Ag-agagag!

It’s probably mean to say this. In fact it is definitely mean to say this. But I heard something today that put a smile on my face. About a year ago, I bought my new motorcycle. She’s a beautiful Honda CBR600FX, and don’t get me wrong, I love it to pieces. But in order to arrange my financing so I could afford it, I had to do several things, one of which was selling my car. This was OK, because a mate of mine had a car he wasn’t using, and as he was moving to London, he let me have it FOC. It was an old Peugeot 405SRi, and whilst a bit knackered on the outside, was pristine inside and very low mileage. So with a bit of a bodywork, she ought to have a been a very cheap little car.

About £300 later, after new suspension, panels, lights, electrics and god knows what else had gone into it, it was still a heap of shit. I was getting increasingly frustrated at having no car, at constantly hearing the excuses from the garage as to why it wasn’t fixed and why it had failed the MOT again (my favourite was when it failed the MOT because they’d put the suspension in the wrong way round) and generally pouring money into a car which was way more hassle than it was worth.

So with no MOT, tax or insurance, I put it on the back of a recovery truch and dragged it down to a car dealer to see what I could do. I found a nice looking Audi 80 2.0 Sport, high mileage, the odd thing here and there, but generally “a nice little motor”. He was your average dealer, trying to rip me off, not budging a lot and knowing full well that at the time, the car was misfiring really badly. He assured me that he’d had a really good drive in it when he picked it up, and that it was probably just because it’d been sat for a little while.

We did a deal on the Peugeot. I got about £200 off the price of the Audi as a p/x. So I lost out a £100. But this bloke sold me a car, which in his mind, wasn’t mechanically fit (I think) . However, 4 spark plugs and £16 later, and I’ve got a perfectly running car again. So this guy tried to stitch me up. But didn’t get away with it.

Why not? I heard through a contact of mine, that the Peugeot (which, as it was was an old dog) has just been scrapped, after being condemned by the MOT station he tried to take it to. Apparently it had a fuel leak (amongst other things).

He got a tenner for it. Life is good.