Car Problems

Car problems

I’m beginning to think that someone is trying to tell me something!  It’s been a week of car problems here with one thing and another. Last weekend my blogging friends who were meeting up at my house got delayed due to a closure on the A34.  The only saving grace was that by the time they reached me, the M40 had re-opened after a big accident earlier in the day.  Car problems, what joy!

On Monday I dropped my son at Nursery School and decided to pop on the M40 to Banbury to get a few things I needed.  I should easily have been home before my son needed collecting at 11.45.  I left home at 9 am, I arrived in Banbury at 12.30!  What a nightmare morning.  I got on the motorway with only a slight delay before the junction, nothing too unusual for that time in the morning.  A few minutes along the motorway I saw the brake lights ahead – oh dear.  That was when the fun began.

Car Problems

This was my view, pretty much for the next 3 and half hours.  Stop, start, stop, car problems on a Monday morning.  Luckily Daddy P was working from home, so I rang him at arranged for him to pick him up from Nursery School.  No way I was going to be home in time.

Of course, the issue that we ladies have at these times – needing the toilet!  Oh boy, those 3 and half hours were no fun for me.  Especially as I regularly saw guys getting out of their cars and lorries to have a pit stop.  What a joy!

Thankfully, my son wasn’t actually with me on Monday, I can just imagine how much he’d have enjoyed that experience – not!  A lorry had turned over earlier in the morning, taking a large stretch of the central reservation with it.

I went home on the back roads and at 2.30 that afternoon there were still really long queues of stationary traffic in 3 lanes – car problems!

The experience, following a busy Bloggers Night In weekend, left me totally drained.  I still feel shattered today.  Hence not a great deal of activity on the blog this week.

Today we had a lovely day planned.  We’d been invited to the Chiltern Open Air Museum to sample some traditional Christmas crafts – making things and exploring.  We were taking a detour to pick up a family friend and one of my son’s favourite people. My son and I set off, left our estate, turned at the first roundabout and ….. Oh dear, something sounds a bit strange, we hadn’t gone 200 metres before there was a big ‘clonk’, we had real car problems.  It was very apparent that my exhaust was dragging on the ground.  That was the end of our planned day before it had even started.

Thankfully this happened before I had reached the motorway, or we’d have been in for more car problems on the M40, and I’m not sure I could have coped with that twice in one week!  I rang our friend and told her our plans would have to change.

I managed to turn around and get the car home, rang Daddy P for help.  When he could get away from work he managed to tie the exhaust up off the road with some string and took it to the garage for me.  I saw any chance of a Christmas present slipping away – car problems just before Christmas – not good.

I plucked up enough courage to drive his Landrover, only the second time ever.  I’m not a really confident driver and struggle with parking even in small cars, his car is just a tank.  I rang our special friend to update her, I didn’t feel happy to drive all the way to the Museum, and half the morning was now gone, so we agreed on an at-home play date at her house and lunch out at a favourite pub.

We all survived my driving and parking and still enjoyed our day, even though we were all disappointed not to have been making some things for Christmas.  Daddy P rang me later in the day, good news, it was only a broken bracket on the exhaust – all repaired for £2.63 + labour.  Sigh of relief all around!

I would really, very much like to have no further car problems this next week!  I have a 4th birthday to prepare for – I am so not organised for that!

2 thoughts on “Car problems

  1. Oh no what a nightmare week. You certainly didn’t show you are not a confident driver last weekend, in fact we thought you were practising for the F1 on the way to breakfast when Jenny said her foot was flat to the floor and you were disappearing over the hill 🙂

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