Arrived home from interview in Milton Keynes with Tony the gorgeous, muscular urban housecleaner in the back of the car and no trousers.

Under normal circumstances, I might have been pleased with the above state of affairs but these were brought about not by extra marital activity but recent changeable weather.

Had been woken in morning by sunshine blazing through the window, ignored the prophet of doom, in the form of a sleepy Thomas warning it would rain later, and decided to make the most of the November warmth by ironing pale linen trousers and deciding to wear them with flip-flops.

After dropping rug rats off at various institutions, all dressed in unseasonal flimsy clothing, I set off up M23 to interview couple living in tiny Milton Keynes shoebox with four children, for piece was writing about people stuck on first rung of property ladder, as rising prices put bigger properties firmly out of reach.

By the time I'd reached Warninglid, the sun had disappeared and with it the light. In its place was one vast steely rain cloud, which duly dispersed its contents around the M25 and its environs.

Fortunately, it let up enough for me to make the tiny dash from special parking space outside Keynsian couple's shoebox to their front door without getting completely soaked.

Having been shown bunk beds - fitted into places you would never think of putting bunk beds - and told how a slightly bigger box would set them back another 50 grand, I thanked them and said goodbye, only to discover the path, along which I had made the tiny dash, was now a river.

The air was now thick with 6in sheets of rain and, even though I only had about 25 yards to go before reaching car, I was going to get soaked.

I did and therefore faced drive home, wearing slippery flip flops and completely drenched trousers. Already cold and shivery and not wanting to spend hour plus drive sitting in pool of water, I decided to remove trousers, hang them over back of passenger seat, turn on hot air blower and hope by the time I got home they would be dry enough to put on for dash from car to house.

The rain continued but I was cosy with hot air blowing on bare legs. And trousers were only semi-damp when I stopped at traffic lights about three sets of traffic lights before I reached home.

It was then I heard banging on the window and looked out to see Tony, trying to shield himself from rain with newspaper and gesturing to let me in the car and, presumably, give him a lift wherever he was going.

Had I been fully and elegantly dressed, I would have jumped at chance to give gorgeous Tony lift anywhere but in trouserless state I would have preferred to let him walk.

However, if I drove on and left him standing in rain, he was unlikely ever to speak to me again. Fortunately, car still contained a relic from another era, that is summer, in form of picnic rug.

So, after quickly stuffing damp trousers under passenger seat and draping rug over legs, I opened the back door and allowed Tony to squeeze in between various rug rat-sized car seats.

He was obviously not comfortable and would have preferred to sit in the front but I told him the seat belt for the passenger seat was broken and asked where he wanted to be dropped off.

"Thanks for the lift," he said, when I left him outside his home. "I would have got completely soaked if I had had to walk . . .

" ... and missed the chance of seeing you without your trousers on ... "