The week that wasn't

This last week is one of those where you wish you hadn’t bothered.
Monday we cancelled going to see Chris’ mum and dad (which worked out well as it happened), because we were too shattered to even contemplate the merest possibility of anything as strenuous as getting out of bed. Vegged all day, and with some serious willpower managed to shop and forage for food.
Tuesday came and went.

Wednesday I had an eye check, which was good, next one in two months. However I had to take an afternoons leave to get to Croydon for the appointment, and figured I would be home by four, so I could have an hour or so of ‘me’-time before heading up Chris’, perhaps a little earlier than the arranged 7-ish. However, traffic had other ideas.

Starting with the double decker bus that broke down in the middle of Croydon High Street, got past that, and pootling along when large six wheeler removal van shoots red light to cut in front of us and then proceeds at a leisurely 15 miles an hour all the way to the A22 dual carriageway. Pootled past it there, and with anticipatory glee aimed for the slip road that would take me onto the M25 and vaguely wondered why vehicles were parked on the bridge over the junction. Sailed up slip road, and discovered that the M25 had been turned into a car park.

Fortunately we started moving within a few moments, and spent the rest of the M25 at a steady cruising speed of 25 miles an hour. M26 speeded up to 45 miles and hour, and M20 hit 70mph for the entire half mile until Maidstone whereupon we were back to 45mph. After Maidstone it all picked up after J8 I thought we were home free. (sigh) Two lots of traffic slowing specifically to rubberneck broken down old bangers with blue flashy lights parked next door to them and a police car doing 65mph that no one wanted to overtake, and eventually got home at 5.30. (funk)

Had very nice evening at Chris, with an experiment in stuffed globe artichokes, which was very nice.
Thursday was migraine day, and for the first time *ever* I got to the Migrileive in time, and was astounded to find that actually, it does work.
Friday I dropped my car off at Invicta to have some electrical wiring in her door fixed (something that had been booked for a while), some paintwork fixed and her front bumper realigned. At three pm they called me to say that the paintwork is fixed, but that the bumper can’t be realigned, it needs to go to the bodyshop, oh and by the way they tried and failed to fit the electrical part in the door, because they’d been sent the wrong part. Sorry madam.

Requested courtesy vehicle to pick me up. 1605 was the only time they could do, I couldn’t do til 5.30. Booked a cab for 5.30 to take me over. 5.40 cab hadn’t arrived, rang them and they said they hadn’t got a booking – the lady I quoted had gone home at 5. Awfully sorry, got one two streets away, I’ll send it now. Invicta closes at 6, I got there at 5.55.

Very stroppy me took car home. Fed animals of varying descriptions. Noticed on way back out door that when they’d put the bumper back, they’d folded one of the headlight seals in on itself. Not a prob, I can fix that myself. Pootled onto M20 heading up to Chris’ and thought What’s that windy rushing sound? Door hasn’t been refitted properly.

I was very very happy with my previous garage (Caffyns), and only went to Invicta because Caffyns is a Vauxhall/Skoda dealer and couldn’t get some of the parts. Moral of the story is, if you want your Ford fixed, go to a Vauxhall garage.

Set VCR to tape programme I intended to watch with Chris on Sat evening.
Had a very nice evening at Chris’.On Sat, he went off to introduce Tom (his son) to the concept of rollercoasters while I went into work, cunningly avoiding the clients Charles had in, and spent some of the day catching up on ‘me’ time. Chris came to mine and he watched Dr Who while I fiddled. David Tennent is far better than Christopher Eccelestone, and I got distracted a few times whilst watching. Discovered that I’d failed to record the programme I’d intended to watch with Chris.
On Sunday we got up at 8 to go for a dive out of Dover. We had to be at the marina for 10. At 9.10, Chris discovered that he’d forgotten a critical item. His wetsuit. 9 degree water is a tad chilly in just ones swim trunks and without the benefit of buckets of chip fat. So he went sprinting off to Rochester while I went directly to Dover. With much luck, and all the other guys offering willing hands to get latecomer ready, we were in the RIB heading for open water at 10.30.

Beautifully smooth ocean, vertical visabilty high, no wind or rain. But this is Dover. Lateral visability was end of nose on the surface due to the fog. Decided that planned dive was not advisable as we were too close to shipping lane, and tugs have a very real history of not being too clever or observant in clear weather, let alone fog. Keeping ahead of the tide, we went a bit further shoreward towards Folkestone and anchored over the Leicester.

Jumped in, and started descent. Now, there’s a very importatant rule that if you don’t want to dive, you don’t dive, even if you can’t say exactly why you don’t want to dive. Dangerous things tend to happen if you ignore that gut feeling. So, first thing about a foot below the surface, one of my fins gets tangled in the shot line. I untangle it and my breathing rate goes up, as it would, but won’t come down again. Weight belt slips askew – still firmly attached, but with uneven distribution leaves me off balance, and breathing isn’t slowing down.

Neutrally buoyant is the idea, however I’m too neutrally buoyant, inasmuchas, with breathing rate too high, I no longer have my normal lung control to descend, although actually, I do manage to get down to about 6 metres, but don’t realise it as I’ve got a bit disoriented. Indicate to Chris to halt, I need a moment, and we hover for a moment or two whilst I try to bring breathing rate down. It’s not happening and I look down whilst I decided what to do; going up probably, but would I be happy going down again? Gut spoke up with very loud voice; No. Binned dive, surfaced and returned to RIB. Oh well, Chris and I’ve bottled a dive each so far this season; it happens.
Now at home chilling after a very hard day examining the fog banks off Dover/Folkestone.