Vroom Vroom
Amongst all the other joys of this week, which as you might have guessed seems to have filled up with a fair amount of busy-ness, my car decided that the Lord was calling it home, probably to offer assistance to a couple of Archangels who needed a big chunky Volvo to get them about the celestial spheres a bit. After a rather embarassing 15 minutes which saw it stuck across the road outside my driveway - blocking traffic and refusing to start again! I decided this wasn't the kind of reliable car it once was, and having done quite a lot of work on it over the past few months the cost of continuing to repair stuff until the next thing went wrong was just a bit too much.
So we bought a new car
I went down to London yesterday to a massive 'car supermarket' called Cargiant which spreads over 23 Acres in West London and chose, then bought, a Skoda Octavia 1.9 Elegance TDi - not a car most folk outside of Europe would be familiar with, but built in Easter Europe by a company wholly owned by VolksWagen. It's a mix of a family Estate (Stationwagon) with a bit of sexy engineering which makes it efficient, low emission, pleasant looking, and quite speedy. Armed with scuds of information from my mate Nick who is the guru of all things mechanical, and runs the same model as an ambulance car for his private ambulance business, I checked out this car, and after the formalities (which involved parting with a large proportion of our inheritance from Jo's gramps) I drove it home.
Even with the great joy (ironic statement) of London's rush hour on a Friday, it was a good drive, and for the short stretch of the A1 out of London where there was chance to put my foot down and it went in a manner akin to the proverbial faecal matter from a digging implement. All good fun. It has also taken away that niggling 'will she? won't she?' feeling I had every time I put my key in the ignition of my old car.
It looks a bit like this...
So we bought a new car
I went down to London yesterday to a massive 'car supermarket' called Cargiant which spreads over 23 Acres in West London and chose, then bought, a Skoda Octavia 1.9 Elegance TDi - not a car most folk outside of Europe would be familiar with, but built in Easter Europe by a company wholly owned by VolksWagen. It's a mix of a family Estate (Stationwagon) with a bit of sexy engineering which makes it efficient, low emission, pleasant looking, and quite speedy. Armed with scuds of information from my mate Nick who is the guru of all things mechanical, and runs the same model as an ambulance car for his private ambulance business, I checked out this car, and after the formalities (which involved parting with a large proportion of our inheritance from Jo's gramps) I drove it home.
Even with the great joy (ironic statement) of London's rush hour on a Friday, it was a good drive, and for the short stretch of the A1 out of London where there was chance to put my foot down and it went in a manner akin to the proverbial faecal matter from a digging implement. All good fun. It has also taken away that niggling 'will she? won't she?' feeling I had every time I put my key in the ignition of my old car.
It looks a bit like this...
Comments
I do have a question though -- where is Easter Europe? Seems to me that such a place should have been able to resurect the old volovo.
My apologizies for not leaving a comment in a long time. I've been by and read your wonderful posts though.
I need a new vehicle, my poor old Mazda truck of 17 years is ready for retirement. It still goes (though for a week I was on holiday and didn't use it - hopefully it will start today to get me to work) but I've decided it is time for a new vehicle.
I will need one to get me to my Sisters in Ontario which is a 5 hour flight or a 4 day drive. She wants me to move to be closer, we are older now and realizing we don't have a much time to be together like when we were younger.
Enjoy your new car Alastair I like the quote "the Lord was calling it home, probably to offer assistance to a couple of Archangels who needed a big chunky Volvo to get them about the celestial spheres a bit".
Blessings for a wonderful week