Little Car: Postscript

In the wake of the silver Fiesta's departure, I thought I would cheer myself up by asking ChatGPT to write a poem about it. Because I have been amused by its previous attempts at poetry, I thought this would be a bit of a laugh. To deter it from going on at too much length, I asked it to write a haiku. Unfortunately its output was rather sweet. (I owned it for 15 years, not 19, but included '2007' in the keywords.)

Silver friend departs
Nineteen years of faithful roads
One last turn away

This hasn't helped.

Goodbye, Little Car

I have said goodbye to my silver 2007 Ford Fiesta, after 15 years of ownership. Which I know is quite a long time to keep a car, but it was still serving my needs, decent cars are expensive and I don’t see the point in changing cars for the sake of it.

Parked in the garage, shortly after I'd acquired it in May 2011

The Fiesta came via Bufton's of Peterchurch. Bufton's have now supplied my parents with four or so cars and they sourced this one for me in 2011. Prior to this, I had not owned a car for a few years, as I worked locally here in Reading and found it less hassle to hire a car for the odd long-distance journey. However, having accepted a job at the OU, I knew I’d need one, a) to travel back and forth between Reading and Milton Keynes, as the train journey is cumbersome; b) because Milton Keynes was clearly built around cars. MK is low-density and spread out for a UK town and it isn’t simply a case of walking from A to B, whereas in Reading, often it is (and where it isn’t, Reading has a much better bus service than MK does).

Snowy at Old Groveway in 2012

The Fiesta proved to be an excellently reliable, sturdy little vehicle. Over the years it’s had some repairs done, but nothing obscenely expensive - I think the priciest single repair was a clutch replacement in 2014 but that was sub-£400. In all the years I owned it, I think I only had to call the AA out three times, and one of those was to my home during lockdown when the car's battery had gone flat. I had managed to put quite a large number of miles on it: at its MOT in May 2011, when I got it, it had 45,128 miles on the clock; at its MOT this August it had 191,144. Although not the most comfortable drive over long distances, it was still reliably getting from A to B and had not reached the stage of "exciting" unpredictability that my Renault 5 reached the year before I offloaded it. So I took quite some time ruminating over whether it made sense to offload a still mechanically reliable vehicle and spend a not inconsiderable sum of money that I could have spent on other things, like a new kitchen. Also, more sentimentally, it had served me well and I was just going to abandon it, alone and bewildered, for the lure of a shinier, newer vehicle? What sort of a way was that to reward years of faithful service? This Reddit thread didn't help with all of that.

My friend Matt owns a 1987 Peugeot 205 which he evidently regards as part of the family. However, I’m reasonably sure that Matt’s Peugeot only does small local journeys. Most of my driving currently is between Reading and Milton Keynes (on the route that I usually take, about 70 miles) or to Wales to visit family (around 120 miles from Reading to Abergavenny), plus the occasional UK-based holiday. I do as little local driving as possible. For the last couple of years I have found the Fiesta less comfortable for longer journeys with pain up my right leg after about an hour of driving. I’ll also admit to being tempted by the navigation screens and climate control that a newer car promised, but then berated myself for shallowness, wanton extravagance etc. Also, various minor things had stopped working – most recently, the passenger door had stopped being willing to open from the outside. Nothing insurmountable, but small things can build up.

Looking a bit solitary in the car park at the Wolverton Park flats in 2019

Because I like to have some parameters, and I’d been impressed with the Fiesta’s reliability, I decided to go for another Fiesta. I’ve since discovered from Bufton's that Fiestas from the end years of production – Ford ceased production of the Fiesta in 2023 – are a bit like gold dust. To cut a few months’ car search story short, and skipping over several possibilities that didn’t come off, I am now the owner of a 2023 Ford Fiesta Trend. The new car is a delicious tomato red. It isn’t one of the turbo engines – actually, at only 1084 cc, its engine is smaller than my 2007 Fiesta, at 1242. Which I suppose isn’t ideal, but other things seemed right about it. Certainly driving it back on the motorway, I wouldn’t say its acceleration felt turbo-charged but I think it will be adequate for my purposes. It's a more comfortable and smoother ride than my old Fiesta - something I could tell as soon as I drove it out onto the road from Bufton's yard, even without Dad commenting darkly that the suspension was better on this one.

Parked near the Premier Inn MK Theatre District, where I often stay. Just back from being cleaned at Roni’s Peartree Bridge.

Mervyn Bufton had agreed that they would take back the 2011 Fiesta and give me something in part-exchange. I was not expecting very much, given that it had done heavy mileage and had some cosmetic damage, and was fine with the £500 I got for it. I was a bit more downcast when, having tried to assure Mervyn that it would be a good car for someone as a local runabout, he said “I don’t know what I’m going to do with it, to be honest” and said that apparently all the youngsters have high expectations, which I assume means more gadgetry than the old car has. Bloody hell. I drove off with visions of it being fed into a giant compactor as soon as my back was turned.

Parked under a tree in the OU’s East car park, July this year

Having a bath at the Hill's Meadow car wash last week

Ready to return to Buftons. Its last journey? 

I'll finish with its successful MOT in July this year. Relatively few advisories really. Rust schmust.

Car update; hay; AI poetry

Car: update

Reading Service Centre diagnosed the noise as being due to a problem with a nearside wheel bearing. Points to Mum, who on our way back from Derbyshire in early July had mooted the idea that it might be a wheel bearing issue. I did text her to congratulate her on her mechanical knowledge, though she modestly claimed it had been a lucky punt. The car failed its MOT on that plus a couple of more minor issues, all of which RSC fixed the same day and retested it. It is now MOT-ed for another year.

When I went to pay up and collect the car, I commented to the very nice chap there that every time the car develops something wrong with it these days, I think it’s going to be sayonara, and referred to its mileage. His response was something like “Nah! Good little cars, those. Go on for ever.” He isn’t the first mechanic I’ve had refer to Ford Fiestas in this vein, so perhaps there’s something in it. He went on to say something along the lines of how he’s had several cars that have done over 200,000 miles and they’ve been fine and as long as I get it an oil change yearly, it’ll be OK. I was cheered by this, though eventually I will no doubt be tempted by the gadgetry that comes with more modern cars, such as navigation screens, sensors to deter you from reversing into walls, and the like (though I think I have, amazingly, managed to avoid doing the latter in the whole of my >35-year driving career despite being sans sensors).

On my way out, another mechanic called over to me as I was approaching the car with “should be a lot better without that noise” and commented that the noise had been “horrific”. Certainly it had been becoming unsettling. I was glad that my worries about them calling me back to claim that they couldn’t hear anything had been unfounded. According to the internet, which I consulted immediately after they phoned me with the diagnosis, it’s extremely dangerous to drive with a severely worn wheel bearing and you should never do it. Oops. The relaxed chap in the office seemed to be of the view that advice off the internet does often overdo the scare tactics.

Cassius' hay consumption

For a few months now Ruth has been concerned at what appears to be a decline in Cassius’ hay consumption. He used to be a good muncher of hay, but I’ve been aware of no longer hearing the regular munch-munch-munch sound from behind me in my office – or at least, not as much as previously. Ruth’s first tactic was to stick a Post-It note low down on the door near his feeding area suggesting that he increased his hay consumption; the note fell off the door and he chewed the corners off it, but we didn’t notice any other change in behaviour.

Wondering whether he simply doesn’t like the hay she’s been buying lately, Ruth splashed out on a pricey hay selection box for him, but he has proceeded to spurn most of the boxes, only showing any interest in a green grassy number which looks as though it’s about the least roughagey of the lot.

My bookshelf stacked with hay selection packs

Cassius enjoying vegetables and ignoring hay

Cassius has now also started on some anti-inflammatory medication of the same sort that Harley went onto for the last few years of his life. Elderly rabbits can get arthritis in their joints, apparently, which can not only interfere with hopping about but also with their management of their caecotrophs (we don’t talk about that; it’s a rabbit thing). Cassius hasn’t shown any overt signs of being arthritic, but then rabbits tend not to show overt signs of anything. The medication is fed to him via a syringe and thankfully, as Harley did, he seems to like it. As mentioned before, rabbits have such a bizarre metabolism that they need the more concentrated dog suspension of this medicine, rather than the cat one.

GenAI forays

At work, we have been instructed to use Microsoft Copilot if we wish to make use of GenAI tools in a work context (which I generally don’t, but am aware that some colleagues do). I am amused by the disclaimer it comes with to the effect that any advice it gives might be complete b*ll*cks.

I have messed about with ChatGPT a few times, mainly to ask it to write poems on specified topics, all of which have been ludicrously saccharine but highly amusing. Here is what it wrote for Ruth’s 50th birthday last year, after being fed selected keywords. Because of my inclusion of the rabbits' names in the prompt, it clearly had trouble telling which name referred to Ruth's partner, so seems to have gone with the assumption that she, Cassius and I are a throuple.

And more recently, I consulted it for some career advice for Ruth:

I also asked it to write a poem about Chloe’s aggression towards Cassius. This one went on at inordinate length, proceeding to glamourize Chloe into some sort of Xena: Warrior Princess figure, and then give the whole thing a happy ending. Also: the understairs cupboard was not her bloody dominion - he was there first.

ChatGPT also had the cheek to title the poem 'Chloe Finds Love':

Recent stuff

Car

My darling little Ford Fiesta has been making a new noise for the last few months, but on taking it to J P Motors, one of the two Caversham garages I use, back in March, they claimed they couldn’t hear anything amiss, so I assumed everything was OK. However, during the second week in July when I had to do quite a bit of driving, it seemed to have got louder, so I’ve now booked it in with Reading Service Centre, my other garage of choice, for an inspection, though annoyingly they didn’t have an opening until 2 August so I’ve been limiting my driving for the past week or so. Keeping fingers crossed that RSC can actually diagnose the problem.

A quick Google suggests it’s most likely something to do with the exhaust. Our friend Helen recently traded her 10-year-old car in for salvage after being faced with a bill for an exhaust issue, so I’m hoping it’s not too big a job. The Fiesta is 17 years old, but I’ve been told previously by JP that Fiestas can go on for ever (which I don’t take as literal truth, but do take to mean that it may have a few years in it yet). A more significant issue than its age may be the fact that it’s now done in excess of 170,000 miles, most of that accrued under my watch (it was four years old when I got it). I have been relatively lucky with repairs to it – a replacement clutch in 2014 is so far the most expensive bill I’ve had. Aside from being a bit sentimental – though if the Fiesta develops serious mechanical problems the sentiment will probably evaporate quite quickly – I just don’t relish the thought of car shopping, though I realise people do do it. Maybe one day soon.

Derbyshire visit

The driving stint earlier in July was to go with Mum to Derbyshire to visit Mum’s older sister Anne, who is now in a nursing home up there (Anne is also, obviously, my aunt). My cousin Helen has lived in the Derbyshire Dales for many years now after moving there back in the nineties for a teaching job. A few years ago Anne and her late husband moved up there to be near Helen, their health having deteriorated to the point where they needed more organized care. Mum and I booked ourselves a night in the Premier Inn just outside Matlock, where we have now stayed I think three times. We drove up on a Wednesday morning and met Helen and Anne for lunch at the Grouse & Claret at Rowsley, just a short drive west along the A6 from Matlock, and then went back to Anne’s care home to see the place and her room (which Mum had seen before but I hadn’t).

After this we went to check in to the hotel and had a short pre-dinner stroll along a straight path running alongside the railway line just the other side of the A6 from the hotel. This turned out to involve quite a lot of bird and plant ID-ing, the latter using the PlantNet app, which I already had installed on my phone, and the former using the Merlin bird app, which I didn’t. Mum was particularly keen to identify the bird engaged in a concerted bout of tweeting in a tree by the path, so I was obliged to install Merlin while hoping that the bird would obligingly keep singing, which thankfully it did, and the app suggested that it was a song thrush, which was what Mum had already suspected.

The railway line

Plant ID

Since installing Merlin, it keeps telling me to take breaks and listen to birdsong.

We went back to see Anne again the following morning. During this visit I was offered a fig roll by one of the staff – don’t think I’d eaten one of those since the 1980s but I did always like them. Anne seemed to be in a mood to offload her books, and Mum and I were involved in a lot of pushing back and persuading her that she really ought to keep them. I did concede to taking two, one a book about William Morris, about whom I know almost nothing but the book contains some photographs of Arts and Crafts houses and other figures in the movement. It also includes this photograph, which I have seen in another book of Mum’s and love simply for bringing home to a modern audience how bloody tedious sitting for photographs in the 1870s must have been. The expression of the girl on the left says it all. The sitters are Morris and the artist Edward Burne-Jones, and their families.

The other book Anne gave me was Pigsties and Paradise by Liz Pitman, a collection of extracts from lady travellers to Wales in the first half of the nineteenth century. I'm only a couple of chapters in but it's quite interesting. I very much enjoyed this:

[Wales] was, until the eighteenth century, regarded as a wild, foreign place, with a mainly peasant population, who were said to eat toasted cheese because they couldn't afford meat.

Colliery band

Prior to the trip Anne had sent me some emails relating to the Lewis Merthyr Band, apparently the oldest brass band in the Rhondda Valleys. Because of Anne’s interest in genealogy, I had assumed that there was some family connection but she had been a bit vague about what it actually was, unless she’d told me before and I didn’t pay proper attention (not impossible). Thankfully Mum managed to clarify it for me:

Basically my Mum's mother's father was called Richard Martyn and came from Cornwall in the late nineteenth century with his young family to work in the mines in South Wales. He was your great great grandfather. He was very musical and became bandmaster of the then called Cymmer brass band. His brother George succeeded him as bandmaster as well.

The band website’s ‘Historical Images’ page has a photograph dated 1898 featuring Richard Martyn as conductor sitting front and centre (at least, I assume that’s him with the baton), and a further photo dated 1910, apparently showing George F Martyn as conductor. A little harder in this one to make out, but I assume he’s the chap in front behind the drum, to the left of the chap with the massive beard. The images on the page also include several of a visit of King George V and Queen Mary to the Lewis Merthyr Colliery in 1912. The Queen was evidently pulled around the colliery on a purpose-built cart drawn by a pit pony. Hope she enjoyed herself.

The internet tells me that the Lewis Merthyr Colliery was situated in the village of Trehafod, about 18 miles from Cardiff, and that the site of the former colliery now hosts the Rhondda Heritage Park.

New vet

We have a family holiday booked later in August, largely in honour of Mum and Dad’s upcoming 60th wedding anniversary. As I seem to have persuaded Ruth to come with me, if only for the first half of the week, we have been obliged to get our rabbits (still two – Chloe lives on) up to date with their vaccinations, as Reggie’s Retreat won’t take them otherwise. Ever since Ruth moved in we have been taking rabbits to the ‘Active Vetcare’ vets on Oakley Road, as it’s reasonably close to the house, but Ruth has become increasingly miffed at quite substantial increases in their prices. A new veterinary practice opened in May this year at Gallowstree Common, a village (or poss hamlet) a few miles north of Reading, run by a vet we’ve seen a few times at Oakley Road and who has impressed Ruth as good with rabbits. We went on a recce a couple of Saturdays back to locate it, incorporating a bus ride and circular walk from Sonning Common (the nearest bus stop).

Cherry Orchard Vets

Walk back to Sonning Common across fields

A week or so later we took Cassius and Chloe there to have their vaccinations. I think Ruth’s impressions of the practice are more or less favourable, though it may take more exposure. We didn’t get to see Sarah Moffat, instead getting a younger colleague, but the consultation seemed to go OK; a minor annoyance was that the vet had some difficulty examining Cassius’ teeth, which is common but I tend to think vets should have mastered a technique for it. Ruth was also a bit perturbed that the scales used for weighing animals was across the room from the examining table, necessitating the vet carrying the animal across the room, and did not appear to have a non-slip surface. (This sort of thing matters much more with rabbits than with, say, cats, who can leap off things from some height and land gracefully on their springy paws; rabbits can break their backs jumping off things in a panic.) Also, the waiting room had separate areas for cats vs. dogs, which is a nice gesture but a bit bloody pointless if they're still in the same room - the ideal would be a whole separate entrance for dogs so that their barking doesn't frighten other animals. I appreciate space is a consideration, but they could wait in their owners' cars and then just come in via the back door. Problem solved.

Cherry Orchard Vets is occupying the former Reformation pub, which closed in 2019 despite some community action to attempt to save it. I don't remember ever going there, though it's possible I did at some point. The new veterinary practice has a piece in our latest issue of Round & About.

Marrow

Ray came for dinner a couple of Fridays ago bringing some selected produce from his employer's vegetable garden (taken with permission of owner, not stolen in manner of Peter Rabbit). Two onions, two cucumbers and two alleged courgettes though one was a sizeable enough specimen to be classed as a marrow in my eyes. I used about a third of it in this recipe a couple of nights later, before having to consign the rest to the food waste bucket.

The recipe is one Mum used to cook us occasionally as kids. I think I typed it out from a Korean cookbook.

Alys; quality theatre; assorted trivia

British Summer Time is here again, though I can never remember which end of the day that renders lighter – evening, I think. It also means our kitchen clock at the house is once again showing the correct time, as we never got around to adjusting it when the clocks went back last October. Have managed to adjust my car radio clock, but there’s some truth in this tweet from @innocent.

Big news since last post is the birth of Dave and Hazel’s second daughter Alys on 28 March, only a week away from Nia’s third birthday on 4 April. Visited on 3 April and had an introductory cuddle of the babe, followed by a follow up at Mum and Dad’s last Sunday. Prior to my trip on the 3rd, I had ventured into Mothercare for a gift for Alys and – never having spent much time in there – was a bit thrown to discover that clothes for newborns come in three different sizes. Which I suppose does make sense, but I’d never thought about it. As Alys was a ten-pounder I abandoned the first outfit I picked up, aimed at the ‘tiny’ category, and chose something more substantial.

Recently did my bit for keeping in touch with the youth by watching Frozen, which I’d added to my LoveFilm list in a bid to find out what all the fuss was about. We were staying over at Mum and Dad’s that night so Ruth and Mum watched it with me; Dad sidled off to his front room as strains of ‘Let it GOOOOOOO’ wafted through the house. It was enjoyable enough though I can’t say I quite get why it’s become quite such a big thing – but then I appreciate I’m not the target audience. Older sister Elsa is the more interesting character – how did she get that way? Did it run in the family? – but it’s the somewhat annoying younger sister Anna who has most of the screen time. On the plus side, it’s undoubtedly a Good Thing that a film with two female leads – albeit animated ones – has become such a phenomenon, and the ‘act of true love’ is between the sisters rather than kiss bestowed by prince, etc.

Cupcakes and Bertie

Spent last Saturday and Sunday in Abergavenny in part for a birthday lunch/tea for Hannah on Sunday. Had roast lamb - which I've not had in a long while - and then some strawberry cupcakes that Hannah had crafted and then transported on the train. Close up of cupcakes left, plus Nia's rabbit Bertie who seemed to have been left face down next to them. The one symbolic candle was duly re-lit for Nia to have a go at blowing out.

Prior to the tea party, helped Dad plant some cuttings of the black bamboo - aka phyllostachys nigra (I speak Latin) - that Ruth had dug up from our garden with some difficulty, eventually resorting to an axe, despite Dad's assurances that it would be a quick matter of just slicing a bit off with a spade. The cuttings were quite tall and didn't have all that much root attached, so I'm just hoping they stay upright throughout the next strong breeze.

Have not yet given much thought to the impending general election, but should no doubt do some research. Mark Lancaster, the incumbent MP for Milton Keynes North, appears to have made little effort on his campaign leaflet to avoid looking like the stereotypical smug Tory git, but I should of course get past that and read about policies etc. Only Conservative and Labour literature received so far, at either of my addresses. Given that the election's on a weekday, am likely to be voting in MK so should read up on Lancaster and the Labour parliamentary candidate Emily Darlington.

Day in London on 11 April to catch the last day of the play My Night with Reg. In fact we saw the matinée rather than the evening performance, but that was quite nice as we were able to go for an early dinner afterwards and get home before it got too late, don slippers and light pipes, etc. Glad Ruth persuaded me to see the play as it was one of the best things I’ve seen in a while – great cast including the v. dishy Julian Ovenden; his brief appearance nude in one scene was the icing on the cake. The audience included a larger number than I expected of straight couples of around my parents’ age, which surprised me slightly though for no good reason; the grey-haired duo next to me were laughing particularly uproariously. There's a Telegraph review of the play here.

Before the play we had lunch at itsu, followed – to counteract the healthiness – by tea and cake at Caffe Concerto on Shaftesbury Avenue. Afterwards, we wandered and into Foyles, which evidently moved premises last year though it's still on Charing Cross Road. It's now v. glam inside, with lots of pale wood and glass. When I first went there, which must have been at least 25 years ago, I seem to remember stacks of books everywhere and a peculiar system for purchasing whereby you took your chosen book to a desk on one floor, collected some sort of ticket, then had to take it to another desk on a whole other floor to actually pay for it. Needless to say that system was abandoned some time ago. We bought a few books we hadn’t planned on buying and then went, via a brief drink in the Soho Theatre bar, to have an early dinner at Cabana Brasilian Barbecue near Tottenham Court Road station, where Dave and Hazel went on a recent visit to London and which I had been keen to try after seeing the photo of a splendidly rare steak that Dave posted on Facebook. Dinner was very nice, including the cubes of Parmesan dipped in honey that we were persuaded by the comely if beardy young waiter to have as a starter.

In Caversham, the saga of where to build permanent premises for The Heights Primary School continues, with a public consultation currently open until 1 May. The whole issue is arousing strong emotions locally, to the extent that members of the Facebook group Caversham Gossip Girls, of which I am one, have been banned from discussing it on the group’s page. Have responded to the consultation giving my opinion of each of the five proposed sites - Mapledurham Playing Fields is probably my preferred option, but I'll freely admit to being influenced by the fact that I neither live near it nor use it. Classic conundrum of most people thinking the school’s a good idea, but no one wanting it on their local piece of greenery. I’m also personally a bit baffled as to where children in Caversham Heights have been going to school up until now, though given that Caversham Heights is the poshest part of Reading, I’d guess not a few of them are at independent schools.

Delighted to discover after taking the Tone Deaf Test recently that I am not tone deaf. Next step might be actually attempting some sort of singing. Although I have belonged to a couple of choirs in my lifetime, both some time ago, I've never had any faith in my ability to actually carry a tune, so, as part of something akin to a bucket list, am determined to find out whether I can.

Car failed its MOT on Tuesday, partly through my own fault in not checking the windscreen washer fluid – who knew you could fail an MOT for that? – though in this case it would have failed anyway as the two front tyres were below the minimum tread and both of the side lights were out, which I’m sure I dimly knew but had filed the thought away in the back of my head. Spent lunch hour yesterday at B and T Tyres in Bletchley, getting the tyres replaced. I may ask Halfords to do the bulbs as I don’t fancy spending a large chunk of the weekend figuring out how to do it myself.