I am on the taxi rank having a puzzling time.
I want to purchase a thing on eBay.
I want a car radio that answers the telephone and plays the music and stories that I keep in my telephone, but I do not understand the things that eBay keeps showing to me.
It says USB AUX MP3 SD FM and lots and lots of other things and I do not have the first ghost of an idea what it is talking about.
I have got a storytelling thing on my telephone. The way it works is that Number Two Daughter pays her money into a thing called Audible, which puts books into her telephone, and by a glad chance of fate, also into mine. This makes me very happy. I listen to them, usually whilst I am cleaning things or cooking.
She hasn’t bought the next one in the series yet. I keep looking.
She has got lots of other books that I would like to listen to, though, and I think it would be a nice thing to do whilst I am driving. Not when there are customers in the car, obviously. Customers interrupt even interesting radio programmes to ask you if you have been busy and are not put off even if you ignore them and turn the radio up. Also you are not allowed to play music to customers, in case they enjoy it and it breaches somebody’s performing rights. I do not play music to customers at all, even when I would really like them to shut up.
All the same there are lots of journeys back from places when it would be nice to be able to listen to a story. I used to listen to Radio Four, but it is not nice any more. It seems to be trying to make me feel worried or guilty, and preferably both, all the time. I do not like feeling either worried or guilty and so I have turned it off. Even the plays are not nice any more. Black people do not seem to be allowed to play baddies, which I do not think is fair, and in any case the stories always seem to finish halfway through so you have got to make up the happy ever after for yourself.
I like stories, especially ones where I know the ending, and I want a car radio that I can fasten to my telephone to get the stories out of it.
I am trying to puzzle my way through lots of incomprehensible eBay pages. I will let you know how I get on.
I have had a very busy day. Mark has been busy doing things to the Peppers’ camper van, which had a hole in the floor, so I have been by myself.
I cleaned my taxi.
This was a cheering thing. It feels lovely now. It is not dusty or sticky and I have squirted it with stuff that smells nice.
When it was clean I drove down to the garage and asked if they would mend the punctured tyres. In fact my taxi had two punctures. I did not find out about this until I got a screw stuck in my front tyre, and when we changed it for the spare we found out that the spare kept going flat as well.
Mark can mend punctures but he has been too busy. I am fed up of worrying about my tyres going flat, so I went to the garage myself.
It was not nearly as bad as I had been expecting. The garage man grunted and nodded and was not patronising at all. This was a bonus, because I have had some sharp exchanges with garage men who think that women do not know anything about cars and can be exploited for maximum profit. They are absolutely right about my not knowing anything about my car but I have always been able to ask Mark when they are not listening, and hence sound far more knowledgeable than I actually am.This is useful if you are on a limited budget.
It is nice to have round wheels again, and he even put the right wheel back on the taxi for me so that I did not have to do it myself when I got home. I am enjoying this evening very much. The taxi smells nice and is easy to steer, hurrah.
I even cleaned the outside. I took it to the petrol station and washed it. I got soaked whilst doing this because the brush squirted out unexpectedly the wrong way, and I got drenched in warm soapy foam. I thought it was just like a very comprehensive hand sanitiser and decided not to worry about it.
When got home I did a cruel thing.
I gave the dogs a haircut.
They did not at all want a haircut, because it is not warm any more, and they have been shivering miserably ever since. The thing is that if I had not cut their hair now they would have been like hearthrugs by the springtime, and when Roger Poopy grows long fur it breaks off and finishes up all over the carpet. This makes me irrationally cross with him. If I am still to love him in January he needed a haircut today.
This was a difficult and wriggly procedure.
Roger Poopy was the worst.
He curled up tightly on the operating table trying to make himself as small as he could. Whenever I tugged a bit out to shave it it snapped back the second I let go of it.
Even his tail was difficult.
There was a very lot of fur.
I cleaned it all up and came out to work, which is where I am now.
I am going to go and try to work out what an MP3 might be.
I haven’t got a picture of the cold dogs.
Have a picture of Pepper and some stolen gaffer tape.
