I rushed around so much that I was not at all sorry to get to work this evening.
My pleasure in being a taxi driver was sharply diminished, however, by the discovery, on the taxi rank, that the heater in my taxi was not working.
Regular readers might have the distant recollection that this has happened to me before, once on a freezing winter’s night on a long and terrible journey alone into the far north. I was going to collect Oliver, and the heater packed up.
By the time I reached Elgin I was so cold I could hardly check myself into the Travelodge, but a telephone call to Mark revealed that it had been a foreseeable problem, and that there was a spare bit in the glove box which would fix it.
All I had to do was to pull the dashboard apart, unplug a broken thing and plug a new one in its place.
This took ages, and a lot of trapped fingers, but I managed it in the end, and had a considerably warmer, contented journey back home, with Oliver in the passenger seat.
Readers, I had not forgotten such a shockingly chilly lesson.
I had ensured at the time that the used up bit was hastily replaced in the glove box, having no desire to find myself in such a pickle again, but without the wherewithal to fix it, and tonight I sent heartfelt thanks to my former self for such thoughtful anticipation.
There was not one, but two spare bits in the glove box.
I tugged the dashboard apart with no ceremony whatsoever, unlike last time when I had been tentative and anxious about breaking it. This time I did not give a hoot, and dragged it out abruptly, making crunching noises as it came off in my hands.
I found the broken bit, and the whole adventure was over in barely more than ten minutes.
The dashboard would not go back together again but I didn’t care. My poor, abused, faithful taxi does not have much life left. In a couple of weeks the aspirational taxi will have jumped through all of its hoops, and its working life will be over.
I am warm again.
This is a jolly good thing, because it is chilly tonight. It is a cold, clear night, because for the first time in days and days the rain has disappeared and we have had sunshine. I have absolutely made the most of it.
All of the washing dried in the garden, which was magnificent.
Whilst it was flapping, breezily, I cleaned out my taxi. It was filthy, having spent the last few weeks conveying wet customers and wet dogs down from muddy fell-sides, and I had not had the smallest intention of cleaning it whilst taking a simultaneous icy shower, and so it has got worse and worse.
I felt very pleased with myself when it was done. It is nice to go to work in a clean taxi.
After that I collected together the hundreds of forms that the council has required before they will consider licensing the new taxi. I filled in the application and then scanned and emailed them all, although without much hope. My experience of sending forms to the council is that their archaic computing system refuses to accept almost everything. It doesn’t tell you this and so you finish up in a sort of oblivious default, whilst in the council administrative tower they draw a red line through your name and taxi-driving career with a final, bitter flourish.
I have sent them anyway, and will telephone tomorrow just to make sure.
After all of that I watered the conservatory. This took ages, because it makes everywhere very wet, and so before I started I had to sweep up. Dried muddy footprints do not mix well with half a gallon of leaked water, and the taxi is not the only place that has been harbouring muddy dogs and walkers.
There was no point in sweeping up before I had brought in the firewood to refill the hearth, so I trailed sawdust all over the floor first and then swept afterwards. I was proud of myself for this foresight. It has been learned through doleful experience.
I swept and watered and mopped, and then, because it had all taken such a long time, I was late to work, which is where I am now.
It has been a very quiet evening.
I don’t care. I have got a good book, a flask of peppery chai tea, and a warm taxi.
