Thursday, November 30, 2006

Aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrgggghhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A day of cleaning planned today. Elder son, his fiancee and her parents are coming down this weekend and I want to create a good impression.

I rise, pull on scruffy trousers and holey jumper and set to work.

Younger Son has his regular wound dressing at the surgery at 10.45 and, as Betty's gears aren't engaging, he asks me if I will take him in Alfie. I think about washing my face or brushing my hair and teeth but decide that as I'm only going to be in the car, I don't need to bother.

I park in the surgery car park and wait for YS. He returns to the car, I switch on engine and 'uuuuuurrrr'. YS and I look at each other. I try again. 'uuu.'

I walk to payphone a short distance away and call rescue. They say someone should be with us within the hour.

YS and I play I Spy but he is much better at it than me so I refuse to play. We discuss Harry Potter and YS's theories for what will happen in Book 7. We have both always been convinced that Snape is not a baddie.

One and a half hours later I call rescue again.

It seems the breakdown van came but couldn't find us so went away again. The lad on the phone is defensive. 'They tried both car parks. And you didn't give us a mobile number to contact you on.'

The car park we are in is only big enough for 8 cars. If the breakdown man had come in we would have seen him; he would have seen us.

Lad on phone seems to think that it was my fault. He will call them again but this is another call-out and we will have to wait - up to an hour.

Half an hour later a breakdown van arrives. He is not the one sent before; he found us without any difficulty.

He is very nice and gets us started. He says the battery has plenty of charge and if it happens again we might have a faulty battery. I think, 'If it happens again, I might divorce Husband.' For no real reason other than I have to take out my frustration on someone.

We get home nearly three hours after we left.

That's three hours of lost cleaning time.

On the plus side, while we were out an Amazon parcel, containing a birthday present I had ordered for Husband, arrived and was left in the toilet. I didn't think it would get here on time so it's not all bad.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Batteries will be the end of all of us someday.

Liz Hinds said...

I often think mine is getting flat.

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

What a frustrating day! I hope it wasn't very cold while you were waiting!

Anonymous said...

Liz, it's just God's way of saying, "This is not your day to clean." If anyone comments on the condition of the house, say it was God's will not to clean it. (I don't think God minds being blamed for that kind of silly stuff - just the George Bush kind of egomaniacal junk.)

And of course Snape isn't a (too) baddie. ;-)

Anonymous said...

Having 3 hours less cleaning time meant you got just as much done with less effort I hope Liz - have a good weekend with the new family!

No idea about Snape as never got past 2nd book - really did not enjoy either the genre or the writing - sorry.