Dirty little thing...

After Wednesday's walk, when I had three dogs in my tiny car, my poor Mini  looked like it belonged to a zoo keeper.  There were paw prints all over the upholstery, and nose prints scattered over the glass.  I'm not saying it was grubby, but it's just as well that my morning drive to Binland is a straight one as I would have needed to just shut my eyes and think of England every time I turned off.  

Anyway, as the weather was beautiful yesterday, and I had a spare couple of hours, I thought I'd take a drive up to the local shopping centre and get the car treated to a wash and go.  There were a couple of cars already waiting, and after a few false starts, I managed to get across that I wanted the top clean done, and that I would be back in an hour. 

A most pleasant time was spent scouring the sale rail in M&Co (I am a classy bird) followed by a small coffee in the only cafe there.  Looking at my watch, the allotted time was upon me to go and collect my car.

From a distance it looked all sparkly and gorgeous, and I upgraded their payment by £2 for a job well done.  I handed over the money and opened the driver's door.  Imagine my disappointment when finding that the interior had not been touched.  'Excuse me', I said.  'This hasn't been finished'.  This is a typically British statement preferable to, 'You didn't even bloody start it'. The boss (I am assuming this because he took the money) called over a younger lad and started shouting at him, all the time pointing at the car and at me also.  I expect he was saying something along the lines of 'the lady not being as blind as they hoped', but the two of them set to with the vacuum, a chamois, some squirty stuff and a duster.  

And here is where a lesson was learnt.  If you stand next to your car while they are working on it, they are extremely thorough.  Three times I went to get into the car, thinking they'd done all they could, and each time, the boss put the flat of his hand up, saying, 'Not yet Madam'.

It all came to a climatic conclusion with the boss picking individual pieces of fluff from my convertible roof, and the young lad doing that chamois leather whipping thing down the side.  If there had been a fanfare and some fireworks, I wouldn't have been at all surprised.

The only thing missing as I drove off was the air freshener, and I tutted a little as I drove off.  This was only seconds before remembering that I hate the fruity air fresheners and the first thing I normally do is rip it off the indicator stalk and double wrap it in a carrier bag to avoid the pungent smell stripping several layers of my corneas before I get out of the car park.

But it looked lovely.

I give it till Monday...