catch 23

You go to pick up the old car so you can take it and sell it to one of the bucket shops on the 'Magic Mile'. Somehow during the 5 or so weeks that it's been with this used car bloke who'd promised he'd unload it for you at a better price than you'd get for it, the battery has died (altho' it doesn't seem all that old). So they jump it. A tyre has gone flat (again, how did that happen?) so you take it to their shop and they put some air in it. You stop the car because it has no petrol (where did that go?) so you have to jump it again. There's the spare wheel you dropped off, but the boot won't open. How did that happen?

You take it to the nearest petrol station knowing that you' ll have to turn it off while it's at the pumps. You pull up and switch off - too late, you've forgotten which side the filler is. Push the car back, push it up to the correct side (someone comes to help just as you get there). But the petrol filler flap won't open. Ahh, because the there is an electrically operated lock on the flap and the battery's dead.

So we have to get a battery before we do anything else. You push the car to a spot on the edge of the forecourt and go looking for a battery because the RACQ coverage has been transferred to the replacement car. Find battery place and talk the bloke into lending a small shifting spanner. When ring spanners of the correct sizes - three different sizes - would be faster. But half an hour later it's done. It's afternoon now. Let's just take it home and clean it up a bit before we try to sell it.

You remember what a nice car it is on the road, even if it's getting pretty damn scrappy inside and out. How great it is to have a sunroof. And just for fun, blow some young punk in a late model VW Golf into the weeds when he tries to overtake on the inside on an access ramp to the motorway. Blissful Saturday once again.

Update: Sunday. Now the boot's opening again. I vacuumed the interior. The battery that failed looks like a cheapie, if so, no wonder it's cactus. It's a red car, it looks good: I might keep it and drive it myself.

And on another tack entirely, Yo Blair. This is how we do it. And women have it better in Afghanistan, just as predicted. Because theory - more accurately, ideological blind faith, blustering and bullying - has trumped the real world for the last five years.