How do you get around?
In a first class train carriage, whenever I can. In the smoking compartment.
So when did this begin? When the money was rolling in?
I used to go first class with everything when I had a lot of money. When I came out of prison I went in the lowest class everywhere. I kept that up until I got a laptop. It's really good to write in first class compartments.
Is that because there's so much stimulation whizzing by outside?
It just happens to work out. It's the only form of transport in which I can actually do something. I can't read in a car. I can't write longhand on the train. They've stopped us using laptops on most flights now.
Totalitarians aren't they. Aren't the people you sit next to in first class pretty awful though?
Well, you don't get the highfalutin ones in smoking. It's usually just some little leper colony at the end of the carriage - men with pipes and yellow hair meet kids skinning up and bond with each other.
Dare I ask the idiot's question, what are you smoking Howard?
Usually marijuana, sometimes hash.
How much does it cost - the ticket, I mean.
It's a lot more expensive than going by car. But in Britain, if you arrange it on weekends, you can get an upgrade to first class for a fiver.
Is the food any better?
No, the food's shite. Except in Europe.
Are the sandwiches easier to open?
They open them for you.
So, have you ever driven a car then?
Lots and lots. I like driving cars, but you can't do anything else at the same time. I bought a red Mercedes 280 estate. That was in the early 80s. It was pictured in many observation reports.
What attraction does that have. It's a bit of a vulgar 80s red Freudian displacement nightmare, isn't it?
Yes. All of those things.
What kind of driver were you?
Good.
What about road rage?
No. I have absolutely no idea what that must feel like.
