So I set off this morning, it was a lovely day and the car was purring up the motorway. I approached Slough and pulled off the motorway; finding a side road I pulled over to grab my directions, and having found they weren’t obviously in the top of the bag, two quick thoughts flitted through my head:
– Have you *really* forgotten the directions *and* the phone number of this house?
– What if my car doesn’t restart if I turn it off.
I’ve no idea what prompted the latter one, as she’s been good as gold. But, of course, both were true. Neither would Rebecca start, nor would the directions appear; no matter how hard I tried to convince the directions not to be on my sofa in the lounge.
After about 10 minutes of trying and covering myself in oil I decided to ditch it all and walk to the damn house. I could remember the street name, and Slough is not a big place. One A-Z later and a 4 mile walk ahead of me. 4 miles and a nice chat with a random person and I arrived outside chez hole. Now, things it didn’t say in the description (didn’t? Doesn’t): Needs modernisation. Would suit DIY enthusiast. Is a hole. All are true. But having got over the shock (and quite frankly, it was a shock), I managed to see potential past the hideous decor and avocado bathroom. Okay. A maybe then. Nice big garage.
So, I wandered back, and asked the estate agent to confirm that the house was not part of a chain. As I wandered back, and eventually located a retailer selling Spanners, such that I might attack the car with more vigour on my return, I was rung by one of the lenders from yesterday. They’d knocked 18,000 pounds off the amount they were willing to lend me. WTF?!
No, seriously. WTF. Don’t be doing that.
So, now down to one lender. Assuming they actually do agree to lend me the money.
The estate agent then decided to share that it was part of a chain, and they’d not bought a house to move into yet. So that house is essentially a big fat hoze’d no.
After buying a spanner, I made it back to the car, my good mood now evaporated completely; and spent a cheerful 20 minutes alternately attempting to fault find (with one spanner and a screw driver) and pushing the car to try to bump start it… by myself. Oh, and trying to start it on the handle. After another joyous period without success, I finally gave in and called the AA. He fiddled with the connectors and – the car started. We retried. It started. We retried several times, it continued to start. I hopped in Rebecca and headed home.
Only… after walking between 7 and 8 miles I was ‘quite tired’ and starting to feel a bit dozy, so I decided I would call in at my mums and have a coffee after all (it being just off the motorway). So I did. The car wouldn’t start. I spent another half hour, this time with 3 spanners and rather more vigour attacking the problem. Nothing. Nada. I give in and re-call the AA. After a cup of coffee and some arguing with my mum, I decide to go outside and see if they’ve arrived. It’s not easy to find my mums house, or it is, but people tend to miss it. On the spur of the moment I hopped in the car and… it started.
So I’ve come home. I’m now very tired, quite achy and I have to fix my car tomorrow morning so I can go and look at a house I’m a whole bundle of unenthused about tomorrow. Bah.
Feh, I nearly forgot. Arrrrr!
