I’ll begin by moaning about my car shenanigans. Shortly after posting my last rant on this topic, I decided to phone my insurance company to see if they could explain to me why a breakers yard in the west midlands had posted my tax disc to me. They had to go away and think about it for a while, but eventually they phoned me back and told me that my car was in fact a “total loss”, and that one of their engineers would be in touch soon to discuss the value of my car. Quite how they decided that repair would be uneconomical without a) knowing the value of my car and b) even looking at it (I learned from the breakers that it went straight to them from the recovery garage without going anywhere near the mythical “approved garage” of which my insurers spoke) remains something of a mystery to me.
Equally mysterious is why they chose to use the phrase “discuss the value of your car”. Because when the engineer phoned me, he told me that he had established the market value of my car by looking online at used Rover 216 GTI’s, finding the cheapest one possible, and deciding that that was probably what mine was worth; no discussion or negotiation would be entered into.
Needless to say, the market value of my car turned out to be less than what I had paid to insure it in the first place. My glasses which were in the car weren’t covered by the insurance policy, and after buying a new pair and paying the excess on my policy I had a whole £50 to play with. Except I didn’t, because my premiums apparently increased when I moved house and/or bought a new car, meaning I am now £100 down - not including the cost of the insurance in the first place, or the cost of the new car.
Of course, when I say I have a new car, I mean that it is new to me. I am now the owner of a very used 1995 Mk3 Volkswagon Golf. It is red. When it was new, it would have looked like this.
Mine looks more like this.
I’m not a fan; but it should be good to get me around and about whilst I look for a proper car.
Meanwhile, exams happened. Some were okay, some were a bit disastrous. Things might have gone a bit better if I’d not taken time out from revision to attend various interviews for placements which were never offered to me anyway. There was also the added distraction of finding out, two hours before my second-to-last exam, that we had five days to find somewhere else to live.
If Dozer knows exactly what happened, he’s not telling anyone. I suspect that I’m happier not knowing. Essentially, the brewery told him that they’d found someone else to run the pub, and under the terms of his contract they only had to give him one week’s notice.
Somehow, Dozer and Charlie (who had officially moved into the pub with us just two weeks previously) managed to find somewhere that we could move into almost immediately, and that wasn’t completely rubbish. In fact, it’s quite nice here… Of course, not living in the pub means that I will have to get used to a few things; like peace and quiet, having hot water whenever I want it, and turning up to work sober on Saturday mornings.
Anyway, with all the relocating and change of personnel, it’s probably a good time for a quick roll call.
Dozer: It probably tells you all that you need to know about Dozer to know that he got the cable TV set up in the new house before he got his bed set up. In fact, it was almost a full week before he was able to physically set foot in his room, as it was so full of his crap. In unrelated news, he was recently asked by his (now ex-) girlfriend, “Hypothetically, what would you do if I was pregnant?” he responded with “Hypothetically, how do you feel about being pushed down the stairs?”
Sam: Sam is the only person I know who gets out of breath eating toast. He is also the only person I know who watches M.A.S.H. and actually finds it funny. Last weekend he got up late and went to the shops just before they closed; in his rush to make his purchases, he completely forgot what it was that we actually needed (bread, milk, the usual stuff) and so came home with tonic water and fresh limes. I still cannot decide if this is to his credit or not.
Charlie Cat: Only technically lives here, since she disappeared a few days after we all moved in to go and spend her summer working for some outdoor activities company, making kids cry. She seems to be enjoying herself. In her absence, there is something of a sexiness deficit in the household, which us grunting Neanderthals are entirely failing to make up for.
That’s enough for now, I think. With all the horror of exams and house-moving behind me, hopefully I shall get back to posting with sort of regularity…
But I wouldn’t count on it.
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