Whatever the reason might be, I – 41 (and a half) year-old Homo sapiens, love toys.

Perhaps there’s some kind of retrospective replacement retail therapy going on, something which I cannot fix with a pair of pliers and a screwdriver, or maybe I’m just happy that my son and I can share a morning spent clicking lengths of Scalextric track together (around his younger brother, under the coffee table around the chair leg and over the train track of course).

As I sit in the kaleidoscope of light beaming through our south-facing window, Fireman Sam lies motionless, awaiting his own rescue after taking a high velocity hit from an airborne Finn McMissile. Percy must be bracing himself: he’s next into the Tokyo Spinout Super Cascade Crossover Trackset (and we’ve prepared him a launch Mr Lightyear himself would be proud of). The imagination can go just as beyond Buzz’s ultimate destiny. So much fun to be had, but you don’t always need toys to be this creative.

Let me paraphrase: sometimes you have to be creative because you can’t get the blinking toy out of the dastardly display case. Please note, I did not say ‘box’. Boxes are what toys used to come in. It was our pre-digital plug and play; our very own ‘rip-and-go’. Here I am now, reliving my past – sharing my son’s present – sharing his presents. But I’m struggling to prise a plastic object away from the very thing that attracted me to it – correction: my son to it.

Make no mistake, I can take the front of a Porsche 997 apart, rip out its windscreen and successfully put the car back together again with a shiny, brand new glass shield in place. Oh, I’m skilled. My Meccano spanner has been replaced with a full set of Chrome Vanadium wrenches. I’m a journeyman technician and my skills began by building blocks, looking up Lego; my ability to construct, deconstruct and reconstruct was ameliorated by assembling Airfix aeroplanes from complex kits of moulded plastic. I’m quite hands-on. I don’t need instructions (well, definitely not to start with). I’m a man’s man. But since when did we need tools to remove toys from cartons?

With my mechanical brain and entrepreneurial mindset, I’m currently working on the design of a tool that:

a)      Can deftly remove the subject toy from its display case within a tenth of the time it is currently taking;

b)      Can safely remove the subject toy from its display case within a tenth of the time it is currently taking without showing my child how not to use a pair of kitchen scissors.

c)       Can carefully remove the subject toy from its display case within a tenth of the time it is currently taking without showing my child how not to use a pair of kitchen scissors without damaging the toy, the kitchen scissors, me or my excited and impatient child.

A rare, but unmistakable, car is back on the road with a new windscreen.

But this windscreen is not rare, it’s obsolete! The glass and the tooling which helps shape it, were both fabricated from scratch to complete this restoration project and finally get the car back on the road.

Only three Adams Probe 16s were ever made; two are in Canada awaiting restoration and the third – the one used in cult movie Clockwork Orange – was bought by Bedfordshire-based car enthusiast and former organiser of the Marcos Owners club Colin Feyeraband.

“In its day, it was more expensive than an E-type” he said. “Even when I bought it as a restoration project in the late 80s it cost around £10,000!”

The first restorer returned the Probe to Colin as a body shell along with 12 boxes full of bits. In 2004 the car was also featured as a Top Gear ‘restoration rip-off’. Colin finally took it to another restorer who then completed the job however, the windscreen was damaged during the process.

The super-fast stolen sports car in which ‘Alex’ (Malcolm McDowell) and his gang of Droogs roared around the countryside, terrorising locals was quietly trailered into Pilkington AGR’s specialist factory which has been making classic windscreens for the aftermarket since the late 1950s, and still retains the vast majority of the tooling produced ’’in-house’’.

“It’s an extraordinary car,” said General Manager Peter Swann,  “and the spooky thing is that the original windscreen was made at this site!”.

“We can’t find the old tooling so we’ve had top start from scratch and that’s been quite a challenge. the screen that was in didn’t fit properly so we’ve had to make adjustments and the shape as a whole is unusual – almost as it’s upside down”.

Probe Interior

Goodwood Festival of Speed (30th June – 3rd July 2011) will be where the car makes its first public appearance. “After that it would be nice to take it other motoring festivals and special events,” said proud owner Colin.

“Can I pinch one of your fags?” We wouldn’t have minded if she was fit, or even close to being fit. But like throwing a bone to keep a potentially dangerous dog from getting too close to us, Mark nodded and let her help herself to one of his tailor-made. We waited for her to make for one of the exits before we dived back into our SA Gold ales, but she didn’t leave. She just stood there, and we didn’t want to be seen with her. “My best friend died today” she said, “she was 33 – can you believe it?” As it happens, we could, but it was neither the time nor the place to be telling her. “They found her in the shower”. Just how she died, or how she came to be in the shower is something we didn’t hang around to find out, not after the day we’d just had (although admittedly, neither of us had just had our best friend die in the shower that evening to be fair). How apt and ironic that the pub should be named, The Retreat.

If hard cheese was sold in supermarkets, I’d be having the ‘Buy One Get One Free’ deal; the buy one -organised trip to the fabulous Millennium Stadium to watch sheep shearers battle against sheep shaggers, boys’ weekend away and have a picnic on the way – get a disaster free deal.

Picnics are great and I love a varied spread from a hamper, preferably on a blanket, in a wide open space, under a hot sun, as the sound of Gypsy Kings echoes from across the lake in Kenwood Park. But a picnic -without the Pimms- on a train with a beer-guzzling barfly from Brisbane is two stops up from Upton Park on the District line.  And here’s the piquant twist: a picnic (without the Pimms with an ale-thirsty Aussie) on the wrong bleeding train.

Try buying two tickets -First Class- to Cardiff and subsequently missing that train. These would have been the first class seats upon which the picnic would have been a blast, perhaps whilst flicking over pages of Country Living as one decides whether to pop in a green olive (with garlic) slip in a black olive (on its own) or crunch on a mini bell pepper (stuffed with cream cheese). If only I had looked at the Paddington to Cardiff tickets to see how much bar time we could afford before departure. Frankly speaking I’d rather choke on a cracker, but that would never have happened as we also had Brie to spread over them – oh how the other passengers in coach D loved it when we ripped open that packet of pungent President.

After strolling into Paddington thinking we’ve got a leisurely hour to bury a tasty beverage before embarking on a four hour journey to watch the All Blacks whoop some Welsh backside, only to realise that the 1315 departure time was the return ticket from Cardiff Central. It was time to panic. But only for another 10 minutes or so (and an additional 70 English Pounds). Sheila said there’s another train in 15 minutes which she can get us on so we can get back to being on on our merry way without too much ado. Bang went the comfy seat in first class though, but at least we were still on time to see the Haka (from two near-the-front seats on the halfway line, right?). We had just averted a disaster and we were back on course. Or at least, so it seemed. The muffled voice of our train driver announced, ‘This train terminates at Swansea’ (funny how they can switch accents immediately after Bristol Parkway. Cardiff was the penultimate stop; we’d bought ourselves a few tinnies and our station was three hours away. Enough said.

As we approached the city of Cardiff, the people in our carriage resurrected themselves from their lazy slumber to reach for their coats, hats and scarves. We followed suit too, and to make sure I had the game tickets in my hand as we head for the stadium, I rested them in the seat pocket in front of me, neatly in an envelope. Gotta get myself together – we’ve got valuable time to make up! Coat on, hat on and rucksack down from the compartment. The train stopped and there was a cheer of excitement as everybody deftly made for the exit doors. This was going to be the first time I would be seeing the mighty All Blacks play, and to witness the Haka so close -almost within touching distance- was making me do my own version of the Maori war dance (only without the aggression). Getting out of the station took seconds and we had about 15 minutes to get ourselves into the stadium -preferably seated with a beer- before the national anthems started. Time to check which gate we should be looking for…

It was at that precise moment, my heart started to make its way up towards my mouth. Just as it passed where my tonsils used to be, it did a sharp U-turn to head towards my backside.

“You haven’t have you?” Mark didn’t need to ask me the most rhetorical question, ever.

Two near-the-front seats, on the halfway line… to see the All Blacks; the Haka, never mind the 70 quid each. I’d left the pair of them on the train. The train that was now well on it’s way to Swansea. I weighed up the chances of getting to Swansea in a cab, meeting the train, grabbing the tickets and making it back in time for kick-off. But unless the cab was a DeLorean DMC-12 driven by Marty ‘Nigel Mansell’ McFly, there was no way I’d even get past the cab stand in time. By now, Mark was blue in the face. Partly from the cold, but mainly from not breathing enough as he laughed himself to near death (I’m just thankful there were no showers close-by). With ten minutes ’til kickoff, we needed to think and act fast: “Ticket office – where’s the ticket office?” A mounted policeman pointed out where we would learn of our fate, “Sorry mate, we can’t re-issue those tickets. You’ll have to buy two new ones if you want to get in”.

If I had time to spare, I would have taken the taffy ticket tosser to task over his profiteering ways. Onwards and upwards into the concrete bowl to witness the Haka. So much for the ringside seats: we ended up behind one of the goals as the New Zealanders huddled together.. with their backs to us.  It’s a good job there were screens in the stadium.

Next time, I’m watching it on the telly.

If Phil and I were superheroes, many people wouldn’t take us very seriously. Well, I think my alter ego, Glassman could get a cameo in Batman Regurgitates II and similarly, Transmitter Man would probably get to play the baddie in The IT Crowd or something. Phil may not be a hero to some, but for many petrolheads, his cars are definitely super.

It was a Thursday afternoon when I met Phil back in 2006;  he called and asked for a quote to remove and refit the heated rear windscreen on his De Tomaso Longchamp (I have to admit that he may as well have said it was a Fatsomutsa Zapparelli for all I knew at the time, but hey – you live and learn). He wanted a new rubber fitted to the heated rear window so I went along, expecting to see some DIY kit car or something. “Oh! A De Tomaso!” I said (I didn’t say it to pretend, but the car looked familiar – perhaps it was that embellished look which featured so strongly in Carrozzeria Ghia -designed cars) but this comfortable coupe didn’t have much chrome. It had a mass of muscle,  a plenitude of panache (and a leaking rear window) all rolled into one shell and plonked onto four voluminous tyres.

We got chatting and Phil suggested that I come along to the Enfield Pageant to see some classic and vintage cars, but I think he was trying hard not look worried about what someone had said about removing windows that are no longer available. Another bit of stupid advice he was given was to ‘cut the rubber’ to remove the glass. After a brief explanation on why rubbers shouldn’t be cut and Fairy Liquid is not such a great idea when putting the window back in, Phil began to relax. “Have you been on Pistonheads?” he asked, furtively “if you haven’t, I think you’ll like it”. He went on to describe the dynamic devotees of this cyber-society and how there isn’t a windscreen specialist imparting his knowledge. “People are always asking stuff about windscreens and automotive glass” he added.  Frankly speaking, Phil was winning the talking competition at this stage. To be brutally honest, he’d lapped me several times by now – but in a good way – and it’s not so bad if you’re defeated by the eventual winner and Phil wins every time we speak. He’s one of those guys that knows stuff; he’s the kind of bloke that remembers all that stuff,  with dates.  I’m sure he won’t mind me saying this (must behave now ’cause I’ll be inviting him later) but he remembers stuff with dates and references,  names and all the kind of stuff that lesser people just wouldn’t retain. Inspiring stuff. The man is one of those ‘Let Me Google That For You’  information resources on his chosen subjects. I duly went along to have a nosey at this online community for petrolheads.

Within five minutes of seeing a thread about the daughter of a formerly fat, erstwhile Chancellor of the Exchequer ( he’s shed about two Cheryl Coles of weight since his days as a Tory politician) Glassman came into existence (although thinking back,  it was a misleading thread title and I was disappointed that after 47 pages of posts, nobody had put up the recipe for Nigella’s Tasty Buns).

Transmitter Man has since kept in touch and we’ve bumped into each other at a couple of hoons. The De Tomasso stayed at home on both occasions, but I was introduced to another roaring beast, the TVR 420 SEAC. I was more than happy to oblige when Phil called a few weeks later and asked if he could leave the ‘Wedge’ with me while he shot off on business – if only he’d told me that he  wouldn’t have minded if I took her for a spin. The thought did cross my mind though, but the noise that thing makes, I feared that he may hear the roar all the way over in Amsterdam. “The screen is knackered,” he said “it has a few little chips on it but the glass surface is so pitted, the slightest bit of sun and I can’t see out!”

So a new windscreen it would be. The full replacement in pictures can be seen here soon.

A blog? Blah, blah, blah…

It all seemed like balderdash to me and frankly speaking, I prefer to see the world through my own mince pies and not via some cached chunk of spam that’s been flung at one of my media devices.  But I’ve been converted;  I have seen the light; an epiphany or what alcoholics refer to as, a moment of clarity (only I don’t have a muffin and a cup of coffee to hand, but I do dig on swine).

Unlike Jules Winnfield, I haven’t decided to walk the earth and neither have I decided to quit and give up ‘the life’. But I do like the idea of walking from place-to-place; meeting people and getting into new adventures. No, I haven’t decided to beg for change, sleep in garbage bins,  eat what you throw away and generally be known as a bum…I’ll  just be Glasstec Paul – no more, no less.

“You have a blog”, said Simon Bunker: he’s the dude who managed to set this whole thing up in a totally cool and unique way which – I’m sure – has never been done before – ever. Now I know some of you aren’t very well and may already be trying to work out which one us is the effeminate one. It’s nothing of the sort (well, there was that one time we shared a muffin at the Ramada Hatfield, but our lips didn’t touch – and the general rule is, if there’s no contact, it’s not gay). As a matter of fact, he took my instructions in Yiddish despite, between us, we have a combined vocabulary of three words - in my favour of course. Within 24 hours, some bird by the name of Sarah McHarry (btw, not even spellchecker recognises that surname, so it can’t be real, not even in America) has  sent me an ebook. It looks like an interesting read and promises to help me build a blog, from scratch all by myself, even if I am a complete newbie. Hold on there sweetheart, you don’t just come waltzing into my inbox and start making assumptions that I, homosapien – one who tears up the assembly instructions for Ikea flat-pack furniture before I start – do not know what I am doing! I have enough of that from my own wifman at the moment, thank you very much. She says she’s hormonal; apparently her body is going through changes as she prepares to mother our second child. Who invented the hormone anyway? I want to have words with that person and see if they really meant to bring two syllables so dangerously close together.

If you haven’t already deduced, my name is Paul and my business is named Glasstec. For ease of reference, when combining the two, I will use Glassman which, was my preferred blog name / title / whatever the correct word is. Turns out, all the .coms and all the .co.uk domains have been taken by other people wishing to call themselves Glassman and this makes me feel very angry – about as furious as anyone would be if the name was used for an online portal for Depression Glass, Crystal Figurines and… Vaseline Glass? What I would do with a glass pitcher right now… Besides, like the time I presented myself as the ‘Glassman from Glasstec‘ to a room full of local businessmen (most of all whom were, as I found out later,  of Jewish extraction) when one of them approached me and wished me a happy Hanukkah and then launched into a very deftly spoken sentence in Yiddish. “I’m sorry, I have no idea what you just said,” I confessed, merley moments before he realised that I do not belong to any of the Jewish fraternities; just Glasstec Paul – no more, no less. But I wasn’t offended, not even a smidgen of how he would have felt if I suggested that we discuss the matter over a bacon buttie.

By the way, I’m not taking to Sarah McHarry’s ebook very well. After the ceremonial preamble to warm me up and get me excited about my new venture, she’s only thrown in, “OK, ready? Let’s rock and roll!” One can only hope this is not a sign of more ‘hoots’, ‘woots’ and ‘booyakashas’ to come. But, in stoic and true man fashion, I will stick to writing my blog. I might have a browse through Sarah’s guide though (when I finish, of course) just to see how well I did.

For the time being, I shall rely on my own logic to see what features I have at my disposal. Can anyone tell me how to change the font?