They say that inside every adult is still a child wanting to get out. This is especially true of me, and it just so happens that the child inside me is the illegitimate offspring of Ray Mears and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. Give this inner child free reign, and I would be skinning rabbits, making dens and brewing my own beer out of stinging nettles and grass before you could say “Who are you? What are you doing in my garden? IS THAT MY RABBIT?!?”
Luckily I live with someone who has a mutual love of all things ‘outdoors’ (maybe not all things – we’re still working on wasps), but it’s hardly surprising that we have quite a lot of conversations about what kind of car we’d ideally need to accommodate us and all the camping gear we’ve accumulated over the years.
So, last year myself, my good lady wife and our daughter Ebony were having an ever-so-grown-up discussion over breakfast about which ‘family car’ we might look into getting at some point in the future.
The conversation went along these lines:
“I like the Citroen Picasso”
“Yeah, me too…. Looks like its got loads of room. What do you think Ebs?”
Now I know that children are the adults of tomorrow. However, there are still a few good reasons why they should be excluded from certain avenues of discourse before they’re absolutely ready.
A look of deep thought flashed across her face before she shouted excitedly:
“We should get a Limousine. NO…. WAIT…. CAN WE GET AN ICE CREAM VAN?”
I wouldn’t actually be opposed to driving a Limo. Say what you like about the trio of Smirnoff Ice swigging lady torsos that seem to be permanently attached to the roof of every Limo in every town across the UK
An ice cream van on the other hand would be an absolute nightmare. Sure, it’d be pretty roomy and you’d have ice cream literally on tap, but you wouldn’t be able to stop anywhere for more than 30 seconds without attracting a swarm of awful little bastards hassling you for a 99 with six flakes and a cider lolly for dad.
She just wasn’t thinking it through, so I sent her to her room.
We have these conversations more regularly since I started working for Chauffeur Monkey (never a dull moment round our gaff) and although I have now driven most of them, I still don’t really know what family car we should go for.
“But the Ford Fiesta LX 1996 isn’t a family car” I hear no one shout.
Correct. However, it’s the car I currently own and the one I regularly stuff – there’s no other word for it – my family into for various trips and outings in and around East Sussex . It’s not a big car. In fact, it’s kind of like the anti-TARDIS what with it being smaller on the inside that it would outwardly appear.
It’s due for its MOT soon and I’m dreading it. I’ve done nothing to maintain it since I bought it for £500 last year. No, that’s a lie. I topped up the windscreen washer fluid about 3 months ago. Not that this makes a blind bit of difference as the windscreen wipers are so old that they’ve grown thin strips of vegetation along their length. I think that every time I use the jet I’m actually just watering the wiper-garden.
There’s no power steering. I guess I shouldn’t complain about this, as performing 3 point turns may well be the only effective exercise I currently do, but it’s just not right in this day and age. I mean it’s got a tape deck for fuck’s sake (although this has meant that I’ve been able to continue listening to a tape of me doing an old school rave DJ set on a local pirate radio station in 2001. With the exception of my children, it’s one of the best things I’ve ever made).
Despite all of its shortcomings, I’ve not had a problem with it in the year that I’ve had it. Considering it’s nearly 17 years old, the engine always starts and it gets me from A to B. It would justifiably wear the classified ad slogan “Ideal first car”.
I think when it finally dies I’ll miss it in the same way that Ebony missed her late Hamster Martha:
“Ebony, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news…. Martha died last night”
“……..*sniff*……..”
“I know its sad darling, but she died in her sleep so it was quite peaceful”
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