It's 7.35am and the smartphone buzzes. It's not the wake-up alarm but an alert that traffic is peaking on my route to work.
Based on the car-to-car communication - and the number of vehicles in my area the system predicts will join the throng in the next 15 minutes - it's time to hit the road if I hope to make work on time.
The car starts its warm-up routine as I finish the coffee: pre-heating the fluids for the internal combustion engine and, depending on the temperature, activating the air-conditioning system to my preferred temperature.
Next door the daughter's electro-mobile is inert. She stays overnight every three or four days; ostensibly to visit the olds, in reality to tap into my power and keep her car fully “fuelled''. Gotta love kids.
She's also still in the shower, knowing she can access the express lane reserved for automated cars. There are only a few trial routes at the moment but I - along with most non-Gen Y motorists who refuse to cede control of the steering wheel - already resent paying for her to motor on bitumen I bought but can't use. And I taught her to drive, too
In the car I pocket the phone and slide the tablet into the dash. The newspaper display is replaced by my favourite apps and the article I was reading on the way out is now read out to me through the premium speaker package.
“Music,'' I tell the car and it responds by resuming the soundtrack I was listening to when I pulled up yesterday. I've ignored the overnight email deluge until now and brush away - literally - the first few, where the sender and subject matter are shown on the heads-up display.
The fourth, from the boss, can't be waved off; the system pauses to ensure I want it, then drops the music to background ambience and narrates the latest missive. On the highway the traffic is a steady 40km/h.
The car-to-car network and infrastructure embedded in the road advises the left lane is closed 5km ahead as a result of an accident - an older car lacking the emergency braking software fitted to modern vehicles has rear-ended another. One kay out from the crash the system beeps ever more stridently until I move out of the affected lane.
It's then I - briefly - see Ms Duff breezing past in the far right lane at 130km/h, oblivious of the drivers as she chats with her friend. It's a requirement of the express lane that all the seats be occupied (that's why I'm paying for a two-seat coupe) to minimise congestion. Welcome to the future. It's just five years from now.
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