While the slight embarrassment of being in a red car with white racing stripes never quite left me, I did really enjoy driving the Proton Satria Neo Sport, a nippy little number. It’s so easy to forget what’s on the outside when you’re having fun. Rather like my new hairdo. Feel great walking around in public, it’s just when I catch sight of myself that I recoil slightly.

However, there is a Lotus influence not only in the ride and handling but also in the design, which is perhaps why it was quite a struggle to actually get a drive in the Satria. My husband was adamant about the admiring glances the car received and refused to accept that perhaps people were just looking on in amazement at a very large, grown man driving a young man’s car with his head bent at a peculiar angle in order to fit in it. What work colleagues must have thought about his flattened hairstyle I dread to think.

But then I did begin to wonder as I saw a couple of guys, on different occasions, actually stop and take a better look at it. Perhaps it’s the lure of the Lotus badge, or maybe it’s actually rather a cool looking car? Even my 14 year-old, who doesn’t say much at the moment, did manage to exclaim “wicked” which I took to be quite a positive reaction and the most animated we’ve seen him in a long time.

But this is a sporty car, with contoured leather seats (exceptionally comfortable and stylish) leather two-tone steering wheel (which I loved, although others thought slightly garish, and went very well with my red-trimmed new TomTom start 2). It zooms around with its 16v “ComPro” engine with the Lotus-developed ride and handling very much in evidence in quicker roundabouts out of the City. There are great added touches, with a chrome central exhaust (surely every boys dream?), not to mention the 16″ alloys and steering wheel-mounted audio controls to impress the girls, electric windows and air-con for those steamy moments. And all for just under £11,000!

It’s fun to drive, practical for a small car and even has a decent-sized boot. It handles corners, windy roads and zooming around town with aplomb. On the open road however, I feel the engine and road noise would get slightly tiresome with as they’re more in evidence than I’d like, but maybe that’s the appeal to men of all ages who never really grow out of wanting to be boy-racers?

And the odd girl too…

Proton’s city nipper

I had confirmation of just how nippy this car was after being stopped by the police.

What an experience and one I feel able to share only because I think he stopped me out of sheer admiration for said nippiness rather than me being a danger on the road. I least that’s what I like to think…

It happened on a late night shopping trip into town in the run up to Christmas. All the lights were twinkling and we had had a jolly good look around without too much money leaving our purses, an achievement in itself. My passenger was of the nervous-in-cars variety, not being a driver herself. Me, being the considerate driver I am, tried to drive accordingly.

Driving in London is usually bumper-to-bumper gridlock, so even travelling at the speed-limit is a rare treat. Having left our fabulous parking space just north of Oxford Street, I set off and took advantage of the relatively empty roads and zipped round Portman Square without sparing the horses, but also without causing any alarm to my passenger. Brisk but legal.

Before we knew it, there was an area police car bearing down on us, lights flashing and siren blaring. It took us a couple of seconds to realise that we were its prey – surely not us two Mums in a Proton?

I pulled over with the most amazing thoughts going through my head, from the mundane ‘did I remember to switch on the headlights?’, to quite the ridiculous, ‘Proton have sent me a stolen car!’ We pulled over and wound down the window to be confronted by a very tall (and good looking) policeman in all his intimidating clobber.

‘You took that corner rather nippily – don’t you think?’ he growled. I couldn’t think at all at this stage as my heart was pounding so much. My passenger just giggled nervously. He questioned us at length, about the ownership of the car and why were driving it and them suddenly turned into a normal human being chatting away about the time of year.

I think he’d suddenly realised what he was up against! Two flustered middle-aged women who could barely speak. So off he went in his macho machine and off we went in our very “nippy” motor.

Perhaps there’s something to be said for gridlock after all?