I own a copy of Autocar's 1992 Special Road Test Yearbook issue. And if you don't know why it's special, James May was the feature editor and got fired afterward for the hidden message he put in this particular issue. See, May was cool even BEFORE Top Gear.

If you watch enough top gear, you know these Easter eggs from their careers. Richard Hammond used to be normal, Jezza had bad hair and terrible suits, and James May was the features editor at Autocar.

I found out about this while going through their Wikipedia articles. It was one of the more interesting entries of the pre-Top Gear years. James May was bored, and decided to fiddle with the big letters you see on headings. An Opponaut or anyone knows with some manipulation, messages can be put in.

So James May put "So you think it's really good, yeah? You should try making the bloody thing up; it's a real pain in the arse." Something he would do in a boring, docile job.






I knew I had to get one. A slice of the May's fine work. So on eBay one day, I found it. Fucking cost 40 dollars for a magazine that would have cost me £1.25 at a newsstand at the local petrol station (if I lived in England). Plus, it was from Britain, not some person in Arkansas.

A slice of history of the age of the PreTopGearJezzaHampsterMay era.