The annual car test in the UK, oh what fun. You drop off your 4 wheeled rusting heap of metal at a garage and then wait hours for the call. Has it passed or more likely you hear those dreaded words ‘it’s failed on the following points… we need to replace…..’. The Latin equivalent of this is ‘let us emptinus your bank accountus’.

The garage I use currently is one of those really shiny new dealerships with lots of spanky expensive new cars outside. All polished and gleaming. Inside the posh building you are greated with the offer of an espresso and ushered to a comfy sofa. A proper sofa that puts our pet wrecked one to shame. While you wait you can watch the latest movie on a massive cinema like TV. Makes me smile thinking about the last garage I would use. Proper old garage. Oil and sawdust everywhere. If there was a chair for customers it was held together by tape. There was a drinks machine but it only dispensed painfully weak bovril and what I assumed was tomato soup. No TV there just posters of various Italian sports cars, cars that this garage would never ever get to work on. It’s the sort of place you take a car where it’s quicker to talk about the few things that work than the hundreds of actual faults. But this old garage had one beautiful feature, it was cheap. Cheap I eventually figured out also ment that sometimes the repaired parts were not actually guaranteed to work or be that securely attached to the car.

Now at the way more expensive yet reliable car fixer, I finish off the lovely coffee while I swap keys and off I go in a sparkly hardly used curtesy car. A really really really nice car. A car with a clear message to tell ‘why drive your crap car when you could give the dealership even more of your money and you could have a proper car like me….’. Sometimes they just go too far. Last year the dealership gave me a huge luxury tank powered basically by a fighter jet engine. During the thankfully brief hours I had that beast I had the feeling it was trying to kill me. The slightest touch on the accelerator and it behaved like a fighter jet going into take off mode. Even Hawklad said that it really sounded like it was growling at us. That kinda thing might have worked with Lewis Hamilton but not with a coward like me.

This time they gave me car with a way more sensible engine… but still there was a problem. The dashboard, the LCD screens, all the electronic graphs and digital performance information. Million options and settings to tailor the experience to suit the driver. It’s just too pigging complicated for me. It took me 15 minutes to find out how to switch the DAB radio on and another 15 minutes to find out how to turn the volume up. I just want to get in, listen to music and drive. Can’t we have two start up options on new cars now. One with all the technology graphs and complicated stuff. And yes one for muppets like me, press one button which basically turns the car on and puts on the radio… nothing else thank you. All this new car complications was not an issue I ever faced at the old cheap garage. The car you got to use there was most definitely not a curtesy car rather something that appeared to have raced in way too many destruction derbies. I think even the Flinstones car would have beaten that sorry looking vehicle in a race. That car definitely gave the message ‘if you think your car is bad try driving me for a week….’.

This time my so called heap of rust car needed many parts which even this garage didn’t have in stock. So I got to keep the curtesy car for a couple of days.

The final sting in the car test ordeal came the next morning. I flinged open the curtains and immediately got to see a brand spanking curtesy car on my driveway and for a few brief wonderfully delusional moments thought…. ‘Wow I’ve never really noticed how good my car looks’. Then I remember, my heap of rust is miles away in a garage being rebuilt, trying to be made roadworthy, at great expense and I can’t afford that car I’m looking at. Well at least I will get another nice coffee in a few hours when my heap of metal empties my bank account.

47 thoughts on “Cars”

  3. I agree! I don’t need all the bell and whistles and the complications when they go wrong. My friend couldn’t get in his car because the autmotated seat thing laid the whole way down and wouldn’t come up! 😂

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    1. I think a car should be a vehicle that allows you to go places. I don’t need a computer/entertainment center on wheels. Nowadays car commercials don’t even mention what the car has (engine, tires, speed, etc.) all they talk about it wi-fi, computer screen, entertainment centers, and bluetooth. I find it very annoying.

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  4. Yes, it’s a yearly inspection here in Oz, too. Generally there’s something to be changed and charged… $Ouch! It reminds me of going to the dentist – sort of. A yearly event that, hopefully, won’t be too costly or hurtful.

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  5. We’ve just put ours in for its first MOT. She passed, though I remember another car I’d bought years ago that was two years old at purchase and it failed its first test on the steering rack. It cost about £70 to get it through and I didn’t keep it. We’ve had the Duster almost a year now, and it’s made a dent in our running costs: the citroen was zero road tax, this, even though only a 1000cc engine compared to 1600, is £180 and likely to double next year. Mileage isn’t bad, but down on the diesel, and my insurance doubled, but then the citroen would have too as everything shot up last year. At least this year it’s cheaper. However, we needed a bigger car and the boot space for Maya is great without having to compromise on back seat passengers. Loads of knobs for Hubby to twiddle with and it’s a comfy ride. This will probably be the last car we own as they seem to be cracking down on older drivers by robbing them blind one way or another.
    Hope it’s not too much to get fixed.

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  6. I have the other type of garage here in Wales, where you drop the car off in a muddy pull in area and leave the keys somewhere handy, to get a text to later come back and leave the cash also somewhere handy and drive away the old car fixed for a song to a reasonable, usable standard.

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    1. Oh and also my parts are often picked up from Tanygroes Car Dismantlers TCD and that is I walk to a car, pull out the bit needed, then pay a fraction of the cost of new, at the desk, in the shed.
      https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Tanygroes+Car+Dismantlers+TCD/@52.1270466,-4.4919688,516m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x486f3cbdf599445b:0x24651b624f75b570!8m2!3d52.1269149!4d-4.4924945!16s%2Fg%2F1tdyf1q6?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDIyNS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

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  8. A few months back I hired a car for £45 for a one way from Scotland to Wales drop off. That car had all the bells and whistles, but it just felt so weird to have a screen for a radio. I admit, I had to open the window wide on the M6 to check occasionally that I was in reality, it was well lush.

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      1. I don’t think it’s safe, but then again what is? Before the seat belt law, I used a dressing gown cord tied between the back doors of a Morris Marina. The kids sat under under it with their arms over and I would turn round and check them every now and then (whilst driving) to make sure they were still sat proper like and not acting up.

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  9. Ah, Gary…we have the same experience. Last year my car was away for weeks (literally) being rewired after mice ate it. We too go to a dealership with all those facilities but I am a coward. I send the man!

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    1. Living in SoCal, one of my biggest fears is losing the ability to drive. Sure, rideshares are an option, but they’ve become obscenely expensive. The last time I used one, it was $15+ to go less than 2 miles.

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      1. And I went to a retirement community where there is a van to do groceries if it comes to that and staff that will take you in a car to a limited number of places during limited hours. The people who gave up driving all seem to regret it, but they really had to give it up as they weren’t safe.

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  11. Oh, I love a good loaner car! It’s also why I like driving my neighbors to/from LAX. The time I got stuck in a jam for 30+ minutes was bliss, because I got to explore all the random screen options!

    For real life, I prefer less computer parts and more buttons. My current car is a 2010 but still has some computerized options that I despise, plus an annoying bug in the mapping option (I figured out a workaround but it still irritates me).

    Our bi-annual smog checks used to take an hour but are now down to about 5 min… awesome!!

    I hope you enjoy having your car back!

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      1. I have a mix of nobs & electronics. I use touch buttons on the steering wheel for radio volume because the knob is all screwed up, doing whatever ot feels like. I worry about the touch button cover eventually breaking. The car’s gloss cover is peeling like mad and it makes me sad… it was sooo pretty before that started!

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  14. Enjoy your sparkling cutesy car for the few extra days you have it! I share your amusing confoundment with extra buttons and gadgets on more modern cars too. I just want the bare minimum features! 😆

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