• Windscreens: they’re like buses, no?
• Peachy
• Fuse box
• Take two tablets and call me in the morning
• One man team
• Back in the saddle
• Parking trouble
• Windscreen update
• Gimme.
• Design flaw?

 

• Computing
• News
• Random
• Sport

 

• February 2007
• January 2007

 

• D-flat Chimebar
• Daringfireball
• Gordon McLean
• Limmy

November 2008

M	T	W	T	F	S	S
« Feb
					1	2
3	4	5	6	7	8	9
10	11	12	13	14	15	16
17	18	19	20	21	22	23
24	25	26	27	28	29	30

Eight cars, and twelve years of driving, and never as much as a chip in a windscreen. Tomorrow, I’ll be putting my car back into the garage to get my second replacement windscreen in two months. At least this time I’m aware of when the chip might’ve happened, as I did hear the sharp crack of a small object (probably a stone) hitting my windscreen as I drove home along the M8 on Friday evening. When I got home, I poured over the windscreen, looking for the chip that might have been left, but couldn’t see anything.

This morning, I noticed a crack coming from the left hand side about half way down the glass, a good two inches in length. When I got out and checked that, I could see the original chip that was caused on the Friday: obvious now that it was highlighted by the associated crack.

When I was booking the car in, I made the remark that this was the second new windscreen in two months for me, and the girl said that the statistics showed that it was likely that every driver would suffer a chip or a crack in their windscreen once every seven years.

So yes, maybe after 12 years of (windscreen) trouble-free motoring I was perhaps overdue my turn, but now the piss is just being taken!

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As I mentioned in this post, I somehow managed to fall on Saturday night when I was out enjoying the rugby. Well, by Saturday night I wasn’t enjoying the rugby exactly; I had already enjoyed the rugby. I was by then enjoying falling down, it seems.

I was aware that I’d really hurt my arm, because of the extreme pain and lack of movement in it on Sunday, hence I was a casualty statistic on Monday. I wasn’t aware I’d managed to give myself the mother of all bruises until last night. It’s on the back part of my thigh, and it doesn’t hurt to touch, but look at it! Is that not the worst bruise you’ve ever seen? I should really be dead with bruising like that or something, shouldn’t I?

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I’ve owned quite a few cars since passing my driving test around 15 years ago. I’m not the most mechanical person in the world, but in the past I’ve fitted some low profile fog lights (Ford Escort), fitted new brake pads myself (again, Ford Escort), changed a couple of tyres, that kind of thing.

Up until today, I’d never actually changed a fuse in a car. You’d think that a fuse would be one of the most common things to go in a car, and I actually had to think about it today to realise that it’s something that’s never happened to me before.

I drive a diesel car, and as it’s only just over a year old it has quite a modern diesel engine in it. Unlike older diesel engines it’s quite clean: a fact ratified by my road tax remittance of only £50.00 for a full year.

One other thing that’s quite different with modern diesel engines (and I suppose modern diesel fuel) is that you no longer need to wait two hours from turning your ignition on, slowly watching your battery drain as the little fuel heater symbol stayed lit on your dashboard, before finally turning the key fully to ignite the engine. In fact, in the time I’ve owned my car (around 14 months) I’ve only ever seen that little curly symbol a handful of times. The point is, when I do see it, I know that it’s fucking cold out there.

That little symbol has appeared the past two mornings: only for a second or so, but it’s still cold enough that my diesel needs to be heated a bit before I use it to run my engine. Yesterday morning, after I’d started the engine, I got out to scrape the ice from the car’s windows. Once I’d done that, I jumped in and began driving to work. After a few miles, I tried to spray my windows with screen wash to clean them. Nothing happened, but I just assumed that it had been cold enough to freeze my screen wash container, even though I always use actual screen wash concentrate rather than just water on its own.

This morning, I did the same thing, only this time I realised that not only was the water not coming out, but I wasn’t hearing the noise from the motor trying to squirt the water out. I even turned off the radio and drove slowly to minimise all other noise, but there definitely wasn’t any noise coming from the screen wash motor.

Resigned to the fact that I’d have to phone the garage and book the car in to get a new motor fitted and be without the car for a day, I was at least comforted by the fact that it’s still under warranty, so it shouldn’t actually cost me anything.

I was moaning about this inconvenience to a work colleague this morning, and he suggested it might be the fuse. I can’t believe I never even considered this could be the fault. My only defense is that I have never had a fuse blow on me before in all my years of driving.

I duly got out the handbook, located my two fuse boxes (one in the glove compartment, one under the bonnet) and set about checking the fuse that controlled the screen wash mechanism. The 30 amp one in the glove compartment seemed ok, so I dug under the bonnet and found the 10 amp one in there. This was most definitely not ok.

A trip to the local motor accessories place and I had a new 10 amp fuse which I slotted in place, and hey-presto, I now have clean windows. Result.

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The pain in my arm subsided yesterday, partly due to the intake of Anadin Ultra, partly due to the intake of a few bottles of Corona.

When I got up this morning though, it took me fifteen minutes to get my shirt and tie on for work - the top button of a shirt is practically impossible to fasten with only one hand I discovered. I did manage to drive into work, but changing gear was a bit of a struggle, and I had to work my indicators with the opposite hand. I decided that I should probably go and get my arm checked out at A&E.

The nice people there took a look at it, and decided that x-rays would be needed to see if I’d broken anything. This involved taking my shirt and tie off to put on a daft wee gown thing, so I got the enjoyment of trying to put the shirt back on afterwards. This time I decided to go for the casual look, and so didn’t fasten my top button, and didn’t bother with the tie.

Four x-rays were taken, but thankfully nothing appears to be broken. The pain and restricted movement of my arm and wrist is down to bruising and swelling. I’ve been given tablets (ibuprofen to get the swelling down, and co-codamol for the pain).

Hopefully be back to full working order within a week or so.

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You wouldn’t have thought that one man could make such a difference to a team. The evidence is unquestionable though: had Wilkinson not been playing in yesterday’s Calcutta Cup game at Twickenham, then very possibly Scotland could have won it.

Especially when you consider that the try he scored wasn’t a try. He clearly had a foot out of play before he placed the ball on the ground over the try line, so that shouldn’t have counted. Despite my shouts at the screen in the pub, the try stood.

Good game though, I quite enjoyed it, and it was a good atmosphere in the pub where my mates and me decided to watch it. I seem to have broken my arm though, as I fell later in the night after a few more libations. If freedom of movement doesn’t return by tomorrow, I think I’ll seriously need to think about visiting A&E to get it x-rayed.

And for the record, I fucking hate Jonny Wilkinson. Hate him.

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I’ve just upgraded to Wordpress 2.1. Seems to have gone OK, but I’m sure some weird things will turn up eventually.

This is the first “spare” time I’ve had to come anywhere near my blog for a week or so. I’ll always say that I’d much rather be busy and employed than not busy and unemployed, but seriously the past couple of weeks so many different things have been going on at work I’ve hardly had a minute to do anything. Why is it that you can go for weeks or even months without any major projects to work on, and then you get three MAJOR projects all at once?

And what’s with meetings? I’ve been to more meetings in the past month than I have in the past three years probably. I’m sick of the sight of Glasgow Airport, and hotel meeting rooms, with their free coffee and orange juice and jugs of water on the tables.

Anyway, things will continue to be pretty hectic, but I should now have some time to write some nonsense for your poor people to read on here. Ooo, that’s nifty…just as I was typing this (unsaved) post, Wordpress has just gone and autosaved it for me. Excellent stuff this. I’m off to dig around under the hood to see what else is new and shiny.

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