pmsumner

I was driving back from Shrewsbury this afternoon, having taken the day off work to go spend some time with a recruitment agency in town. I took a series of very weird back roads home, I don't exactly know where I was to be honest! At one stage I passed a tractor cutting the hedgerows and verges. Passed it, got to a junction, went to pull off and something felt wrong. Like steering not working properly wrong.

Grumbling loudly and using many swear words, I pulled over, stuck on my hazards and yep, front nearside tyre was flat.

At least it gave me a chance to test whether the jack, spare tyre and locking nut fittings worked as expected, right?

They did. Took about 10 minutes to change all told. Not bad I guess.

Unfortunately the spare isn't a "proper" spare, it's a temporary. So this afternoon I'll have to pop into town and get the flat fixed up. Time I really didn't want to be spending out the house, as there's plenty to do here.

My new car's now mine, mwahahaha! :) It's shiny. It goes quick. It's quiet! Really quiet, as in I can't tell from the sound of the engine how fast I'm going like I used to be able to.

I spent half an hour this morning troubleshooting the 12V power socket, which the previous owner did warn me didn't work and blew it's fuse. I first of all had to find the correct fuse box - hidden behind the glove box - and then the appropriate fuse. Oddly enough, there wasn't a fuse in the right hole! Luckily I'd just been and bought a big bumper box of fuses for pipsytip a week ago so had one to replace it with.

Pushed a fuse in, and it blew before I even had it plugged in properly. I did have the ignition on but there shouldn't be a circuit there, I've got nothing connected in! Hrm, thought I - must be something stuck in the socket. Turned off the ignition, pulled off the power supply cover and stuck my finger in. Nothing.

Confused now. Thinking it might just be knackered wiring or something, and about to give up I poke around the central control area and find an unexpected 12v socket in the rear! Pulled off the cover and there's a 5p piece jammed in there. Solidly jammed in there. Needed a pair of pliers to get it out. Replaced the fuse, tested the socket with my radio transmitter and it works. Hurrah!

I wonder how much a garage would have charged for the same troubleshooting process? £30/hr sounds about right charge for "mechanic time". Plus I'm sure they would inflate the cost of a new fuse several hundred times!

This is the update to the ticket I raised with Quidco on the 3rd April 2007, 2 months after using their site for the first (and currently only) time:

Hi, We are pleased to announce that, as part of our strong and continued commitment to our members, we will are clearing out of our own pockets earnings enquiries that are still in "sent to merchant" status for the second half of 2006 and all of 2007. Your enquiry falls in this time and is now showing added in your earnings. Payment for this enquiry will be made in this months payment run. Kind regards, Quidco Member Support

Interesting way of phrasing things. I can't help but feel that there's got to be something that they're not telling us.

Apparently a jump start from a Ford Ka isn't worth the effort (according to Mr RAC) :)

So, one proper jump start later, and I am at work, and will be taking the car to Kwik Fit in Warrington at lunchtime for a new battery. I should have done this the first time it happened (but I forgot).

I said that I hadn't spent much money on the car lately. I should have known better. Today I went to start it and nothing. Not a noise. Fewer lights than should come on, came on. In fact the "Service" light was half-on-half-off. This is absolutely positively not a good sign.

Used my recently acquired jumper cables (I tried beating it until it gave in) and still nothing. Some lights came on stronger, but no enginey noises.

I need a new car, but can't afford a new car, so end up spending money on the existing car which I could be putting towards a new car. This cycle is depressing and annoying, annoying and depressing and frankly all-round frustrating.

I'm compensating myself by eating chocolate from the Cadburys shop at Cheshire Oaks.

( Why? )

I left the car at the garage at 9am, and they said they'd call as soon as they knew anything. I popped in on the way home, only a minor detour, at 1130 and was told there was no news yet. Walked home, took about half an hour, and got a phone call at about 1205 saying they'd finished it.

Grrrr.

Sure they did it on purpose.

Anyhow, just under £150 all told, but they've a 10% off labour costs thingie on their website, so got 10% off that whoohoo. I guess it's worth it for knowing how fast I am travelling, right? Someone tell me that I'm not mad...

Now I am relaxing briefly, while I try to stop my legs from complaining at me.

What shall I be doing with this time off? Well I shall be taking the car to Manor Garage tomorrow morning to at last get my speedo fixed. It's not been working properly now for about a month, and I just don't ever have the time to sort it out! I have the part that I think I need, but don't know what they're going to charge to fix it. Hopefully it won't be as much as I'm expecting - expecting up to about £150.

Watching Sherrybaby. Loving it. Thought the music was done by the same person that did Secretary but IMDb disagrees. Maggie Gyllenhaal - how can you not love her? She's gorgeous. Not at all the type of girl I normally think is deliciously lovely but still. I think it's all down to Secretary. Anyone who looks that good with their arms in spreader bars and cuffs can't go wrong in my book.

Tonight I have beer, and tomorrow that isn't spent at the garage and crying over my credit card, shall be spent organising and tidying and cleaning in general. I am constantly amazed at how much cleaning this small house needs.

Now Sherrybaby's done, I'm wondering if I can get away with watching Bab5 S4 without Jane finding out! She might just kill me if I start.

Jane's at OMTC Committee meeting tonight. It's nice to be alone every now and then. Rehearsal on Monday was uhhm, interesting, as we were missing a lot of people - the 3 main principals (Lucy, Emma, Jekyll) and Spider. We did have a wonderful Jekyll stand-in - Mark's stepson, who has just been accepted to Guildhall School of Music and Drama, lucky thing. And he has a wonderful voice!

Awwww she's so sweet, Maggie. Watching interview with her (DVD extra) and she's just got it, the character, so well.

What else is on our list of DVDs that hasn't been opened yet then? :)

Principal rehearsal, Julie (Emma) who is brand new to OMTC sounds brilliant, and I suspect this should come out sounding excellent.

On the way home, I was overtaking a lorry and pushing the car quite hard, I felt a bump which I assumed was the rev limiter kicking in (I've had it happen before when pushing), but after that nothing felt quite right. I had less power than I should have done, and I had to drop down a gear for hills that I'd normally do in 5th.

I suspected it all along but I guess I didn't want it to be. I got home, the only time I could really stop, and there are the symptoms of a failed ignition coil. Firing on 12 cylinders instead of all 16 would certainly explain it. This is annoying on a number of levels:

1. It's expensive and I don't have the spare money to pay for this, damnit it's coming up to Christmas
2. Time. Due to a bizarre sequence of events I've had to have a credit card delivered to a local branch of a bank. Today I've had to go into Chester to pick this up before I could even call the recovery people. It's going to be gone 11am before I even head off to work now.
3. This happened at JUST the wrong time. If it had happened a week ago I'd have been able to deal with it, if it had happened next week I'd have been able to do it easily, but this week? Pain in the ass.
4. This comes just after the repairs needed for the MOT pass. Yet more money...

I hate cars :(

I took it in to get new tyres a few weeks ago, and the guy there had trouble getting a couple of the bolts back in after removing the wheel, and I've been driving on 3 ever since - not a huge issue really. I was suspicious as it's the same wheel as we had problems with before, when the garage in Manchester tightened the bolts so tightly they sheared off when attempting to remove them next time.

Anyhow, at the service apparently they could only get two bolts back in. That is an issue. 3 is safe enough for the short term, two is extremely unsafe. I asked how much it would cost and they're telling me that it needs a new hub, new bearings and new something-else's which I can't remember now. A grand total of... well let's just say that it's over £300.

The service itself is about £180 which I expected, and they did some diagnostics on the rough idling which they can't find a specific fault for, and are unable to fix. Hrmph. As well as the speedo, which has been working consistently since about Tuesday last week.

I guess if I looked at it overall I'm probably spending £1000/year on the car, which for a car of this age can't be that bad all told, but I can't help feeling that it needs replacing. But with what money? According to Jane it's as simple as "saving up a few months". One day I'll sit down and show her exactly how much debt I have...

I was driving to work and cruising quite happily, not speeding excessively and driving vaguely sensibly. One moment I checked my speedo and noted I was going 75, next moment I checked I was apparently doing 0.

Ahh.

Shit.

Looks like my speedo cable thingie needs replacing then. Let's add that to the "list of things wrong with the car" which includes:

• Rough idle
• Knackered thread on driver's side front wheel
• Annoying high pitched squeak at higher speeds on bumpy roads

So yes, happy all round here.