So much time has passed since my last blog that I don't really know where to start. I fear I have tried to sweep The SuperCamp (along with this blog) under the carpet in a distant corner of my mind. But as mentioned in a previous entry, no Mental Carpet can contain the Yellow Peril and she remains, as Big and Beautifully Loathsome as ever she was. Today was the 3rd MOT, so please accept this backdated tale of the first one......
What follows is a tale of the death of Perseverance
Spontaneity is okay to start an action but is pretty useless when it comes to completing one. As soon as any hard work begins, he casually exits, laughing to himself that he's had me over once again, leaving me and my perseverance to finish the job.
My perseverance, if a person, would be a wheezing, Victorian child. Destitute, propped up on a crutch and barely able to muster enough energy to scratch at his litany of skin disorders. So, I figure that an MOT is exactly what he needs in his life- a bit of structure, a bit of direction to boost his morale, a milestone.
The MOT will bookmark our progress. It will give my small coughing cohort and I a list of instructions on black and white DVLA approved paper, a ten step plan if you will. A map to get us out of this mental quagmire.
"Where are we going sir?" asks Percy (it's a pun on perseverance. Please keep up)
"We, my young asthmatic, are going to ride this Yellow Chariot to the local inspector to get an outside opinion on our work thus far"
"But" he starts. Overcome by coughing, he takes a minute to regain himself, "But… we have no insurance sir"
"Yes, 'tis true m'lad. However, I'm sure you don't need me to tell you that in this fair land we have policies known as FullyComp that allow holders of such a policy to drive other vehicles."
"Not always sir….[more coughing] ….it's always best to check the small print"
"Yes, thank you Percy, I am well aware of that. Anyway, should we find a FullyComp person whose small print is compliant with our plan, we shall sail, maybe just as passengers, but sail we shall."
"And he'll…….[cough]….fix me up proper, will he sir?"
"Erm…"
"He'll cure this damned pox, will he?"
"Well, not exactly…"
"He'll be my benefactor, clothe me, teach me a trade and find me worthwhile employment, will he?"
"Erm….one step at a time, my ill-fated friend. One, hesitant, polio-inhibited step at a time.."
So work on TheSuperCamp began in ernest to get her ready for the big test. Sprucing her up, trimming her edges, powdering her cheeks and shining her shoes; like a child going to the first day of school or a loved one going to a job interview. This proved to be fairly immediate and satisfying work. Imagine if you will a montage of me and Percy working away together, sun shining, soft focus, slow motion, chasing each other round the SuperCamp, collapsing into a heap and gazing up at the clouds. His health ever improving, the Supercamp looking better and better.
1. We fitted the rear window from the original door into the new one and the two gas struts to hold open the rear door.
2. After some modifying of the frames to work round the new wheel arches, we fitted the two front seats, complete with seatbelts.
3. We fitted all exterior items- bumpers front and rear, lights, number plates.
4. ...then had a general tidy up, removal of tools, tubs of filler and four tonnes of sandpaper.
It only took a day and served as a satisfying reflection of the past few months of work. I even had someone with insurance to drive. My-slightly nervous-Girlfriend. As demasculating as it was to hand over the keys, I bravely set aside my pride and booked the MOT appointment.
The morning of the test, I was very nervous. Today I was opening up to the rigors of the outside world. Today she would leave the safety of my care to be poked and prodded by men that don't realise how special she is. Men that can't see past the red oxide, dodgy welding and flagrant safety risks to see her true beauty. Her potential!
I made all the appropriate checks- kicking the wheel a couple of times. And we saddled up, 'buzzed' out the gates and onto her Majesty's highway to the usual slight smell of burning.
100m down the road and it all seemed to be holding together...."We're doing it!" I cried, slapping the dashboard "We're actually bloody doing it! I knew you'd be alright SuperCamp!"....she rumbled ahead, another 200m down the road...I felt like a king, I felt like I needed my own national anthem. MyGirlfriend looked petrified, but I could live with that, she may be the pilot but goddam it I'm the captain of this big, yellow brute! 500m away from the site and we're racing up the gears now...to 4th.
"Is that it?" asks MyGirlfriend.
"40mph is a perfectly adequate speed, thankyou very much" I reply.
"It doesn't sound right" she said.
I'm going to have to quell this mutiny, I thought...though slowly realising that something didn't feel quite right.
There started a sudden juddering right below my seat. "The sea is an evil mistress" I whisper. "I'm pulling over" she says and just as she starts to indicate there is a sudden lurch and a drop down on the passenger side.
SCRREEEEEECCCCHHHHHHH!!!!!
Metal on tarmac.
We skid about 10m, veering onto the grass verge and narrowly avoiding a shiny, parked Audi. When we stop the stillness is disturbed only by a wheel rolling down the road and collapsing into a hedge. That would explain why my side of the van is sitting considerably lower than MyGirlfriend's who from my point of view looks like she is sitting on the high end of a see saw. "Shit."
The scratch in the road was quite impressive and certainly justified a few years worth of my road tax. It would seem that whoever had put the wheel on last had not tightened the wheel nuts as much as they should. The slight movement of the wheel on the hub increased with the speed, bending and widening the holes more and more until it was enough for the wheel to slide clean over the nuts and escape into the hedge.
"Hi, is that the MOT garage?"
"Yep"
"Yeah, erm Hi. I'm booked in for an MOT in half an hour, but unfortunately I'm not going to make it."
"Oh, why?"
"Erm, well I'm not sure I should really tell you this but ...well, my wheel has just fallen off."
If it didn't signal the end of my dreams, it would all have been surreally comic.
I called MyColleague out who bought a car-jack and tools and we put the spare on, Working quickly so as not to be caught redhanded at the end of the huge gash in the road. Amazingly, despite grinding along on the brake hub, TheSuperCamp showed no signs of damage whatsoever. Good old German engineering.
So barely a mile down the road, she had come to a grinding halt. We had been defeated by the cold and cruel world outside my fantasy of vehicle playmaking. As dramatic as ever, I felt it as a cold slap in the face.
Once the (almost flat) spare was on, we made a hasty exit with My-FullyComp-Colleague driving The SuperCamp with MyGirlfriend. I followed in the work van, where a sad realisation dawned on me. Up until that point my perspective of the SuperCamp was always of her looming over me as I worked in her corners. Now, watching from behind as she limped along I saw just how strange, cumbersome and fragile she actually looked. She didn't dominate the road, she wobbled along it, ungraceful and out of place.
And as that entered my head, I glanced in the rear mirror and noticed a small dark shape on the side of the road where we'd been. We'd left something behind. And as I saw his outstretched hand drop to the road I imagined his last little polio-ridden breath...
