Something else happened with the wifes cars. I was driving it to the MOT centre to be tested. Which is a government requirement to make sure the car is fundamentally road worthy.
Anyway, half way there something serious happened. Yes you guess it: A wheel fell off.
Which was unfortunate, as it really needs 4 wheels to go fowards.
Luckily it happened at a junction, and the car was stationary.
I knew something was wrong when I drove it. It felt funny, but I figured the brakes were sticking - this car never gets used and I though it would figure itself out.
So I'm stranded on a very very busy street. Right on the junction. With 3 wheels. The wifes broken car. And million angry commuters in every direction. I had no TAX, no MOT (that's where I was going) and the car was going no where. This was 8:45am yesterday. The town ground to a 3DOkid style halt.
So obviously the Police turn up.
I figure, if I'm lucky, I'm merely dead. As opposed to raped and dead. Which in the two minutes it took for the cop to get out of his car and walk over to me was precisely what I figured would happen. I had No Tax disc, i do have a tax disc but it was in the house, and obviously no MOT certificate. Ergo, everything was not entirely legal.
I am legally allowed to drive an un'MOT'd car to the garage, but obviously the cops hear that every day. So -- I'm dead.
At best, seriously, points on my license and a fine, at worst? A court, a jury, a license taken off me, me losing my job, and eventually dying of starvation in the gutter clutching my 3DO, in the rain, under a bridge somewhere.
Anyway -- 2 minutes are up and the cops with me.
"What's up Sir"
"Wheel fell off my car officer, on the way to get my MOT."
The copper looks at me like: "OOOOOH REALLLLLLLY!?"
Anyway, he goes over to the car and goes: "Do you have a spare wheel and jack?"
I said "Yeah."
He said "Bring 'em here"
So I grab the spare and the jack and tyre iron and take them to the copper. The copper, then, bless him, lifts the front of the car so I can slide the jack in underneither.
No kidding.
It's like that moment in the incredible hulk.
Anyway, I slide the jack under, swap the tyres in record time (I've never changed so many tyres as in the last few weeks!)
...but then guess what?
The damned car battery is dead. The car had been on charge all night, but sat in traffic in the morning with it's hazzard lights on and no engine had drained it. It wouldn't start.
So the copper then helps me bump start the car.
I kept forgetting to breath.
So we're all done, and I'm shaking the cops hand and offering massive donations to the Police officers annual Ball, and he taps on the window screen where the tax disc should be and says: "Get this sorted will ya!"
And then he drives off at Mach 3.
I'm soooo lucky. Even more so because that wheel could have come off while I was doing 60Mph. Fortunately I chose to drive through town, and never went above 20Mph.
oh, and the car passed the MOT Test
Than as her mind focuses on a tall dark & masked Antonio Banderas, the car will quickly be forgotten ...