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Whoever designed Catatonia's singles sleeves in the late 1990s must have known about that one, somehow.

Yup, there was one of them in with a load of lethally sharp broken Dinkys and Lesney King Size in my primary school classroom - it vaguely annoyed me, though I couldn't be sure why. Never seen the Tom & Jerry prototype before - possibly it made sense as they already had the casting and there were already a couple of licenced character vehicles featuring the cat 'n' mouse in the Juniors range. I had this earlier version of 'Jerry's Banger', for a short while anyway. I also had this half-assed 'Wacky Races' effort when I was a kid - apparently it's not all that common, though probably not really valuable.

I fitted a pair to my '95 Speed Triple, made a big difference. Laborious to rebuild though!

Nothing huge to report (don’t speak so soon…) just replacing the pollen filter on the Focus, well worth it as the old one was clarted in crap, but what a cunt of a job. Then it started a mild misfire as you slow down, thinking coil but one of the wires had come loose where I’d previously crimped it years ago, 2 minutes with the crimpers and it was running like dream sir. Total spend including filter £4.71.

That’s lovely - on the BBS alloys it’s really really up there on the list of cars I’d love to have.

Had a really good day today. Got Universal Credit approved so that's my safety net for 12 months (bit of a surprise, since I've never claimed I get the slightly less arduous 'new business' version as a self employed person) as well as info on business and art courses that are available to me as a mature student along with grants I had no idea I could apply for to help with costs. This was tempered somewhat by coming back to find I had a parking ticket, the job centre hasn't got a car park and I was told I'd be good for an hour on a neighbouring street that's single-yellowed.. I got ticketed at some point during the 45 minutes I was in for my appointment. It's a reflection on my state of mind that the prospect of a surprise £35 bill didn't make me that angry, just a bit disappointed. Then went over to the art centre and got some excellent help and advice there on artist networking opportunities, gallery opportunities and an insight into just how active the local art scene is. Also got to see what sort of thing the art centre promotes and quickly realised it's a very broad church with their featured artist doing abstract sculptures in materials you might consider to be rubbish (I loved them, if I had space there was one I would have taken home), another artist doing miniature portraits, and a shop full of samples of local artists work from wargaming miniatures to ceramics to jewellery to glass items. My stuff is very different to what was there but then what was there was very different to everything that was there too so that's pretty neat. There's local studio space I can hire that's not exhorbitantly expensive, a poetry night that is apparently both good and good for networking, and generally just a shitload of stuff that's made me feel rejuvenated about my job. Having access to an actual meatspace art community really helps and something I've not had for above a decade. Scunthorpe continues to treat me well in ways I was never expecting and that light at the end of the tunnel is looking a bit more like the exit than an oncoming train today.

Looks like!

Today's job is currently to empty the big unit of my large machines and we have the most temperamental forklift imaginable hence we've had to jump start it and tow it about with the car!

Yeah we're into all that shenanigans, can easily work to a hand drawing like also to save a couple of quid moving cars, mind we like having stuff like it down here!

Would need a panel van for those I think! 😆

Just a snapshot from the local 2CV group on Sunday, our regular monthly breakfast meet before we set out for Drive it Day. With bonus Ancient Austin.

I stood on the frames a few times to get on the roof and it flexed the door skin a smidge but wasn't enough to be concerning, he's on about using it for sleeping bags only

The Mustang and I think the Porsche 968 came later on, I’ve never seen one in the flesh. I’m not even sure they were retailed in the U.K.

First proper girlfriend had a pre-facelift Nova GTE (I think, certainly a sporting one) it was silver with brown tartan seats this would have been back in 1999/2000 so they weren't so rare back then. A few years later another girlfriend had a pre-facelift Skoda Felicia in black. It was nicknamed Curly as the number plate was P***UBE, sadly it was written off crashing into a taxi after we had been to Meadowhall for the day 😞

Last lass I was with had a bright yellow base model Ka when I met her, and a mk1 MX5 when it ended. Her minimum speed everywhere was 40 and I’d seen three figures in the Ka, it was entertaining* when she drove.

When I met the current partner i had a 3 1/2 Sport

Loving the stories on this thread. Some of you have partner shiters and some not. The late Mrs_Boom had a 1989 Corolla in white when we met. Although she had given it to her previous husband when she split with him. It was more use to him than her as she worked in That London and was terrified of driving. She had a (very minor) bump in said Corolla a few years before while putting a cassette into the tape player. She never drove again. To coax her back into a car, I bought her a 2004 New Beetle which she never drove either (my neighbour has it now). Odd how fear can overtake and rule someone. The Corolla was a nice steer (I borrowed it when the ex husband went into hospital for a bit) although it had been owned by a Chinese takeaway before, and the interior stank of fish! (Well, that was the reason I was for told for the smell anyway). Eventually it became too frilly, and had some sort of air blockage making it run silly rich. It got carted round to the local garage who practically folded it up and had it ready for cubing in about 30 minutes. The Mrs was furious, glad I wasn’t to blame for that one!

Remember Corgi 859 Mr. McHenry's Trike As a boy I had one of these. Zebedee would raise out of the rear box by turning the knob. It also came with a leaflet and a pull cord No? Ok, well... There was a protype made for a Tom & Jerry variation Jerry would raise with an ice cream, stolen from an entrepreneurial Tom.

Told you VW SDi engines are absolute dogshit

These arrived yesterday. Nice and shiny. MOT booked for next Tuesday.

It wasn't licencing problems that cancelled the Corgi Dan Dare releases. It was the cancelling of the entire show... A proposed television series to be shown on ITV with actor James Fox (or Gareth Hunt) set to take on the role of Dan Dare, while apparently Rodney Bewes would play Digby. Canned due to lack of finance during the shake-up at ITV, that ended ATV. Storyboards, artwork and models were produced and studio time was booked - during a strike that took months to resolve. More info here https://downthetubes.net/british-comics-reference/british-comic-characters-and-strips-profiled/british-comic-characters-profiled-dan-dare/the-lost-dan-dare-tv-series/ Van Cleemput saved this one too, the Dan Dare flying car from the 1981 catalogue Last sold in 2014 for £5000 This document was 'Discovered in the office of Marcel Van Cleemput' which gives an indication that licencing perhaps wasn't going to be a problem There was also this contraption, auctioned in 2020 for £2100, which was a little over its top estimate of £60... Which was later released by Corgi in 2000 as the Royal Mail MCII vehicle Who's got one of those then?

The current Mrs Martc had a mk1 FIAT Uno, bASe model in solid black, formerly owned by some hire car company and originally registered in that London. It never missed a beat. At the time I had a Lada Samara. Talking of which the previous girlfriend had a dark brown Lada 1800 with vinyl roof.