Art - a matter of personal taste.

In the wee small hours I do tend to watch some random things in the hope they will send me back to sleep.  At 2am this morning, I was watching several episodes of a series about auctions and I was amazed at the amounts of money people were willing to pay for things.

A lot of the items featured were paintings and they were selling for millions of pounds.  And I could not see why, other than the name of the artist.  Two of them looked like they had been painted by 5 year olds but turned out to be a Picasso and a Modigliani, I think one of these went for nearly £30million.

I do like looking at paintings, but I like to be able to tell what I am looking at.  I like John Constable paintings, which I know is old fashioned, but then so am I.

In one of the programmes, a vehicle auction was featured.  Now I knew what I was looking at.

But the sums being paid for a fully functioning, and even MOT'd, roadworthy vehicle were tiny compared to those paid for a few blobs of paint on a canvas.

One of the cars was an SS, the company which became Jaguar in the 1940s, and it was beautiful.  And, yes, it went for more money than I will ever see, but it was still just a fraction of the amounts the paintings reached.

This isn't the car, but it is just as beautiful.

If I ever win the lottery, I know where my money would be going.

Cars I have owned.

I bought my first car when I was 18.  It was brand new and cost £3500, in today's terms about £8200 (see being an accountancy student helps me calculate these things).  It was a 1988 Citroen 2CV Dolly in Plums and Custard colours, I can even still remember the registration number, it was F604 UWK.

It had a mighty 602cc engine, was air cooled (like the Formula 1 cars, but that is where any similarity ends), the tyre iron doubled as a crank handle to start it if needed and it took me everywhere. 

I don't actually know how fast it went as the speedo stopped at 72mph and there were no such things as SatNavs to tell me, mind you it didn't have a cigarette lighter so I couldn't have plugged one in anyway.

One year I had gone on holiday to Wales with Mum, Dad and the dog and we had taken both mine and Dad's cars, we went out for the day and were having a quiet picnic by a lake when three cars came screaming over the bridge.  It was a group of Police Officers on a high speed driving course.  Dad spent the next 30 minutes taking them for rides around the car park in MY car!

I traded up after 3 years but I really, really wish I had kept hold of it, it was such a fun little car.

This isn't my car, but it is the same model and colourway.  I have checked on the DVLA website and it seems likely that the car was scrapped when it was only 10 years old which is such a shame.  However if it was still around, today it would cost more to tax than my current car which has a 1.9 lite engine.

My next car was a Peugeot 205 GL, this one was not brand new but about a year old.  It was a speedy little thing, but not the fun to drive that the Dolly was.

Mine was only a 3 door.

It was smashed into in a car park at a local park when I was working there, whilst it was in for repair I was loaned a Maestro which I thought was fantastic, not a sleek car by any means, but a good solid workhorse, so my next car....

Mine was newer than this being a K reg, but the shape hadn't changed much, if at all.

After this there was a succession of Ford Fiestas and Escorts (why are Ford cars named after porn magazines?)

The last new car I bought was a Ford Escort SI, 1.8 litre in silver with body kit, sports steering wheel and polished aluminium gear change knob.

It was beautiful.

Unfortunately a redundancy (number 1) meant that I couldn't afford to keep it.

Cue several years without a car.

Just as I was back on my feet and considering looking for a car I was made redundant again.

Now, after a couple years of being in a steady job I have been able to buy a car again.  It's the oldest car I have ever owned, but other than the 2CV which gave me my first taste of freedom and Independence, it is the one I appreciate most.

Yes it is old, yes it is dented, yes it is scratched.  But it is fully paid for and it is mine!  It was MOTd before I collected it and I have since had it serviced at a Fiat dealer just for peace of mind.  I hadn't intended to keep it long, it was just a first foray back into car ownership, but I love it!

How do you feel about your cars?

Why I am sacrificing my front garden for a parking place.

Ok, so I am going to have my garden for the next couple of years at least as I am going to have to save to have it paved over and the kerb dropped.

But this is one of the reasons why I am doing it.

It wouldn't be so bad it being parked there if the owner wasn't living in it.

It wouldn't be so bad him living in it if he wasn't here weeks at a time.

It wouldn't be so bad him being here if he didn't have to run the engine for half an hour at a time in the early hours of the morning, you cannot sleep with the window open due to the noise.

I would have thought it illegal to live in a motorised caravan on a residential street, but the Council are unable to tell me whether it is.  The Police drive past regularly without a care.

Another reason is this.

The next door neighbour, who the motorhome owner is visiting, likes to park half on his front and half on mine whenever the motorhome is not here.  I actually managed to get on my own front one evening after work as the neighbour had gone out.  On his return he screamed backwards and stopped inches away from my car.  This picture is taken from my front step so I am well onto my own front.

I know we have no right to park on our own fronts, but a bit of give and take would be nice.  And being deliberately blocked from parking is not nice.

I have an approximate cost of having the Council drop the kerb, but I have no idea how much it is going to cost to have the garden paved but I want to save a few thousand before I start getting quotes.

Has anyone had their front garden paved or blockpaved recently?  How much did it cost?

I have a car!

I have been without a car for many years now, two redundancies and residual debt saw to that.  But I had a promotion and payrise last July and have been saving ever since and I have finally saved enough to buy a decent second (third?) hand car.

I tried a few dealers that were local, by which I mean easy to get to on foot or by bus and hadn't seen anything that really grabbed me.  Some of the dealers I walked into, turned around and came straight out again as they just felt 'wrong' for want of a better word.  I have had feelings like this before, generally hotels and bars and have just had to walk away.

Last Saturday, Dad drove me over to Michael Kiernan Cars in Anstey, Mum came too but 'just for the ride, she would wait in the car'.  And as we drove in, it just felt 'right', it wasn't a new place (they have been in business since 1973) and the cars weren't sorted into any particular order, but it felt welcoming.  We were greeted but left to wander around, which we did, all going in different directions (Mum had decided that she would have a look round too).  

I was immediately drawn to a car right in the middle, it was a mucky looking Fiat Punto.  I went and found a salesman who fetched the keys.  He talked to us about the car briefly and then left us to it.  We all checked various things on the car, Dad went for the engine, Mum for the boot, I checked everywhere else.

I made an offer and it was accepted.

I arranged to collect the car this weekend.  By the time I collected it, it had been MOT'd, cleaned and few issues sorted.  I was also given a 3 month warranty.

It is a fantastic little mover and I do feel I have got a bargain.

I will definitely be going back when it is time upgrade.

Sunday Night Mash Up

This week the weather has been bad.  Even in the protected area that is Coventry we saw damage, nothing in comparison with other areas, but normally bad weather just goes around us.  Fence panels down, trees down, roof tiles blown off and smashed, roads closed due to flooding.  We never see this.

Other than the weather, it has been a quiet week.

I did collect my car yesterday, I love it!  It might be old and bit bashed about, but it is mine.  I can get about now on a whim, I no longer have to rely on buses and trains.  My commute to work has been cut from 90 minutes to about 20.  What I was paying for my monthly bus pass is covering my insurance (which is pretty steep) and my car park pass with some to spare.

It does feel like a new start.

The week ahead is going to be quiet at work, as it is half term a lot of people are off.  I am in this week but off next, looking forward to that so much now that I have my car.

The dog and I went to Kingsbury Water Park today.  It was a bit wet and even more muddy, I nearly lost my wellies a few times.  Bess decided that she had to walk through every puddle she came across, some came halfway up her chest but she seemed happy enough.  I did make her sit on a towel on the way home.

Sunday Night Mash Up

This weekend I finally received the results of the three ACCA exams which I sat at the beginning of December, I passed two (F5 - Performance Management and F8 - Audit & Assurance which is the one I failed in June) and failed one - F4 - Corporate & Business Law.

The Law module is the one that I struggled with right from the off.  There are no calculations and no definites, it is all too woolly.  This precedent says you can do this, this precedent says you can do the opposite.  But I have to pass it as it is a compulsory module so the resit will be in June.

Also this weekend I finally bought a car!  I am collecting it next Saturday and I can't wait, although when I am going to read now is beyond me, those two hours each day that I spend on the bus are my reading times.

I am going to do a post about the car dealers as they were lovely.

This weekend saw me start my 1940's diet experiment (it has been a busy weekend), so have been prepping and baking and cooking, I now have a week's worth of meals and snacks.  Hopefully I will lose a bit of weight, feel healthier and save a bit of money.

Sunday Night Mash Up

This week can be summed up in one word.  

Frustration!

There are things going on at work which are making me feel like banging my head against the nearest wall.  I have got a week's annual leave left which I need to take before the end of March, I think I will be taking that sooner rather than later.

I have been searching online for a car and on Wednesday found one that I liked, could afford and wasn't too heavy on the insurance.  I left work a bit earlier than normal and an hour's bus ride and a 2 mile walk later I arrived at the car dealer.  It was by now, much too dark to have a proper look at the cars.

I couldn't find anyone to speak to so decided to call it a night and head home.  Another 2 mile walk and I was home.  The website of the dealer gave the option of booking a test drive so I did this for Saturday (yesterday) morning.

Friday afternoon, the dealer sold the car.

I was not impressed.

I can understand why they did it.  I was 'interested' in the car, I may not buy it, I may not even turn up as arranged, so they were not going to turn down someone who was there offering them money.

But I still wasn't happy.

So I have another month to find and buy a car as my rip off bus pass auto-renewed yesterday.  I have to pay £85 per month and allow 90 minutes+ each way every day to do what is essentially a 15 minute car journey, so that is why I want a car.

I have also indulged in a little online sale shopping this week and I am looking forward to it arriving.  If it does.  I ordered some items from Florence + Fred online not long after Christmas, I opted to have them delivered to the nearby Tesco so that I could collect them, unfortunately the courier company could not find Tesco and so they were returned to the depot.  This delivery is to a private address but if they can't find Tesco....

Today I collected my new glasses, they are fab, but I just wished they weren't so expensive.

I wonder what this week has in store for me.

Sunday Night Mash Up

This week I discovered that my line manager is pregnant, and I have to admit that the green-eyed monster did make an appearance for a while.  This was quickly replaced by concern over who was going to be managing me whilst she is off!

Friday was a quiet day at work, quiet in that there were 4 people off, it was certainly not quiet in the work load seeing as it appeared to be me picking up most of the slack, but at least the day went fast.

Saturday I was hoping to go and look at a few cars but unfortunately the online banking site I use was down so I couldn't transfer the money from my savings account.  I was hoping to do a cash and drive away deal so that will be next weekend now as it is still too dark to look at cars after work.

I also had my eyes tested this weekend, and once again my prescription stayed the same, there was a slight change in my requirements for reading but thankfully not enough to warrant bifocals.  I do have to take my glasses off to read very small print but the optician says that this is an age thing and whilst I am happy to do so then there is no need for reading glasses.

Apparently I have a weakness in my right eye muscle which has never been pointed out before which has always been my weaker eye vision-wise.  When I look up and to the right both eyes move together, but looking up and to the left after a certain point my right eye goes off on its own and starts looking to the right!

Because I have had these glasses for several years now I had promised myself new ones even if my prescription hadn't changed so £310 later I have ordered two pairs, one Morgan, the other Fendi,
both with ultra thin lenses, they should be ready in a week or so.

It is the first weighin on Tuesday for our weightloss group at work, after the last few days I have had I will be pleased if I haven't gained!