that by climbing an a stage and singing to a soaking, muddy crowd they will solve anything at all? Remember Live Aid? Seen any less African poverty recently?
What did amuse me was the way some six year old kids had been allowed to make the New York stage’s backdrop of badly painted tyres. About time cyclists admitted their guilt.
The folkie? Well come on, have you ever seen anything as out of its time and pointless as Melissa Etheridge?

One light, two lights, three lights...ooh my little finger

Posted by Steve Orme on July 6, 2007 11:46 AM

There are many things wrong with Britain today but possibly the most worrying is how, as a nation, we appear to be programmed to be thick.
Education, education, education seems to have evolved into dumb, dumb, dumb.
Three Brits die each year testing nine volt batteries on their tongues, 150 people a year are hurt because they have not removed all the pins from a new shirt and five bone-heads a year present at A&E with Scalextric related injuries.
Now, please, think carefully about this. How, with your clothes on, can you possibly injure yourself playing with an electric car?
Two ounces of plastic is hardly likely to do much damage if it runs over your foot and I can’t really see a lot of danger having a bit of a Hamilton with your nine-year-old on a bottle and a half of red.
I suppose you could lie down on the track side and fly a dinky little GTO up your own nostrils or get involved in a bit of road rage with a tall German but generally there can’t be a much safer way to spend a wet afternoon.
On the other hand 30 people have died in the last ten years watering their Christmas tree. With the fairy lights switched on.
Oh, look at that, David Cameron, HM Leader of the Opposition, has just walked through the office. I would have liked to have asked him what the Conservative Party’s position is on naked cyclists. If indeed the party has ever positioned itself on such a person. But he’s gone and all I can tell you is that he is very tall.
Back Monday with a Peugeot 207CC and some intimate bruising off a train set.

scale3
Now that looks like it could be dangerous
scale2

A spectator runs to put the kettle on. He could trip and fall

Tasty treat

Posted by Steve Orme on July 4, 2007 11:56 AM

I saw a terrible smash last night, a Skoda Fabia had run into a wall. Marzipan and chocolate all over the road.