Tom – as a reader since July (yes, that was the reason) and as someone who lives in your patch (Stratford), please stick to the cars as the chances of me spotting you in a wagon are much slimmer!. I would like to add that although I have been a “lurker” rather than a commentator, you, Brian (of Brian’s Brief Encounters) and a handful of others have become required reading every day (or several times a day when at work). Your humour (as dark and as black as I like) coupled with your writing style are good enough that the book deal is going to be very interesting and is something that I am looking forward to. Yes, this may appear to be very sycophantic but please keep up the posts irrespective of where or what you are driving – like some of the other comments, I think that you probably prefer being out on your own rather than being part of a crew but I can only comment on what I have read here. Suffice to say – having followed all the pay related posts as well as all the maternitaxis I now have a different impression of the work that you do compared to six months ago. Please don’t let one job get you down; I spent two years working for both NATO and the UN in Sarajevo in ‘96/97 and know that occasionally something bad happens which makes you question what you are doing but it is the little things that go right that add up to outweigh the big things that don’t.