Mileage: 26,744 – 23/05/2003 – Kamping & Bulbs
I |
like May: the mornings are light, the
evenings are light, and the sun is strong – and we get two bank holidays! The weather gives me a reason to run the air conditioning on
occasion, but there are also opportunities to power down the windows and enjoy
some fresh air.
Almost immediately after
my last Diary Entry, Charlie and I had a couple of unfortunate accidents just
before a very important meeting with the NSPCC associated with the John O’Groats to Lands End Charity Road Trip. Me; I fell down and out of our stairs at
home, whereas Charlie sprained her ankle; so the two of us hobbled and shuffled
into the meeting room and the representative was probably wondering what kind
of people we were! Fortunately, we are
going to be sponsoring the NSPCC, and you can read more about the John O’Groats
to Lands End Charity Road Trip here. However, the drive to and from Warrington
gave us the opportunity to sample the M62 on a busy weekday. Oh what fun!
May
sees the start of the summer show season, and these kick off with the Fiesta in the Park Show at Wickstead Park,
Kettering. Because of the timing of the
rendezvous on the Sunday morning, Charlie and I decided to take advantage of
our tent, and go Kamping together with some like
minded Ka Klubbers. So with the saving
on accommodation, we took the opportunity to have a Kabeque, which of course
involved one or two drinks, a lot of meat (most of which was once going
“moo!”), and generally had a great time.
Kermit also received his first ever sunstrip - a nice, bright orange
affair with an interesting logo, and you can read about that here. We
also picked up some natty Ford Racing badges.
Kermit’s
30,000 mile service is looming. The
30,000 mile service is the biggest one of the schedule, but it will be due (in
theory) whilst we’re away taking part in the John O’Groats to Lands End
Charity Road Trip. This will lead to an
awkward compromise when it comes to Kermit’s service history. Providing he’s serviced this side of 30,000
miles, I’ll be content. Unfortunately,
at least as far as paying for bills, he is likely to need at least two new tyres soon, and possibly four.
During
our drive back from Fiesta in the Park, around half
a mile from a footbridge over the A1, I noticed a guy wearing black standing
with his back to the traffic, and his arms outstretched as though mirroring the
Angel of the North. As we approached,
there was somebody holding their arms up as though trying to encourage the guy
in black to come down from the bridge.
Quite scary stuff, really. But
as we were almost upon the bridge, it looked as though he was jumping off! Both Charlie and I had spotted this,
whereupon I immediately swerved into the hard shoulder and braked rather
firmly. Well, he didn’t jump, but had
he of done so the vehicles behind would have quite simply run over the body
lying in the road. It was quite scary
on two accounts: one, because we did believe he had jumped, and two, because
nobody else spotted it. Adrenaline is a
wonderful hormone!
Finally,
Kermit’s driver side dipped headlight bulb failed just as we got home from Fiesta In The Park.
Now I had been contemplating uprated bulbs anyway, but I was going to do
a survey, however this failure forced my hand somewhat. Thus, after careful consideration, we went
for some of Ford’s “Blue Vision” uprated
bulbs. However, I was rather sneaky in
asking Charlie to collect the bulbs from our local Ford 
dealership, Polar
Ford. Now the excuse was that she had
Kermit and I was at work, but the real reason was because I knew that Polar
would have at least one Streetka on the forecourt and I sincerely didn’t want
to see one up close and personal.
Unfortunately, Charlie wised up to this!
Replacing
the dipped beam headlights took me two hours, but before you laugh, I’d invite
you to check it out here and then have a look at a
Ka’s headlight, specifically how little space there is to work with!
Finally,
just about after I upload this entry, I’m taking Kermit to Alton Towers,
although I suspect he’ll fail most of the height restrictions and will not be
let in!