Pallet
Friday. Grey, cloudy and much cooler today; even spells of rain now and then. It was a long and extremely busy day at the office, non-stop from an 8 a.m. start till well after six in the evening, when I finally escaped. The last delivery for the New Man Cave was supposed to arrive today, but there’s been a supply problem, and my makeshift study will be around a while longer. Dash is off to a beach party in Whitstable tonight — with the GCSE results out yesterday, this would be a riotous one. Thunderstorms rolled in after dusk, with heavy rain and lightning. I went to bed early and set an alarm to wake up in time to collect Dash from the Canterbury bus station. Most Whitstable beach parties end with everyone piling on to the last bus around eleven. My car was running on fumes, so I had to stop to get diesel on the way — which is where it got interesting.
Our local BP filling station, just round the corner on the A2, was dark and empty: partly coned off, lights out and ominous paper signs on the pumps saying ‘Cash Only’. I drove on to the nearby Tesco, and was met with a similar scene — lanes coned off and a queue for the one set of pumps still working. Even these were quickly abandoned as the people in front of me found the electronics had jammed, pump displays frozen on the last transaction. I can only guess it was the electrical storms playing havoc with circuitry. Whatever the cause, I had no bars on my fuel gauge, and no way to fix that. Luckily Vanessa had fuel and did the pickup run, while I drove home, half expecting the engine to sputter out at any moment. Dash remained oblivious to all this, and arrived home pleasantly merry, having had an excellent time.
