I became a trucker by default. It was the 1980s and I was working three jobs just to pay the mortgage and keep my family going. I was a milkman, a taxi driver and a barman and I was tired and bored. We were living in a town with a ferry link to France and so at the evenings in the pub I got to know the truckers who drove back and forward from the Continent. I’d listen to their stories and think what fun it sounded. I saved up, passed my test, bought an old DAF tractor unit, hired a trailer and began my life on the road. Back then, it was just as weird and fun as I imagined it would be. On my very first trip, I met a one-legged prostitute who worked the service area at Auxerre and a Scottish driver who introduced me to the Congolese cocktail lumumba (brandy and chocolate milk).