h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You stay away from my (potential) new millstone ...erm, car.
Unless you aren't lloking at the same copy of the ironically named "practical classic" magazine

It is not yours I want - I am going for something unfeasibly old skool!

So how old skool are we going then Abi, a Morgan?

It could be an M3 beamer?
Or it could be "old skool teacher" i.e. an Austin Agro

I'd have thought she'd have a lot more style (and sense) than your second suggestion DJ.

Well it is a very early Mazda 323... No come back! Come back, it does have two redeeming qualities.

1) It has never not been housed in a garage and it is in showroom condition.

2) The genuine mileage is a drop dead 20,000 miles.

3) It is costing me £350

Somebody reserve me a Dusenburg (sp.?), with long fenders and white-walled tyres.

Meantime, I think I'll buy myself a feather boah (sp.?)...

Blimey that's a bit of a bargin there Abi. It certainly beats the fiesta I got for about that price.

My mum once had a 323, and she burnt the clutch out driving through deep sand in the back woods of Poland - the one you're buying isn't a goldy colour is it? Could be the same one.

*checks in a worried manner*

No! So you see Duncan I am not after your new millstone!

It could have been resprayed....check the colour under the carpets.

stop it, you mad, bad, scarey person or I will ring up and buy that car you are after!

This may sound a bit negative...but it isn't meant to be...:
The cheapest you can get a car for in this day and age is £1000. Anything with a lower purchase cost will cost the difference to get through its next MOT.
I bought a £700 landrover and it needed a new radiator and water pump one month later...£300. Then I bought a £300 Renault 5 and that neaded a new exhaust, brakes, wheel bearings and one of the front wheel arches had to be welded back together. OK, so it went for years and years thereafter, but the first MOT was still painful. Then my brother bought a £200 Ford escort van and that cost me £2000 to replace (it would have been cheaper to replace the brother, but what are you going to do).
Actually this all fall sdown 'cos I bought a £4000 GT6 and god alone knows how much that has cost since...and it still isn't working. I therefore disqualify myself from giving further advice...

Listen mate the bloke that is advising me on this purchase is a very prominent Dublin man.

(And no I don't mean you! )

Well the cost of my car actually was the cost of getting it through the MOT.

DJ (Spearcarrier) I think I know why your E-type is so cheap - it used to belong to my father. He bought it because he needed an open-top car to be filmed on television. It was his pride and the joy - the love of his life, but he had only had it 3 weeks before driving it (at great speed) under a lorry. My father walked away, but the car was a crumpled heap. Obviously some bright spark eventually put it back together again and is now looking for a 'quick' sale.

Good to see someone else whose life's work is accelerating the path of British cars from factory to scrap heap

I am somewhat bemused by the Government's reaction to the forthcoming fuel blockade - rather than dealing with an issue that has much support and is not going to go away, they are simply telling everyone to 'stock-up on fuel'. Apart from filling the tank of one's car, what exactly do they mean? I was always told that the transportation, handling and storage of petrol was highly risky and should not be undertaken without great care and certain precautions. Now the Government seems to advocating the mass storage of great qualtities of fuel everwhere possible without a second thought for the possible disasterous consequences.

Not at all - fuel should be stored in a very large green plastic container by the feed barn along with the more potent insecticides...don't you watch "Countryside Today"

The hauliers should stop complaining about getting a fair deal with regard to their European competitors...in Germany and France the road hauliers have to compete with a functioning rail network

During the last blockade, one chap was found to have 'stocked up' by filling a wheelie bin full of petrol and leaving it in his house. One for the Darwin Awards I think!