“Mokka!”

We took to shouting this Vauxhall brand-manager’s Costa-derived inspiration every time we spotted one the same as the one we’d been ‘gifted’ by the insurance company as an interim hire car. Paid for, dear reader, by an insignificant sum embedded within your very own insurance premium, so please accept our heartfelt thanks, as we drove around in it for almost six weeks while the ‘accident management company’ dealt with the complexities of consigning the Astra to a tip.

And indeed, the Mokka was a very pleasant vehicle in which to tazz around. Not quite as enjoyable as the Mazda 5 which we had for a similar period while some git in Luton drove around in our supposedly ‘written off’ Volvo, incurring numerous parking fines and several toll-free trips through the Dartford Tunnel. Even impudently sporting our duplicated personalised number-plates, it took all of two weeks and the frustrating tedium of numerous letters to various parking authorities before the fraudulent use of our ‘written off’ vehicle simply ceased. No explanations, no feedback, no rationale, no justification, nothing. Except a pile of paperwork and a lot of hours, which I’ve also written off.

And those, esteemed reader, you’ll be pleased to know, haven’t cost you a penny on your over-inflated, automatically-renewable annual insurance premium.