NotSheep

Partly a normal Saturday morning, partly not: swimming lessons for George and Freddy at 9, followed by Barney’s lesson at 9.30. Nobody went to Fit Kids today - I don’t know if Henry wants to go again, and Barney decided not to go because the alternative was to hit the library - well, if books are involved, you can’t keep him away. (Funny moment at dinner tonight, with George making up a song for Barney, to the tune of “I want to move it” from Madagascar - this version went “I want to read it read it, I want to read it read it”, and then “lots and lots of words, lots and lots of words” LOL)

So they all went off to the library with Scratchy, then walked back to the leisure-centre for George and Freddy’s gymnastics club at noon. In the meantime, I went car-shopping. More about that in a minute.

Scratchy, Barney and Henry were supposed to be going to paint the Scout Hall doors at 1 p.m., but events overtook us and we didn’t get home until nearly 3 - fortunately about ten other Scouts did make it, so the doors, I am told, now look very sharp

As for me, I had a day I won’t quickly forget. For a start, I think I might be about to buy a Chrysler Voyager. I drove it this morning, it looks good, feels good and the price is reasonable. The guy who’s selling it seems honest (it’s a trade sale, not private, but it’s a small place and he’s quite happy for our mechanic to look it over). His wife is very nice too. How do I know that? Because she made me a cup of tea when I was shaken after driving into what, thankfully, turned out not to be a child.

There was nowhere for me to leave my car while I test-drove the Voyager, you see, so it was parked up on a grass verge on the other side of the very narrow country lane where the garage is - in front of the house of the guy who owns the business. As I drove, we were chatting, as you do, and he mentioned he’d four children. We got back, I said I was interested in the car, we agreed I’d call him on Monday morning, etc. Then he went to prepare another car for someone and I got back into mine and started to reverse off the grass.

And that was when there was a bang

I reversed into a car. Or, to be more exact, I reversed my big old MPV into a very small, very red, very shiny, very new-looking, very expensive-looking sports car. Exactly the kind of car you really don’t want to drive into. Not that you want to drive into any kind of car, but if you had to do it and you had a choice, you wouldn’t choose one like that, because you just know the owner of a car like that has spent lots of money on it and has probably quite a lot of emotional investment there too

I had seen it, but I didn’t think it was quite so close, and then, just as my wheel went down off the verge, I hit it. And in the next split second, it went through my head that it could have been a child coming out of the house

It wasn’t a child, thank goodness - just a piece of metal. But still, a very red, very shiny, etc, piece of metal. And its owner, who was talking to the guy who’s selling the Voyager, was not pleased. I wasn’t sure whether he was joking when I was saying “I’m really sorry, it was such a stupid thing to do” and he was replying “Yes, it was a stupid thing to do” etc. The selling-guy was being very reassuring and saying it would polish out in five minutes, telling me not to worry. His wife, who’d seen it happen on their security cameras, came out to see if I was okay, and seeing how shaken I was, insisted on me coming into their house for a cup of tea. The man who owned the sports-car, meanwhile, got into it and drove off.

While I was drinking tea, the sales-guy came in and said that the sports-car owner hadn’t been joking, and that his attitude was unnecessary. I said he’d probably been upset (especially since, I was told, he has no children and the car is very much his baby), but they were both quite cross about the way he’d behaved. I said of course I’d pay for any damage, but the sales-guy said that he’d sort it out, it would only be a few minutes’ work, and I shouldn’t worry. He left and returned again to say the sports-car owner had phoned to say that he’d gone home and polished it and that the mark had just polished off - and that he’d apologised for his attitude! He also said that on his way home, a piece of trim came off a car in front of him and hit the front of his shiny red sports-car… really not his day!

So no harm done in the end, except possibly to my nerves.

(It’s a bit ironic that my car is going into the body-shop on Monday to deal with the damage that was caused when it was hit by another vehicle back in July!)