Unlucky For Some

I've never been that superstitious, but when buying our luxury motor from a trader in Essex, I commented to Bob that the date was the 13th - possibly not the best day to do this. "It'll be fine," he said "I got married on Friday 13th". That put my mind at rest - after all, his marriage is going very well. However, my ease was short lived, as the car is going not so well.

We paid (as per the rules) a princely sum of £500 for our 1990 Jaguar Sovereign. Not a bad deal considering it has 6 months MOT, electric everything, and a 3.6 litre straight-six engine. However, less than 2 hours after handing over the cash I applied the brakes at a roundabout to be met with a bang and a grinding/ratttling sound. I limped back to Bob's, at which point I heard the tinkle of metal on tarmac. Bob retrieved one of our brake pads from the road (basically a scorching hot piece of metal), and we now await the verdict from the garage as to how much this will damage our budget (and our egos).

Rich, meanwhile, is sitting pretty on his £499 BMW 735i - a big, black behemoth of a car which, so far, seems to exhibit no signs of breaking. Germany 1 England 0.