I married an engineer. As someone who read books like Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch (1970) while waiting for the school bus, it is perhaps a miracle that I married at all; but who could resist the charm of a first date to the Sutton Cheney Steam and Country Fair in rural Leicestershire? The honeymoon was four days in York. This included a full day in the National Railway Museum. On the way back we stopped off, mercifully only for the afternoon, at the Crich National Tramway Museum. Calling at a supermarket before getting home, I asked my husband to get whatever he fancied, meaning quite clearly for the evening meal. He returned with a £40 trolley-jack for the car and asked what was for supper. We survived a decade together thus, occasionally attending slightly more glamorous European events, such as the British Grand Prix and the Le Mans 24 Hours. I had by now discovered that part of Simon's agenda for our combined ‘bucket-list’ (of things to be accomplished before we die) was a visit to the Indianapolis circuit for the 500-mile event. So we went to the self-styled ‘motor-racing capital of the world’ for our tenth wedding anniversary in May 1996.