It’s Saturday and it’s time to go shopping. As you know there is a quick way to go to the shops and there is a safe way to go to the shops. With family in tow I thought it to be better to go the safe way. Unfortunately this does mean walking an additional 35 minutes. That is bearable, but doing it with two (“my feet hurt & are we there yet”) kids is quite another matter. We eventually get to Wal-Mart and decide to put the kids in the trolley to, you know, give the kids feet a rest. With the plan to get a taxi back we buy some of life’s comforts, including a hairdryer and a DVD player. Before we know it we have a full shopping cart (or trolley as we know em) full of stuff. With rumbling tummies we decide to go to subway to get something to eat and call a cab. Should I really wheel this trolley from one shopping complex to another? Well it is a full trolley and the kids are tired so I figure, what the hell, let’s do it. I must admit that I did think about growing stubble and had a yearning for a can of special brew. We finally get across the busy road to where subway is and I empty the trolley. I should have taken it back really but I wanted to keep up appearances……… so I pushed it in a pond (just kidding! It was a lake)
We chill out and have something to eat and think about getting home. Problem 1, what is the number of the taxi company? Problem 2, where are we… er … outside of subway… er near the Wal-Mart and McDonalds (that really narrows it down). With trusty iPod touch in hand, I go looking for a wifi signal I can jump on to. I get the yellow pages on screen ready to give the taxi company a call. There are four results that are returned: Pet Taxi (I just figured it was a small company or an expat Gordie with a cab company). Nope it turns out that it is a company the transports pets…Great! Number two on the list “please leave a message after to tone” WTF! For a taxi company are you kidding me! Number three, ring ring beeeeeeeeeeeeeee… Great! Come on number four. “you have reached to offices of fox technology… please leave a message…” oh bugger!
Right! Who’s up for a little wander home then? I crack on with repacking the bags to get them into a position where I didn’t crush anything.
“Excuse me Sir” came a voice. “huh?” I said. “Have you been let down by a taxi firm or are you waiting to be picked up by someone? My husband and I were just having coffee and it looked like you need some help”. The Lady went on to say she owned a business there and her husband valued houses for a living. Now I wouldn’t usually get into cars with strangers but she and her husband didn’t seem to be the type to abduct us. (Apart from than I recon Sarah could have taken them out if it all went wrong, and I could of held her coat). Door to door service! Result! Like I keep saying these are very generous people who can’t do enough to help you. I expressed my extreme gratitude and said if there was anything I could do for them please let me know.
Earlier in the day I left a message with a man called Dave that deals in cars. He is a friend of Dan’s from the church. He rang back and said he had a friend of the church that sells cars and he is still open. Do you fancy going around there and seeing what he has and maybe go for a test drive? Yep! Sounds good to me! Twenty five minutes later I was out the door on my way to see a car, driven by another person I only just met. This is starting to become a regular theme. After a nice chat about the differences between the USA and UK we arrived at the car dealership. We are on quite a tight budget, (but face it, who isn’t) and I told him how much I had to spend. At one end of the car park there was your top of the line SUV’s and at the other there were complete wrecks. There were 2 that fitted my price range. One was, let’s say, basic. Electric nothing, small engine and made in 2004. The second one was bigger, quite luxurious, but built in 2000 with a few more miles on the clock. I took it for a spin but it really didn’t accelerate quite how I wanted it to. It turns out I had the brake on. Hey! Don’t judge me OK. There is a fold down seat in the middle between the two front seats where you would expect to see a brake handle. On this car there is a pedal on the floor for. It was next to the other brake pedal. So just in case you didn’t get that, the pedals are: [Brake][Brake][Accelerate]. The worst thing is the brake is where the clutch would be on a stick shift (manual) gear box. Some see this as daunting. I see it as keeping other road users on their toes :0)
We chill out and have something to eat and think about getting home. Problem 1, what is the number of the taxi company? Problem 2, where are we… er … outside of subway… er near the Wal-Mart and McDonalds (that really narrows it down). With trusty iPod touch in hand, I go looking for a wifi signal I can jump on to. I get the yellow pages on screen ready to give the taxi company a call. There are four results that are returned: Pet Taxi (I just figured it was a small company or an expat Gordie with a cab company). Nope it turns out that it is a company the transports pets…Great! Number two on the list “please leave a message after to tone” WTF! For a taxi company are you kidding me! Number three, ring ring beeeeeeeeeeeeeee… Great! Come on number four. “you have reached to offices of fox technology… please leave a message…” oh bugger!
Right! Who’s up for a little wander home then? I crack on with repacking the bags to get them into a position where I didn’t crush anything.
“Excuse me Sir” came a voice. “huh?” I said. “Have you been let down by a taxi firm or are you waiting to be picked up by someone? My husband and I were just having coffee and it looked like you need some help”. The Lady went on to say she owned a business there and her husband valued houses for a living. Now I wouldn’t usually get into cars with strangers but she and her husband didn’t seem to be the type to abduct us. (Apart from than I recon Sarah could have taken them out if it all went wrong, and I could of held her coat). Door to door service! Result! Like I keep saying these are very generous people who can’t do enough to help you. I expressed my extreme gratitude and said if there was anything I could do for them please let me know.
Earlier in the day I left a message with a man called Dave that deals in cars. He is a friend of Dan’s from the church. He rang back and said he had a friend of the church that sells cars and he is still open. Do you fancy going around there and seeing what he has and maybe go for a test drive? Yep! Sounds good to me! Twenty five minutes later I was out the door on my way to see a car, driven by another person I only just met. This is starting to become a regular theme. After a nice chat about the differences between the USA and UK we arrived at the car dealership. We are on quite a tight budget, (but face it, who isn’t) and I told him how much I had to spend. At one end of the car park there was your top of the line SUV’s and at the other there were complete wrecks. There were 2 that fitted my price range. One was, let’s say, basic. Electric nothing, small engine and made in 2004. The second one was bigger, quite luxurious, but built in 2000 with a few more miles on the clock. I took it for a spin but it really didn’t accelerate quite how I wanted it to. It turns out I had the brake on. Hey! Don’t judge me OK. There is a fold down seat in the middle between the two front seats where you would expect to see a brake handle. On this car there is a pedal on the floor for. It was next to the other brake pedal. So just in case you didn’t get that, the pedals are: [Brake][Brake][Accelerate]. The worst thing is the brake is where the clutch would be on a stick shift (manual) gear box. Some see this as daunting. I see it as keeping other road users on their toes :0)
I will think about over the weekend and let you know I decide.
Once I got back it was trick or treat time. This is definitely big deal here, just not so much in the community we are currently living. In total we got treats from 6 out 20 doors knocked. I get to impression that if you were to go to a neighborhood with houses rather than apartments to would be quite a different experience. My favorite highlight of the evening was when Katie knocked a door and a voice came back with a very basey “yeah what!”. Katie then looked at me with big eyes to say “should we go or stay”. Just then the door opened with the bright light shining in her face. She looked up to the ceiling and this huge black bloke (let’s call him high-tower) who pretty much filled the doorway and looked down on my little daughter. “Trick or treat” said in the faintest voice I have ever heard. “Oh sweetie, I don’t have any candy… but yo luk so sweeet, I’m so sorry I don’t have anything”. “That’s OK, thank you anyway” says Katie. I look back as we leave to see this tree of a man say “awe…”
Oh bless him
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