Today we were up early (6.30) for a Sunday, we went to pick up a Chevy dayvan that King Sugar won on eBay.
Tube tickets to Waterloo and then a South Western train to Salisbury came to around £87. We were looking forward to driving back home in it and had already loosely arranged a couple of weekends away with friends in July.
We'd arranged on Friday to meet the seller at the train station at midday. When we were leaving Waterloo this morning, we texted him to let him know we were on the train. He replied asking us to let him know around 15 mins before the train was due to arrive at the station, he also asked what colour jacket King Sugar was wearing.
Fifteen minutes later he sent another text saying he would be delayed by up to an hour and that we should wait for him in Cafe Nero and he would come a meet us there and we would walk to the van from there.
He'd changed the collection arrangements several a few times already over the last week and all this made us a bit nervous, the change of plan at such short notice, we had the money for the van in cash too. Over the last few years we've had quite a few car buying friends who have been mugged in situations like this.
The whole thing didn't feel right so we decided to get off at the next train stop and head back home, another £64 in train tickets.KS sent the seller a message telling him so .
As we were coming into Waterloo station, KS received a message from the man saying he had just left Salisbury Cathedral , that he always attended the service there on a Sunday and that we should get the train back to Salisbury to honour the sale. He said that we had cost him time and money and that KS should apologise, he said that clearly KS was paranoid and should perhaps move to a small village somewhere , where there was less crime.
Out of curiosity I searched the cathedrals service times online and saw that the regular Sunday service finished at 12, an hour before this man had said he'd just left.
Since then he's sent quite a few horrible messages, makes me feel uneasy , maybe we are too over cautious, maybe living in a place like London makes one more cynical , I don't know. But what I do know is that King Sugar has been in the car business for almost 25 years now and is as straight as they come, I've never known anyone fairer or more conscientious .
I feel that the world is a frightening place at the moment and feel worried about what's going to happen next . I bought KS a trifle from M&S to cheer him up, it seemed to do the trick, he's asleep now . But I'm not , I sitting here thinking too much.