Simon Mason wrote:
This morning in bed I was going through a scenario in my head where I
had been involved in a RTA with a motor vehicle. I realised that I do
not carry a pen and paper with me to exchange details etc and knew I had
no hope of remembering anything after years of abusing my old brain with
beer ;-)

I do however carry a minidisc player and have used it in the past to
record sounds through its mic in socket. I believe i-pods and some other
mp3 players have microphone input sockets.

Ah but wouldn't you have to carry a microphone around with you? Well no
- a loudspeaker is a microphone in reverse, so I plugged in the
earpieces into the mic-in socket and then recited my car reg number into
it.

The signal strength bar moved as I spoke and listening to the recording
I could make out every word. Then I realised that most people have
cameras on their mobile phones ( I don't have a phone) and could
photograph the details, so it wasn't such a good idea after all. :-/

You can't photograph something someone tells you, so perhaps the dictation
machine idea still has legs. Mind you, modern phones also have the
sound-recorder facility built in.