"The Day Today".........

.......had a very inauspicious beginning.......

The Suzuki is poorly again: once more, over-heating......

We've been here before, and I rather thought that the heater hose that didn't blow the last time this happened had gone to join the one that did......

Anyway, Suzuki was booked in to Amato's in Chesterton this morning to see what was up.

Now, call me old-fashioned, but I don't reckon much to the idea of driving an over-heating car through the Cambridge A10/A14 Milton interchange and attendant rush-hour gridlock.

So I didn't leave until 09:30.

This gave me ample time to fossick about aboard Pippin, during which I succeeded in snapping the frames of my glasses.

'Bother', I said, "and for good measure, "tsk"........

What do do?

Well, rather than fly off the handle, get all stressed and generally behave like a four-year old, (my default setting in circumstances such as these), I rootled around in the back of the medicine cupboard and found some disposable contact lenses from the days when I used to wear such things and which had been kept by for just such an emergency.

So far, so calm......

Vision thus corrected, I drove the Suzuki to Chesterton without incident, met Amato, handed him the keys, then met our friend who had kindly agreed to meet me there to give me a lift home.

All still pretty calm..........

Despite the fact that sorting out the busted glasses was going to take most of the day and completely sod-up any chances I might have had of getting in some useful tinkerage time on the Alvis engine......

On a very precious day off..........

I held it together pretty well during the search for the letter from my optician telling me I was due a sight test..........

My grip barely loosened when I rang them to make an appointment.

Even when my call was answered by a Bright Young Thing who had clearly just passed the "Smiling-Down-The-Telephone" course...........

She gushingly imparted that ":-)" the earliest I could be seen was next Thursday, ":-)", yes they did repairs, ":-)", but would have to send my glasses away ":-)" ........ ":-)"

I fear that, at this point, I grew somewhat terse.

I needed my glasses fixing NOW!

THIS DAY!!!!!!

I am a Hole-Maker for Heaven's sake!

And one CANNOT attempt hole-making if one is not sure where the bleedin' target is!

Good Grief !!!!

Ahem........

You will be surprised to hear that frustration did not get the better of me.

I did but smile back down the phone, nodded, and booked the only available eye-test appointment, while declining the postal glasses-mending service, and wishing the "Smiling-Happy-Down-The-Phone" one a good day.

And all this, while thinking how nice it would be to give her multiple paper-cuts then toss her into a pool full of ravenous Piranha fish..........

Clearly, I'm getting old.

Anyway, Vision Express's Customer Service Course alumni notwithstanding, my glasses were still broken, I had to work on Tuesday, and I couldn't do it wearing contacts. (They're okay for distance vision, but no good for my recently acquired long-sightedness.......yes, it's me age....)

 A solution had to be sought.

I rang Alleyes in the nearby village of Over.

(There's another town not too far off called Ware. Let's not pursue this...... For this way, surely, madness lies....).

Alleyes are brilliant. They are a factory outlet shop operating from an industrial unit in Over. I got the frames that I broke this morning from them two years ago. Could they fix them? Well, they'd have a look....

Actually, they couldn't.

Apparently, you can't solder titanium.

(Serve me right for getting the state-of-the-art-mega-poncey-lightweight-frames then...........)

But they could sell me identical frames for £125, pop my existing lenses in, and promise to install any new lenses that might be required as a result of my forthcoming eye test in the same frames at no charge.

Well, when it comes down to it, any problem you can solve by throwing money at it is not a tough one.

I need to be able to see clearly and well, not just 'okay', to do what I do.

And I needed to be able to do so immediately.

The new frames were replete with my old lenses in under two minutes.

I'm calling that a result.

And the best bit is, all this glasses-mending behaviour was over by 13:00hrs!

An afternoon and evening of blissful Alvis tinkerage has seen the cylinder head off the engine, all the cylinder head studs removed, carefully cleaned, bagged and labelled, the head gasket teased off and hung intact on a nail, and the water pump housing removed, after one Hell of a knock-down-drag-out, thanks to copious quantities of Ambersil freeing-off agent, a piece of wood, and a club hammer.......

What do you mean, "You want photos?"

Wait until "The Day Tomorrow"...........