I try and come up with something to say. I scour my mind for stories about wholesale prices, but I've got nothing. I decide to forget about it.

'Pick Your Own!' he says, suddenly.

'Eh?'

'A sign back there. "Pick Your Own", it said. Probably strawberries.'

I nod at him, my mouth slightly agape. I've got nothing about picking your own, either. Why have I got nothing about wholesale prices or picking your own? Surely everybody has stories about those two things? We drive on.

'Or raspberries,' he says, sticking his bottom lip out a bit. 'Could be raspberries?

Oh, God, it's me, I think. I am being a bad passenger. I must be. Why else is this man resorting to simply reading out signs that he sees? I've got to come up with something to get the conversation going. I am the passenger. The non-driver. It is my responsibility.

I have a brainwave.

'Have you seen those new space vegetables?' I say. 'It's been in the news. Chinese scientists sent a load of seeds up into space and when they came back down they'd been genetically mutated so that they're now super-seeds. A man grew a melon that was eight feet long! Imagine if they did that to raspberries'. You could sit inside one and eat your way out! You could use it as a sleeping bag or as a giant red igloo! And then have it for breakfast! It's biodegradable and nutritious!'

I am proud of my conversational gambit. It was relevant, topical, and posed an important and necessary question - imagine eating your way out of a raspberry! Also, it touched upon issues of global warming, healthy eating and new advances in camping technology. I am not a bad passenger any more. I am an interesting and wise one.

The man casts me a sideways glance.

'You can already get big melons,' he says.

I sink back into my seat. I have to rethink my strategy. I am boring this man to death.

'Pat's Burgers,' he says, as we pass a filthy van in a layby. 'Cup of tea, 50p.'

I try and look interested, but there is nothing interesting about this whatsoever. Why is he just reading out signs?

'I like tea,' I try.

The man just nods, and whistles a bit.

Maybe it's not me, I think. Maybe it's him. Maybe he's the boring one. Who just reads out signs they see? A boring person, that's who. I came up with the perfectly good topic of eating your way out of a raspberry and it was rebuffed. Rebuffed in favour of saying 'Pat's Burgers' and telling me how much tea was in a place I'd never see again.