Jalopnik Guide To Meeting Your Boss's Boss In Petrolhead Style

When in a city known for its extreme public displays of supercars, be extra wary when heading into a coffeehouse. You will come to regret what you'll miss while inside.

Here I am in London, walking its myriad streets and turning my head to the occasional air raid rumble of a TVR Tuscan at full throttle, and I meet the boss of my boss Ray Wert, Nick Denton, publisher of this fine motoring magazine, on the High Street in Hampstead Village. We go into Maison Blanc for an espresso. Bad idea.

It will only become apparent an hour later that we should have waited for an outside table to free up. As we chat about all manner of things I will not mention here, a preep-preep-preep in my pocket indicates an incoming message, which I leave for later checking. Half an hour later, we finish our coffees and I leave Nick to head home with his father. Here is the message, which I now check:

A Maison Blanc előtt épp most ment el egy GT40.

It's from my friend Máté, an incredible treasure chest of local petrolhead information, and I have a vague notion that his Hungarian will not need translating.

Although in retrospect, those Jurassic Park-style ripples on my not particularly good double espresso observed midpoint were no doubt caused by the GT40's 7-liter V8 rearranging matter along the High Street.

What a city. And what a comically unlucky way to time a meeting.

Photo Credit: Máté Petrány