1084 Car Hiring

The past four days have been a mini adventure of additional experience. I hesitate to say new experience because its substance recaptured aspects of previous experience. It began with going and returning a hired car. There were two reasons for making the investment. I wanted to create a different image as my vehicle is old like me, and designed for the conveyance of the old and those big of limb. Because it is old, there is that element of uncertainty about all long journeys which I wanted to avoid. I decided to collect the vehicle from Newcastle airport rather than locally, or from Newcastle city centre. It is twenty seven stations from my end of one line here to the airport extension and involves one change of train as the line commences in Sunderland at its other end.

Many of the Metro stations have artworks and during the summer I plan to visit all of these with my camera as well as getting off as at many of the other stations and just taking a walk about. There are not 101 stations but if you count in dual line stations there are some eighty stops to make and with return visits where there is more to see than on one half day venture I should be able to make that 101 over time.

The journey began with an interesting event as a couple joined at a early station, in their forties I would guess and very tactile, touching, caressing, a few kisses and obviously engrossed with each other and unconcerned at the reactions of other passengers. It was evident from the conversation that they were on some form of sexual adventure together which may have already commenced, or was in its early stages, as at one point she placed one of her legs over his, deliberately wicked, before correcting herself. She was an attractive well dressed woman without a regional accent while he was confident, local, and appeared to be having the time of his life. What was their story, I wished I could know?

I often react this way when on public transport. Sometimes I look at a figure, usually female, and see them naked. This is not a sexual interest but curiosity about what the person is really like, once you strip away the clothes they are wearing, although you can tell a lot from how people dress, how they stand and hold themselves, how they behave in public and interact with others. As a young man I failed as a salesperson of typewriters for an internationally known Italian company whose machines were better on design that typing effectiveness, and in order to pass the time I would take a three pence ticket on the London underground from one station to another on the circle line but continue for the whole circuit which I think took something like 56 57 minutes. I was never alone in this escapade because by reaching the half way point round point it was evident that three distinct groups of other passengers were doing the same thing. The truanting school children, the old, keeping out of the cold and rain, and salesmen, in those days it was a male enterprise. Our company employed over 100 sales personnel in the area of the underground and it was known that anyone else making the trip could be found in the last compartments of the train making alternate circuits each day. It was thus I commenced the observation and curiosity of other travellers or those who appeared to spend unusual amounts of time in public places, city pubs in winter, and city open spaces in warmer times. Now of course there are cameras everywhere, so individual who lingers and the curiosity observer will be noted and checked if the behaviour is prolonged or unusual.

I mentioned the older couple because on the return I had a cup of coffee and lunchtime chicken with lemon sandwich at the airport Starbucks and sat at a table from a young couple, she hungry excited at whatever venture they were undertaking, having removed her glasses and all touchy feely, and he looking pleased but a little embarrassed. I did not look for more than a moment because to do so with them was an intrusion despite the public nature of the location sitting within the international arrivals and departure reception area, with the café service area to one side and the information tourist centre to the other and the special assistance seating to another. If this had been Paris or Rome there would have been much more of touching and feeling in public by all but the married and the old, but In England we are still embarrassed although it is changing when about five years ago I met a former work colleague who I had not seen for close on a decade previously and I was given a great embrace, when previously our relationship had been formal. At least I was not given a kiss which I still think is inappropriate unless the individual is a long term friend or a new lover.

There is something exciting about airports. That sense of a new adventure, or having a different quality of lifestyle. Of course if you fly enough it becomes just a means of getting from A to B although not necessarily quicker for inland routes, given have now to get there hours before boarding and the location of airports. I prefer first class train travel if I want to work or think, enjoy a meal. There was a period in the early 1980's when British rail trains were reaching the end of their effective lives and trains were breaking down and being taken out of service or drivers were not arriving when expected. I was undertaking work in London during the week, an official enquiry expected the last between four and six weeks which continued for thirteen, and where because of the workload it was necessary to continue until late afternoon Friday and return Sunday afternoon and with constant break downs and delays. I switched to the plane, but quickly longed for the train. You had just about settled in your seat when it was time to refasten seat belts for the descent and the long underground ride into central and East London where I was based was unenjoyable. Today I remembered it was getting on for three years since my last plane trip and how wished I was going to some place new or returning to rediscover somewhere previously visited.

There are three aspects of my car hire experience to be recorded. paid in advance for a full tank of diesel assured this was a good deal but the extent of my travels led to the car telling me that I had to refill on my way back to the airport, so I went to a garage convinced that the petrol cover would be released by the multi opening/locking key. It did not, and a quick check of the controls, more about them tomorrow, did not produce a solution. Another vehicle owner could not help, nor could the two staff at the petrol station, but a young man, checking tyre pressures on his fast car, worked out where the release button was located. I did not feel as much a fool as yesterday however, when I used the vehicle for a town centre shop and on returning to the multi story could I find the vehicle, could I not, up and down each level of floors although I thought I knew, as I did which side and where the vehicle had been parked. In desperation I went to the ground floor to work all the way up with increasing dread that I had not locked and it had been stolen, and I could not remembered the registration number or had the written down papers with me. However there it was, just half a level up from the entrance, and my mother is the one with memory loss! I had gone for some replacement black shirts, amazingly at only £4 at Primax, after finding that other stores did not have any in my collar size. This was doubly fortunate, because in addition to their cheapness, I was able to strip off and use the old one as a mop, as my body was drenched from the sweat of fear that the vehicle had been stolen. It reminds of the instance when going to a football at the Borough some 30 miles away I had not been able to find the vehicle on foot, after the match ended and it was necessary for someone to come out where I was by the phone booth and go in search.

The third aspect is that I ordered the vehicle on the internet without a too close inspection of the small print, marvelling at the inexpensive nature of the contract only to find that that a third extra was required in insurance premiums unless I was willing to gamble on not have a any kind of knock where the surcharge could be as much as £600. The system was a good one because on return having paid for the diesel up front it was just a few seconds before the return procedure was completed. I know you will have expected me to say more. Perhaps tomorrow?