:: Diary - January 2016 ::

:: Sunday, January 10, 2016 ::

It's been a while!

I haven't died, I haven't sold the car, and I haven't set fire to it in a fit of pique, although I admit that all of those are equally likely outcomes. No, various circumstances have conspired to ensure that I have done sod all to the car since the last time I used it at the start of November. Well apart from fixing the cigar lighter and the window switch the following week.

I wanted to get the Porsche back to the house and the TVR along to the farm, but I didn't want to put them away wet, so was waiting for a dry day. I'm still waiting...

Then I ordered a new pair of sofas for the house, for delivery "just before Christmas". Then I decided to decorate that room before I put the new furniture in - this was a while ago so I had about 8 weeks to do that. Then they phoned me in the middle of November and said the furniture was ready, so I had to ask them to hold on to it for a couple of weeks till I got the paint rollers out.

Then the sofas were delivered, still 3 weeks early, and the ripped old ones were piled up in the garage, which restricted access to vehicles and tools more than somewhat. I phoned the Council to uplift it but they said that they couldn't do it till the middle of January. And they wonder why they have a problem with fly-tipping. Eventually, during that "limbo" week between Christmas and New Year, I managed to fit it all (albeit not at the same time) into the Range Rover, to take it to the tip - ahem I mean "local amenity and recycling centre", so I got my garage back a week ago.

Meanwhile I decided to visit the Porsche and make sure everything was OK. It wasn't - the battery was flat as a pancake so I had to go back with a trickle charger, which meant being shouted at in John's quietest whisper both times...

In between all that, I dug the pedal car out from behind the TVR and had a think about stripping the paint off it - will I use nitromors and a scraper, or just sand it down. In either case, I need to do it outside so that there's no chance of splashing the TVR with stripper, or covering it in dust, so again that's dependent on the rain going off for a bit. This is a specialist subject for me - did I ever tell you that I used to be a stripper in the Navy? I'm not allowed to talk about it, or if I did I would have to kill you (probably by boring you to death) but suffice to say that it's not easy getting black paint off large slightly-curved panels that are designed and protected to spend a lot of their time submerged deep in salty water, especially when you are paid on piece-work. De-shitting blankets is a romp in the park in comparison. At least I can see in the dark by the green glow off my bollocks.

Right, forget I told you that now, ok?

In between all that, I've been busy with work, to the extent that I've decided that I need to be even more selective about what I take on. I've got no time to sit and do sod all.

The TVR needs a general tidy-up. In fact, if I stop deluding myself, it could do with a complete rebuild. Everything works though, including the notorious electrics, nothing is broken and it goes well. It just looks bloody horrible. Thing is, though, that if I spent money and time improving it, I would want to keep it like that, and would be less inclined to use it - and the whole point in having it, is that I enjoy driving it! I'm already noticing a change in my attitude to the Porsche since I got that sorted up - last year I used it, on and off, right through the winter, but this year, it hasn't moved since October.

Anyway... today is the day of the TVR car club. Dave's cars are SORNed, Jim is going on somewhere else afterwards, it's pishing rain, but more importantly, it's bloody freezing, so we decide to go in the Range Rover - at least then you can view the scenery over the top of everybody else.

The event is very well attended - lots of regulars but also a few new people. The lunch is very nice - I had a burger that was about 2 inches thick, topped with another inch of pulled pork in a barbecue sauce, with the usual chips and coleslaw etc, then 3 mini-doughnuts with caramelised banana and ice cream - very filling it all was. Dave and Claire had the same, it's a good job the Rangey has self-adjusting air suspension...

Our chat roved over the usual range of topics (see what I did there?) including potential car purchases, the general lifestyle philosophy of "fuck it", getting old, employment advice, and potential attendance at TVR events over this coming year, including possibly the first event at Burleigh in April. That doesn't seem much to fill 3 hours, but it did. Although to be fair, about half of that was spent chewing the massive lunch.

Soon we load ourselves back into the car for the journey home - that is after I have squeezed my arse through a door gap that Twiggy would baulk at, because the Vauxhall Astra next to me takes up more of the parking space than my Range Rover does. Heater on, and we're skelping off, despising wind and rain and oceans of standing water in the outside lane of the motorway. Global warming? Yes please!