Henry visits Sebastian
Henry continued recalcitrant, locking and unlocking himself as the mood took him without any reference to myself or to the authority of his key. He insisted that the battery in his key was ‘casi descargada’ so I put in a new battery. He was not having any of that, and continued his insistence that his key battery was running out of juice.
Changing the key wasn’t helping – he was determined that whatever key I used, it was still on death’s door. In all I changed the batteries in both keys twice – they can’t all have been dud. I felt that it was only a matter of time before he locked me in and I perished, only for my mummified corpse to be found months later.
With this grim picture in mind I took him over the mountain and down to the Poligono for Sebastian to sort out. I explained, and Henry obligingly ignored Sebastian’s request for him to unlock. Sebastian’s next move was to dismantle Henry’s card key and extract the secret skeleton key lurking within. Having effected entry he looked at Henry’s electronic display panel with its suicidal message.
I knew what he was going to say, so I jumped in quickly with ‘I’ve changed the batteries. Twice.’ ‘I’ll put it on the diagnostic machine. I’ll ring you when it’s finished.’
To Sebastian cars are machines, not members of his family, so therefore they don’t get names. However, he is enough of a gentleman not to tell me that cars have makes, not names.
The rest of the day continued without drama, and as evening approached and I had heard nothing I made a supper judgement. I had a sort of feeling that cooking supper was a mistake, but I carried on nevertheless. Sure enough, just as I had got to the point of no return, when supper was inevitable and not to be delayed any longer, Sebastian rang.
I woofed it down like a starving wolf, summonsed my chauffeur for the day, Stephen, and we set off over the mountain to collect the chastened and fully functioning Henry. I dived into my handbag to extract my purse and pay – no purse could I find!
Never mind, I’ll pay on the card. Good idea, except my card is in my purse! ‘I can’t find my purse. I’ll come back to pay tomorrow.’ I wasn’t unduly worried; my purse is on the kitchen table – I must have forgotten to put it in my bag.
Was it on the kitchen table? Had I forgotten to put it in my bag?
I’ll tell you next week!
Henry Locks Up!
I had 2 boxes of plastic recycling, plus a bag and some flower pots for the rubbish. I heaped it all in the back of Henry, climbed in and headed for the bins and the buzones at the bottom of the estate. While I’m there I suppose I’d better check for post.
I parked Henry and got out. As I did so he went cl-click! That’s odd, I thought, that sounds like his locking click. I turned to check the door – sure enough it was locked.
Henry had locked me out! Not only had he locked me out, but he had locked my handbag and its indispensable contents in – I had no phone, no money, no house keys, and of course no car key – that was still there in its slot, on the inside.
I tried all his other doors, all of which were securely locked. I swore at him. Loudly. He remained locked.
Verbal abuse wasn’t working, so I walked back home – fortunately it’s not far, to fetch his emergency key. Of course I couldn’t get into the house to get the key, because the house was locked, and the house key was inside Henry.
But I have a secret key, so I fished it out and effected entry. If I hadn’t had a secret key I don’t know what I would have done; I couldn’t ring for help, my phone was – yes – inside Henry.
Having re-locked the house door and re-hidden the spare key I set off back to the recalcitrant Henry, parked in the bright sunshine with an air of innocence and a smirk. He refused to acknowledge the emergency key, and remained obdurately locked. I swear I heard him chuckle.
OK, I’ve asked him nicely, and he has ignored me. With cold fury and a not inconsiderable amount of malice I dismantled the emergency key – it has a sort of skeleton key hidden inside its credit card shape, and it can only be reached by pulling the head off the end of the card and pulling the key out.
I shoved it into his door catch and turned it, as if it were an old-fashioned key. He obviously wasn’t expecting this, because he opened.
However, any trust I might have had in Henry and his key has been broken. I now go everywhere with the ordinary key in his key slot, and the emergency key in my pocket. That way I always have a key if he decides to pull that stunt again!
He is on a warning!
What day is it?
It was 6.00 on Sunday, and I lay in the deep pre-dawn dark organising my mind for the day.
The path my mind was following was: Mick is coming at nine to build a wall for me.
I need to go shopping sometime this week. Maybe I’ll go after he’s left. Or maybe I’ll go tomorrow after Dave the gardener has left.
Better not, it’ll be Tuesday, and market day, so heaving. No it won’t – Tuesday is market day in Albox, not Arboleas; as I’m not allowed to go to Albox it won’t matter.
Maybe I can hang the shopping over until the end of the week? I’ll have a look at the list. Better get up, else I won’t be organised when Mick gets here.
As I prised myself from my bed the awful truth dawned on me; today is Monday, and I had been invited to Margaret’s for a pizza on Sunday!
Oh no! I was really looking forward to my outing! Good company and a pizza, what more could a person ask? And I had simply not turned up! How rude!
Remorse propelled me to the laptop. I clicked a grovelling apology, asked humbly to be forgiven, and suggested tentatively that maybe if I were good I might get an invite another day?
The sun rose upon my chastened state. I was overcome by shame – which lasted until Margaret emailed to say – Pizza Day is Sunday. It’s Sunday today!
Oh. So it’s not Monday today then? Well, that’s all right then!
I wonder how far through Sunday I would have gone before realising that it’s not Monday?
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