Winter colds and cars

I had a weekend to forget, all things considered.

Woke up Saturday morning with one of those colds that makes you feel like your sinuses are packed with cement and your head is trying to turn itself inside out. Philippa panicked at the prospect of having to go through labour while infected with flu and decided I should get as far away from her as possible, so sent me out into the freezing weather with a shopping list and instructions to ‘come home when you’re healthier.’  

I traipsed around the wet towns, with sleet being driven against me like a ruler being driven against a misbehaving Victorian schoolboy’s knuckles, and ended up soaked, shivering and miserable. Then I got back to our car, which took the annoying decision to refuse to start, presumably as a protest at being left outside in the Wintry storm in the first place.

None of the local places were still open so I couldn’t call out a mechanic. We’re members of RAC but they quoted me an ‘Estimated Recovery Time’ of 4-5 hours, and I was already feeling hypothermic and the weather was getting worse, so I didn’t fancy sitting in sub-zero temperatures while they sorted out loads of other people ahead of me. So in the end I got a taxi home and left the pissing car where it was.

Philippa was delighted, for many different reasons. I would have thought she would have been pleased to see me home safe, but no. I’d spent unnecessarily on transport, I’d endangered my own wellbeing and now I had abandoned the car that will be needed to take her to the hospital when Junior kicks his way through her waters. The fact that we have another car sitting outside the house that is operating perfectly seemed to escape her notice.

Anyway, I got a lift back to the motor yesterday morning and the pissing thing started first time. I’d still like to know what the problem was though, so I’ve dropped it off at a garage this morning to be ‘thoroughly investigated.’ Probably means I’ll be charged three months wages just because they hooked it up to a computer for 30 seconds, but there we are. Better safe than sorry.

RC 17-12-18