Rank bad taste I call it

YEARS AGO, when a London taxi driver refused to take me past Hammersmith on the grounds that his grandmother lived in the opposite direction, I began my first flirtation with minicabs, most of whom can honestly put their hands on their steering wheels and say: "We try harder".
Although my youthful and loyal affair with the London taxi has, as a result, long since cooled, we still remain good friends. I can frequently be seen, on pay days at any rate, bowling hither and thither in those shiny black cabs that are as much part of the scene as Westminster Bridge or Buckingham Palace. Now a travesty of taste has happened. How can I put it to those of you who have not been to London recently? The door panels of these ugly but elegant, loveable automobiles are beginning to appear with brash, gaudily coloured advertisements.
They go past emitting silent shrieks of pain. Anything can happen now.
I was invited to lunch last week at the palatial RAC Club. I approached it from the Piccadilly side, fearful to go down the Mall (in a mini) lest I see a plumed Household Cavalryman bearing a banner advertising strip revue at the Whitehall.