Cat

Busy day today.

Parkrun

I was timekeeping because one of the DofE kids had sneaked their name on the roster before I could last week. This is the second time this has happened. Nobody even asks my permission! (NB They don’t need to ask anyone’s permission. Some roles are typically filled by the same people each week, for example finish tokens, one timekeeper, certain marshal positions, volunteer coordinator.)

The funnel didn’t go smoothly thanks to a rookie error on the tokens and a UI problem with the app. It’s all fine, as long as the funnel manager is told and they note it down on their clipboard. After that, it’s the results processor’s problem.

I wished I’d worn my big parkrun coat because it was freezing. Good for the runners, though.

Cat

Back at home, it was a comedy of cat errors.

I cleaned the bath and mopped the bathroom floor, shutting the door behind me when done: the stuff said not to let pets walk on it till it was dry.

I mopped the kitchen floor. Mr Perkins was out when I started, but came in before I finished. I grabbed him before he could walk on a wet bit and tried to shut him in the living room.

He was displeased. He went all slinky and got past me.

I sighed. I grabbed him and took him upstairs and shut him in the shower room with me. I put my phone on the side of the sink and put some water in the sink, then plonked his paws in varying combinations with varying sharpness of claws.

Yes, of course my phone ended up in the water.

I gave Mr Perkins’ paws as good a wash as I could, then let him go.

He walked all over the bath mat, leaving wet paddy-paw prints. That’s fine; it’s what it’s there for. But I hadn’t thought to bring up his towel.

I opened the door, then remembered I hadn’t shut the stairs door, so he walked all over the kitchen floor, still not dry, again.

I grabbed his towel, and repeated the above from the sigh, but learning from my mistakes. He was displeased.

While we were trapped upstairs, I started folding towels on the bed. The very first one, a bath towel, I laid out and folded in half then folded one third over. Mr Perkins sat on the folded third. I couldn’t complain; his feet were still damp, and that’s what towels are for.

I folded the rest of the towels, putting them in tidy piles. When I was done, he got up from the first towel, but before I could fold it and put its friends on top, he sat on the pile of its friends and settled down, moving only to lick his still-damp paws.

I sighed; finished folding the first towel, and picked up its friends, complete with cat, and put them on the first towel. I expected Mr Perkins to get up, but he didn’t.

I picked up the pile of towels and cat, carried it to the landing, and put it beside another pile of towels. Then he alighted.

I went back downstairs, failing to stop him sneaking past into the kitchen. Luckily, the floor looked about dry by then. I couldn’t face washing his paws a third time.

Air

I had to go out, leaving Mr Perkins alone; not for long because Mr Pandammonium would soon return from his epic trip.

I left a plethora of post-it notes for him regarding the cat and the washing and stuff.

I’d be driving for an hour, so I got the phone-charging wire out and plugged it into my phone.

‘I’m not going to charge because there’s liquid in the charging hole,’ the phone said in different words in a dialogue box. I sighed. Cat. I put the wire away.

Henry’s handling has been a bit weird. When parked the car and looked to see how far out from the kerb I was, I realised why: Henry’s front offside tyre was flat. I sighed.

I went to my writing group meeting, where I read it a short story I’d written after getting my new glasses.

After the meeting, my phone still wasn’t ready to be plugged in. I looked on Google maps for a garage (aka a petrol station) so I could fill the tyre. There was one, as I vaguely recalled, on the way, not too far away.

I pulled in, and looked around for the air machine. There was none. I sighed, and opened Google maps once again.

A car pulled up at a nearby petrol pump. The driver got out and clocked my tyre. My window was open because it was boiling.

‘Your front tyre’s flat.’

‘I know; I’m looking for air, but they don’t have any.’

‘Do you know Elizabeth Way?’

‘Yes.’ It wasn’t very far away.

‘The garage there has air. I had a slow puncture, and got some from there.’

‘Thank you.’

‘You’d better be careful, or they’ll throw the book at you.’

Eep.

At the Elizabeth Way garage, I couldn’t see the air. I went in the shop.

The air machine was on the other side of the forecourt, near the jet wash.

It only took coins. I didn’t have any coins, except, perhaps for an old pound coin. I’d neglected to bring what passes for my purse. I wondered if the man would do cash back on a card payment, but he didn’t look amenable.

I’d seen a cash machine outside.

‘It’ll charge you two pound.’

I huffed. ‘Thank you.’ I went back outside.

I realised I couldn’t get any cash anyway because my card was with my current pound coins.

I went to the machine to see if it took cards despite what the man said. What the man said was correct. If it took cards and contactless payments, I could’ve paid by phone.

There was a couple at the air machine. Their car was parked in front of it, but they weren’t using it. She was on the phone; he was faffing about in the back of the car.

They asked if I wanted to use the machine. I explained.

A man on a bike came past and asked if we were getting air. The lady said no; I wondered if I could cadge a pound off him and we’d share the air. He was hoping to do the opposite. It made more sense his way round, of course. He cycled off before I could say anything.

As I stood staring at the air machine, hoping it would suddenly accept contactless payments, the couple spoke to each other in a language I couldn’t quite recognise. I love trying to work out what language people are speaking, although I’m not very good at it.

Then the lady turned to me and offered me a pound coin. Oh, the relief! She was still on the phone; I let her finish up.

‘Vale, vale.’

That’s Spanish for ‘Ok, ok.’ But none of the rest of sounded familiar.

When she was finished, she rummaged in her purse for a pound coin.

‘What language was that?’

‘Spanish.’

We agreed, chuckling, that Spaniards speak too fast.

She handed me the pound coin.

‘Muchas gracias.’

She looked surprised, but touched.

I went back to fetch Henry over. The couple had moved their car forwards to the vacuum machine by then. They were busy hoovering their car’s upholstery and mats.

I watched Henry’s tyre as it came back to life, hoping it wasn’t a slow puncture like the man at the other garage had had. I topped up the other tyres while I was at it; none of them really needed it.

When I was done, I went back to the lady.

‘Otra vez, muchas gracias. Usted es muy simpática.’

That’s Spanish for the polite form of Many thanks again. You’re very nice. I’d have said kind, but I don’t know the word for kind.

Henry’s handling was much improved. I drove home, via Screwfix in Ely. It’s a shame I hadn’t picked Screwfix on the A10 because they were probably still open when I passed, whereas the Ely one wasn’t. Luckily, Henry’s newly improved handling meant a three-point turn in front of the barriers across the road was easy.

At the research park roundabout on the A10, I saw no vehicles coming, so I entered the roundabout. I glanced to my right as I did so, and double-took: one, maybe two, families of geese were crossing from the tree-covered island in the middle to the central reservation where I’d just come from.

The adults were at either end; there was possibly one in the middle like a lollipop lady/man/person, and a stream of baby geese – goslings, you might say – crossing in an orderly line. The flash of cuteness was welcome after the air stress.

Back at the ranch

I got home, bursting for the loo. I went in the bathroom, only to find a tent hanging from the shower curtain rail over the bath and a ground sheet in the bath, along with grass and mud. Why did I bother?

Mr Pandammonium was overwhelmed by the plethora of post-it notes and the smell of cleaning products. He’d noted the contents of the notes, and acted accordingly.

Later, I asked him if he’d put his washing in the washing machine. He had. It hadn’t been making a noise, so I asked him if he’d taken it out. He said there hadn’t been a note to say that.

I sighed, thinking about how all that wet washing would be sitting there, but I was too knackered to do anything about it at that point. Then I forgot all about it.

Still, it was nice to see Mr Pandammonium. Mr Perkins curled up on his knee after tea, while we were starting to catch up on two weeks’ of telly, starting with Masterchef.

Both of us were ready for an early night.