A LOT OF MILEAGE FOR MY STRESS LEVELS

I’ve noticed that my blogs of late are a bit of a litany – whinge, moan, condemn, castigate. A journalist’s stock in trade.

I must make an effort to revert to my original intent: recording the quirks of life. So, here goes. Er … oh, yes.

My car was recalled for a safety check, so I also booked it in for its MoT and a major service. Good thinking, I thought – the recall meant I would get a courtesy car, should I need to make any unexpected trips.

Of course, like all courtesy cars, it came with a teaspoon of fuel in the tank. ‘Just put in what you need,’ said the man at the garage. Okay, let’s see: diesel, just local driving, a fiver's worth will be plenty.

Ah. Slight snag, Unfamiliar car, unfamiliar petrol cap, just look away for a couple of seconds and the litres/price reels are going round faster than the interest on Bill Gates's current account. Before I can take my hand off the throttle I have clocked up almost £11. Shit!

Can’t let the garage have it – the service will cost enough – so I do a couple of jobs I’d been threatening to do for ages, including a drive over to an old mate 10 miles away, and arrive back home feeling better.

It was only then that I noticed the new-fangled dashboard shows me how many miles before I can expect to run out of fuel: a hundred-and-bleedin’-eighty miles! Shit again!

I’d just got my coat off when the garage phoned. Er, sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you need new brake discs and pads at the front and new pads at the rear. Let me see, yes – with the MoT, a total of £550.

HOW BLEEDIN’ MUCH!?

Right, that does it! Over lunch I go through my diary and find two more jobs I haven’t done that need doing some time … this year. At least a 60-mile round trip. That will have to do. Via the motorway, so I can get some revs on, use up some more juice.

Jobs done, I motor back at a fair speed, and notice near my turn-off that I am down to 115 miles. Until I come across a Police ‘Incident’ sign that slows traffic. Two crawling miles later I am back up to 120, and God knows what my blood pressure is up to.

I didn’t dare look at the dashboard it as I reached the garage; just tapped in my PIN, smiled what I imagined was a wry smile, and drove back home in my refurbished, MoT’d old motor.

Then I sat down with a cup of tea and Mrs N and idly watched Deal Or No Deal while my simmer subsided. The chosen contestant was married to a Noel, she told Noel (Edmonds), and they had called their son Leon, because it was Noel spelled backwards.

Shame she hadn’t married the man at the garage, I thought. His name badge said Trafford. But everybody called him Traf.

That made me smile…