We are home, bloody but unbowed.
There was a thrilling moment when pulling out of a petrol station, when the engine stopped and refused to start again, but Mark fiddled about with the wires underneath the steering wheel and everything was restored. Somebody grumpy pulled round us and blew their horn, and we made some taxi driver hand signals, because we could not help accidentally blocking the road.
There is something of a wiring issue at the moment. After the last trip and the nasty smell of burning and the small fire under the steering wheel, Mark replaced some of the wires, but we know that some more need replacing, probably all of them actually, and we are going to have to get around to it soon, because carrying a fire extinguisher is not exactly a solution.
However we were pleased to discover that the last rewire has improved the headlights enormously, and I am happy to report that we can now see where we are going, even at night. This helps very much, it would be dreadful accidentally to run over a werewolf, or whoever else might be out and about at the times when we are habitually on the road.
We woke up somewhere in Scotland, and really we have been driving all day. Scotland we much improved today, the picture is the one that I took yesterday and could not get on to these pages. That was a grim moment. I had written the day’s diary entry whilst Mark was in the shower, and then realised that I did not have the right sort of telephone reception to get on to the mighty Internet. There was lots of signal on my phone, but it must have been the old fashioned sort, without 3G, or whatever it is that makes possible written communication with the outside world.
I flapped about for ages, in a horrible combination of anxiety and sleepiness. I hoped that Mark might volunteer to get dressed again and drive the van somewhere else, but I am sorry to say that he didn’t. He made a sympathetic grunting noise and went to sleep.
In the end I managed to wave my phone in the air until it found some 3G floating about somewhere. It linked to my computer, and eventually I managed to get the whole thing to join the cyber-universe, but it was touch and go, and I could not get photographs to download at all. It started posting them, but kept telling me that my requests had timed out, and in the end I just got fed up of it. My eyes felt as though they had filled up with cement dust and I had had enough of the day. I abandoned you, heartlessly, and went to sleep.
This worked out all right in the end, though, because even though I forgot to take a photograph today there is a spare one here, left over from yesterday, and so you can have that.
We are home now, and Mark is lighting the fire. We have only just got here, and I can tell you that it is wonderful to be back. The cement has set hard on the floor of the conservatory, it looks a bit like the sort of cage that old fashioned horrible zoos used to have for their animals. There is the odd paw print and boot print in it, but this does not matter because when we become rich we are going to tile it. I think I would like pink tiles, but I have not told Mark this yet.
I am going to go away and leave you. I have not yet unpacked, and I think what I would like more than absolutely anything else in the world is an early night. We are not going to do anything at all tonight. We are going to have a small holiday for the evening, and go to bed. Mark has got to go to work tomorrow, and I have got to post to Oliver all of the things that he has forgotten, like toothpaste and his woolly hat.
It has been a busy few days. I am not sorry that they are over.
