Who are these characters I hear you ask? Well, they are acquaintances of mine and they all sit in my car every Friday night.

We park up and we sit there like we sat there the week before and the week before that. Sometimes it's a laugh and sometimes it isn't but that doesn't stop us sitting there.

So this month I pay homage to the Parkies. Wherever you may be wherever you are here's looking at you kid. And may the glory of the car hold you all in good stead.

I try to think what people did when they didn't have a car to park in and sit there till all hours of the night. It must have been a hard life.

When a friend turned seventeen and brought his dads car out for the first time we all knew this love affair was going to last forever. He couldn't drive it anywhere because his dad checked the mileage. It wouldn't have made any difference anyway because nobody had any money for petrol.

And when he had a brand spanking new car of his own what did we do. Go and sit in it outside the nearest park. Oh yes we drove around hoping we might get lucky. But that never happened. Because at the end of the day we are sad but proud of it.

There was a time when sitting in a car meant something. It doesn't any more I'm afraid because as soon as one of the brothers gets married he gets the magic call. Usually at about 11pm from the Misses asking where he is. He puts the volume on his phone really low and pretends it's an old girlfriend or his cousin. Ten minutes later he fakes a heart attack and has to get dropped off.

There are also very few spots left to park. The local park is teeming in the evening and the back alleys don't have the appeal they used to.

Every time I park on the end of the street I get mistaken for one of three people. Either I'm spying on a girl I've got a crush on, I'm a smack dealer or a secret boozer.

It's really good when the weather's fine so you don't have to keep the engine running. But that doesn't stop one smart geezer from switching the engine off completely in the middle of winter. He tries to save petrol you see.

Four is the best number. Two is too camp and three is a bit rough for the guy in the back. Four is just right. The problem is when we get five. The three guys at the back get all uptight. Maybe because there is touching going on or maybe it gets too cramped. I had seven in a car once and the engine off when it was snowing outside. That was not a good night.

Getting picked up at night is the best. From then on it's just a big disappointment. Chunky gets the odd laugh when he lets one off, Clydebank is too busy smoking and Spanky has got issues. So you return home and pretend you had a great time. Happy Parking brothers.