We have continued with the camper van project.
We had planned to make an early start, leaping out of bed shortly after dawn and dashing off with shining morning faces, but that turned into one of those best laid plans that collapse at the first moment of challenge, in our case about two minutes after we woke up.
When we opened the curtains the day was grimly unwelcoming, windy and wet, so we thought we might have a coffee in bed. Then Mark remembered that my taxi needed something doing to it because of a troubling noise, and I remembered that I had promised to do some printing for our next door neighbour. He is marking exams but his printer has failed to work.
My own printer is on its very last legs as well, it keeps telling me that it is about to expire and I need to contact Epsom, but I haven’t done, because of not wishing to spend three quarters of an hour in their automated call system only to be told that it will cost me a hundred and eighty six US dollars to fix the problem, plus domestic taxes. It is the sort of problem which will drag on and on until a moment of intense and desperate printing urgency, at which point the thing will pack up, refusing to work with a martyred air of I Told You So, and Mark will have to take it apart to try and get it to work again. We will finish up with ink all over the desk and then have to buy a new one anyway.
Really I need to think about a new printer before that day arrives, but we all know that I will have forgotten by tomorrow.
Our next door neighbour came round and attached his computer to the printer, which worked well enough in the end, and printed out dozens of pages of badly-spelled exam papers, educational standards not being what they were, whilst I offered occasional gems of advice and occupied myself with checking Mark’s emails, because he never bothers.
I was halfway through this process when I made the horrifying discovery of an email from his current employers. Actually there were two emails but one was telling him that they intended to pay him tomorrow, which was, frankly, very welcome.
The second was announcing that the mobilisation for which he was due to depart on Sunday has been changed.
They don’t yet know when the new date will be.
I summoned Mark out from underneath my taxi to impart this news, and he telephoned them. Then he telephoned everybody else who has been trying to get him to go and work for them, and who he has turned down. They have all found other people by now, which led to much grumbling and eye-rolling.
I tried to make my face look suitably stricken, but actually I don’t mind very much, it is very useful to have Mark at home, and another few days will not be a problem.
We will find out tomorrow.
After that we finally organised ourselves to go over to the camper van.
Mark was building shelves and work benches in his shed whilst I carried on packing up all of our things. We are going to take the whole van apart and so it needs to be empty, which it isn’t.
There is a very, very, very lot of stuff to be packed. I mean a very, very lot.
We filled the entire back of Mark’s taxi with towels and saucepans and dishes and coffee pots and teapots and cutlery and underwear. Then I piled curtains and dressing gowns and swimming clothes and tinned food on top of that.
I am not nearly even halfway through yet.
I have not started on the bathroom or our bedroom or the wardrobe.
It is no wonder that he needed to upgrade the braking system to five tons.
Mark keeps looking at it all and making witty comments and laughing.
We had to leave it in the end and make our way home for work. Actually we had almost left when we remembered that the dogs had packed themselves underneath the bed in the camper van, which is one of their very favourite places, and so we had to go back again and unlock everything and summon them to accompany us, which they did with some reluctance.
I understand how they feel.
