No.76 Surprise Surprise!

Wow! What a weekend. Picked up the MGB on Saturday. She leaks. She rattles. She vibrates. But she also purrs too and I love her. Saturday night driving back from friends the British weather threw everything it had at us both for a good two hours but the partnership held out steadfast, resiliently and to the bitter end. Rule Britannia.

Alan’s right. The car sticks to the road like the proverbial to the soldier’s blanket and with the top down you get a sense of belonging to the road that I’ve not experienced in any other convertible.

With the hood up you get a sense of being in a German wartime bunker for the windscreen is long and very narrow and really concentrates your vision. There’s an override button on the gear knob which when flicked is supposed to give you more acceleration. It doesn’t but it delivers a great noise under the bonnet and makes you feel terribly James Bond as you employ it hurtling into the corners.

The nephew’s 18^th birthday was great. He’s actually turned into quite a gentlemen. We were worried for a while when he was young and going through the terrible Twos. In fact I think we were worried for about 10 years come to think of it.

Sunday proved to be a day of surprises for me and for my rels. It started early as I wanted to get on the road as soon as I could and start the journey north. By accident I found the short cut to the motorway I can never find when I try to find it.

After two stops at service stations and an awful lot of wind rain and spray I arrived in Chester unannounced at the house of my aunt and uncle. Aunty ended up in the car navigating me to cousin Jennifers at some speed as time pressures required us to get to her house then to Liverpool inside an hour or so. Aunty Ann should have been a rally driver’s co-pilot. Crickey she was good. “Second left just where that bus is turning right, it’s not too early to indicate and slow down right now.”

Jennifer and her boyfriend were surprised indeed to see me and the former showed me round her new house whist the latter fixed me a cup of tea.

By 6p.m. I was standing at the back of a church in Woolaton, Liverpool expecting to see Father Des a friend I had met whilst working in Romania many years ago. Alas it was my turn to be surprised as I found out that he and other redemptists had headed south on the same motorway on which I had headed north that morning.