OUTSIDE THE NORMAL FRAME OF REFERENCE
I set out with a straightforward shopping list in April 2013 when I decided to stop dreaming and actually buy an SZ-generation car.
It had to be a Rolls-Royce and it had to have picnic tables. My wife added just one caveat: “You can choose any car you like… as long as it’s black.” And that’s how I came to be driving home in a dark blue Bentley with no picnic tables.
It wasn’t exactly love at first sight. A cold snap meant that my first glimpse of the car was as an anonymous lump under several inches of snow on the dealer’s forecourt. The Bentley had to be dug out before anything could be seen and all attempts to start the engine were thwarted by a flat battery. However, I could see that the Champagne leather interior was absolutely unmarked, complemented by highly-figured burr walnut. The eye-wateringly expensive Avon CR227 255/55R17s were virtually unworn, and the Black Sapphire coachwork was as close to black as blue paint can get. Overlooking the small detail that the recorded mileage of 71,211 (supported by the service history) was 10,000 higher than the figure mentioned in the advertisement, I returned the following week for a test
