Of course, for the "grey pounders" who like to drive to Netto or for a nice carvery in the country on Sundays, the best thing of all is being able to drive other grey pounders wild with jealousy by cruising serenely in a Honda Civic.
Well, that image of the Civic as the must-have motor for the over-50s entering God's loading bay is about to be consigned to the crusher of history.
Because the new British-built five-door model about to come on the market is exciting, speedy and stylish. Forget One Foot In The Grave, think Sex And The City (but with Kelly Brook in the passenger seat, not Sarah Jessica Parker, please).
Which means that for the first time since I outgrew my pedal car at the age of six, at 48 I'm now officially eight years older than the average target market for the new Civic. I don't believe it!
Younger
Yeah, but I'm young at heart - aren't we all getting younger and younger these days? - and I know the difference between Converse and Skechers trainers and I can even sing the lyrics to I Predict A Riot by The Kaiser Chiefs. Sad that those wrinkles give the game away.
But, on the test drive out of Nice in the south of France, encased in such head-turning champagne-coloured metal, the missus and I couldn't have felt more rejuvenated if we'd had a course of Botox and adrenaline injections.
Even Elton John, who we passed through security with at the airport and who knows a thing or two about trying to look younger, would have been tempted to give the Civic a spin along his yellow brick road.
THE Civic, in the looks department, has had a facelift more radical than even Joan Rivers could imagine. Gone are the safe, conservative lines, to be replaced by a sleek, flowing wedge shape adorned with angular flashes in all the right places, headlamps with the sultry stare of Kate Moss and the muscular rear of a fighting bull.
If you like the Audi A3 you'll love this, but more so. Grief, it's even got an aerofoil over the rear windscreen.
So, whenever we parked in some Provencal village, every Pierre and Pasquale offered lascivious looks. Good job they didn't look too closely inside - they'd have ended up salivating over their baguettes.
Lightshow
On ignition, the dash, a series of concentric arches, flashes up a cool, blue lightshow, with the really important info - the speed - positioned right at the top in the biggest lettering.
The steering wheel, in leather and metal and armed with an array of controls from voice recognition to bluetooth switch, mirrors the sportiness of the 1.8 litre i-VTEC engine, while the bright metal pedals show they mean business.
Naturally, this being a Honda - who have set the environmental bar for all other makers to aspire to - it's still incredibly economical on the juice, especially when in sixth gear.
We could barely see the petrol gauge move as we spent a day switching from zooming down inviting straights to negotiating the tightest hairpin bends in Europe.
Neither did we have any worries about taking a vertical tour down a French cliff, as the Civic hugs the road like a passionate Gallic lover.
After such exhilaration, it almost seems churlish to point out that the Civic still does some of the boring, but essential things really well, so as not to alienate the older generation and family types completely.
Capacity
The boot, for instance - even though this Civic is slightly shorter than the last model - has more capacity.
There's more legroom and the back seats can fold away in two different directions, while the floor of the boot drops down to create even more space. Honda boasts about accommodating bikes with the wheels off, and I wouldn't like to argue. Other boring stuff is that this Civic is still extremely comfortable, especially with the suede upholstery (although the young guns will probably prefer the black leather version) and very, very reliable.
So as the sat-nav with a voice, not unlike Angelina Jolie's in Tomb Raider, tells you that you've got to guide your way through a muddy French ditch masquerading as a road and the wipers automatically come on to cope with a flash storm, you know you're going to make it through.
The new Civic range also includes a diesel 2.2, which is meant to be even better than the one we had. Honda's test driver, Antony Davidson, offered to take us for a spin in it, but in something as racy as the Civic, that would only accelerate the grey hair.
