Unexpected scramble

“What are you doing today?” John wondered. “Erm… well, we’re taking the white car in for a service this morning,” I said, “and then I’ll probably do some paperwork. I’ve got to tax the blue car.” “Oh, right,” John replied, “I can do that – tax the car.” Lovely, thank you – I mean, you don’t look a gift horse in the mouth do you? So I left him to it.

Some while later, John came through to tell me that he couldn’t tax the car…..because it hadn’t got an MOT. Whaaaat? I leafed through all the paperwork for the car and, sure enough, there was an absence of an up-to-date MOT certificate. Oh, crumbs. I looked at John, horror stricken. “That means……. I’ve been driving the car for nearly five months without an MOT……”

Goodness knows what I had been thinking about last October, but it certainly wasn’t the car, obviously. I got on to the garage. “When are you looking to book it in for?” said the very nice chap on the other end of the phone. “ASAP?” I offered hopefully. I could hear him turning over the pages of his book of bookings…… oh, please don’t say next week! “We’ve had a cancellation for this afternoon. Is that any good to you? At 3 o’clock?” Oh, you little life-saver!! “Yes, that’ll do nicely.” I responded as cool as you like, as if I wasn’t desperate.

So we scrambled about to get ourselves there on time this afternoon but first, walk the dog. I had suggested to Harriet that I’d go over this afternoon. The scramble to get the car MOT’d brought forward the dog walk. At 12.30 I texted the Kenilworth Sleaths: ‘We will come and walk the dog now if that’s OK? Be with you in about twenty minutes…’ The reply came back: ‘We are just looking for him, he has escaped!’

The little monkey. He’s always doing that. Someone leaves the gate open and he shoots out quick as flash, tail wagging, off on an adventure. Many’s a time Paul and Harriet have had to scour the streets for him. He’s even been featured on Facebook before now, with a poster emblazoned across the top of his photo: ‘Do you know who owns this dog?’ as people come across him on their travels.

Anyway, about ten minutes later we got a text: ‘Found him’ accompanied by the following photo:

A slightly bedraggled pooch, clearly having found some lovely water and/or mud to play in. Oooh, and he was as happy as anything having had a taste of freedom.

John came with me on the dog-walk, through the woods that he’d rejected the other day. To be fair, the route was a little bit up and down, but John managed brilliantly and we had a really lovely time. Apart, that is, from nearly getting run over by a cyclist. He screeched to halt behind me and then fell off his bike. A couple who were following on, called across to me, “He’s been riding like a maniac.” Oh, dear. “Well, he fell off his bike.” I said. “Good,” came the savage reply. Clearly, they had no time for the maniac.

This evening, it was time to say hello to the college crew. Once again, lovely to speak to those who could make it, and to catch up with what’s been happening in their lives. Sue P made us smile: “Victoria rented her house out last week, for four days, while they filmed an advert there,” she told us. “Ooooh,” we said, impressed. What was the advert for? “Tena Lady,” Sue replied giggling…….. hehehe. Watch out for the Tena Lady adverts, everyone……

I never did get any paperwork done today…. maybe tomorrow?

Just because it’s St Patrick’s Day, here is a blessing written by the Irish poet, John O’Donohue, for you:

“May the nourishment of the earth be yours, may the clarity of light be yours, may the fluency of the ocean be yours, may the protection of the ancestors be yours.”

Take care everyone. God bless.

Covid rates are still going up. In the last 7 days: 534,747 people tested positive for the virus (up 43.9%); 740 people died with the virus (up 1.9%); and 11,580 people were admitted to hospital with it (up 21.9%)