Mr Morse

White male driver, 35-45 wearing shirt & tie. Couldn't see any LOC stickers in the windows

Upper Parliament Street, about 3pm Tues 12 April, just pulling in to park W reg Astral Black IS with red TRD emblem on the back.

Looks like a sick Vectra

As long as the air freshener is a genuine one with the CE logo it should be fine.

Think that Lexus have to fit the washers to comply with EU legislation. This'll be one of the few occasions where the EU has benifitted Mr Motorist then eh?

Boot capacity is the same - 400 litres The manual does not show different specs for the IS200 and IS300, only between the saloon and sport cross, so exterior and interior dimensions are the same

Just do the funny handshake, usually works donesn't it :winky: :winky:

I won't be taking my business to Nottingham again, so either Leicester, Stoke/Hanley or Sheffield next time

Folks, An interesting and informative editorial by David Smith of the Sunday Times about the recent hike in the oil price. I have worked in the upstream oil industry for almost 20 years now and have seen nothing like this. It is reality and is going to happen. Economic Outlook: David Smith: Why we aren’t skidding on sky-high oil prices "AT FIRST it was a curiosity. When oil prices rose above $30 a barrel before the invasion of Iraq two years ago, we knew they were following a familiar pattern. Sure enough, once the statues of Saddam Hussein began tumbling, so did the oil price, dropping below $25 a barrel. But that did not last either. Rather than settling at a non-crisis level, and indeed within the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ target range of $22 to $28, the oil price began a fresh climb and hit $40 a barrel a year ago. That, you might have thought, was that. But it wasn’t. North Sea Brent hit the giddy heights of $50 a barrel last autumn, subsided a bit over the winter, but has been above $55, before dipping late last week. But prices could rise again. In an eye-catching report, Goldman Sachs suggests that oil prices could “super-spike” to more than $100 a barrel, with US crudes reaching $105 or more. This, it should be said, contains many ifs and buts, and is not intended to be the firm’s main forecast. But even its base case has Brent crude averaging $50-$55 a barrel this year and next, before coming down in 2007. These are big numbers and raise key questions. Why haven’t prices at this level caused more obvious economic distress? Oil has been associated with some of the great economic disasters of the past, so why not now? Will there be a big impact on growth, or inflation, or both? Oil plays a central role in the economy: petrol is perhaps the most visible price. People who could not tell you the cost of a loaf of bread would have a fair stab at the price per litre of unleaded. Unless you drive with your eyes closed, never sensible, petrol prices are hard to avoid. The same is true in America. Petrol is already above $3 a gallon.The threatened rise to $4 is a “nightmare scenario” the White House has been studying, not least because it looks as though it might come true. Alan Greenspan joined the fray a few days ago, referring to the lack of global refining capacity as “worrisome” but predicting that the “price frenzy” would subside. The Federal Reserve Board chairman also offered the fascinating statistic that 11% of the world’s energy consumption was by vehicles on US roads. Although Britain is also more car- dependent than ever, and the government admits it will miss its target for cutting carbon-dioxide emissions to 20% below 1990 levels by 2010, oil has less of an economic impact here than it had in the past. The “oil intensity” of gross domestic product in Britain has declined by more than 60% since 1970. This does not mean that oil demand has dropped by that much. The economy is much bigger, and so is our demand for oil. It does mean that the ratio of oil consumption to GDP has dropped. So, whereas in the past a 1% rise in GDP was associated with roughly a 1% rise in oil demand, now it means a 0.4% rise. Oil intensity has also dropped, though by slightly less, in other industrial countries. The reasons are familiar. Industry in general, and heavy industry in particular, has been in retreat, replaced by a less energy-intensive service sector. Energy efficiency has improved; in the past quarter of a century average new-car fuel consumption has fallen by 25%. It does not mean, emphatically, that high oil prices are an economic non-event. But it does mean we should think about them differently. Higher oil prices push up inflation, and the extent to which this becomes a problem depends on so-called second-round effects; the extent to which they are reflected in higher wages, for example. Rises in oil prices also reduce growth, particularly in a world where most firms (except the oil companies) find it hard to pass on cost increases. This reduces profits, investment and employment. Last year the International Energy Agency, together with economists from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Monetary Fund, carried out simulations on the effect of a sustained $10 rise in the price of oil, from $25 to $35 a barrel. It suggested that industrial countries’ GDP would be reduced by 0.4% in the first year and by a further 0.4% in the second. Consumer prices would be 0.5% higher in the first year and 0.6% in the second. Applying this to the $30-a-barrel rise we have seen, assuming that it sticks, would hit economic growth by 1.2% a year for two years, and push prices up by 1.5% to 2%. In a low-inflation world that would be a big hit. If oil rose to $100 a barrel and stayed there for any length of time, a global recession and much higher inflation — stagflation — would be what the models predict. Why, with oil well established in the $50-plus range, are we not seeing many of these effects so far? The models could be wrong, although the IEA stressed that its approach was conservative. It may be too soon. We do not yet know whether $50 will stick, let alone that the super-spike to $100 feared by Goldman Sachs will come to pass. Perhaps, too, policymakers have become more sensible. In the past, higher oil prices would have had central bankers quickly responding with interest-rate rises, thereby exacerbating the impact on growth. Both the Bank of England and European Central Bank left interest rates unchanged last week. They recognise that dearer oil is a brake on growth. The last thing the economy needs is a heavy foot on that brake."

Saw an unmarked silver Skoda Octavia estate in Nottm today with the blues and two going. Really good looking motor with dark tints front & rear. The lightshow was amazing!

Looks nice ...... gonna get mine done soon ...... I hope your a resident, what with parking there !! ← Did you also notice the new (green coloured) boot spoiler I also had fitted recently? Looks uncannily like a wheelie bin don't you think?

Being proactive I'd say

Exactly - but no one will take the plunge for 21st October because the French will start throwing their toys out of the pram :winky:

There are a bunch of public holidays this time of year - Easter, May Day, Spring Bank holiday... Should be October 21st - Trafalgar Day 2005 is the 200th anniversary of the death of the World's greatest naval commander and victory over the combined French and Spanish fleets.

Had my fronts done today - 50% tint which is the lightest they do, slightly lighter than the rears: Linky £60 from Tint-R Nottingham

Happy Birthday Mr Grumpy :D

I wouldn't ***** on a chav if it was on fire

In North Cyprus, members of the public can actually stop cars for traffic offences, and detain them untill a police officer comes along. The member of the public then relay the facts, and presto :D ← Technically that could be done here too couldn't it, as that essentially describes citizen's arrest (although if I am not mistaken you also need a witness) ← Scarface put me wrong here, but most "common" RT offences are still non-arrestable offences and therefore the "arrested" person could sue for damages against the member of the public who pinched them? What's the legal history of Joe Public pinching Mr Motorist for such things?

Steep hills - in East Angular?

My old lady looks at it this way: He's looking at that website again = he wants to spend more money on that bloody car She ain't far from the truth.....

I'm on for it

You have a lot more choice with manifolds for the IS200 in the UK, as it's not sold in the US. Mr ProLex and Mr Altezza to name a couple. I haven't come across anything available in the UK for the IS300

Are you doing one for the IS300?

it will need modifying to fit a right hand drive car, im a little scepticle that the header alone can give 15.5hp, but proof of the pudding and all that ← I checked with them already, they said OK for RHD. Fargo has same on his IS300 and said it fitted no problem, unlike some of the other US brands

I'm planning on getting one of these XERD when I go to Houston later this year. Dynoed at 15.5 bhp increase