The question
Excluding property, what is the most expensive thing you have ever bought?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
The Guardian's weekly The Q&A repeatedly uses this standing prompt, with minor contractions and word-order variation.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
A Cessna Golden Eagle eight-seater aircraft. I flew it across the Atlantic both ways and did two US tours and two European tours in it. I finally sold it and got a job as an airline pilot in which I was paid to fly, rather than the other way round.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 July 2024 source ↗
A walk-on part for my mum in Les Misérables. It was in a charity auction. She always dreamed of being in a West End show.
My microphone cost me six grand.
A case of Chateau Margaux 59.
A caravan. I was brought up going on caravan holidays – but we quickly realised that a double-axle caravan was too much of a commitment and sold it.
I once threw up on the shoes of one of my vocal heroes, the Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan. He sent me home in a taxi with a towel.
“What makes you think you are so special?”
Runway 27R at Heathrow.
I’ve been asleep at the wheel on the M11, had an engine fire over the Atlantic in a light aircraft, driven unprotected through an enemy firing zone to do a gig in wartime Sarajevo – the list goes on and on. But I did have stage 3 throat cancer and was cured by some fantastic UK medics.
Procrastination.
Well, I’m not too happy about snakes. I also hate sand. It’s very inconvenient.
Courtney Pine, Tegan Quin, Ronnie Wood, Melanie Chisholm, Suzi Quatro, Robbie Williams
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