I always used to wonder what kinda person would drive around in one of those horrendous really bright canary yellow cars or indeed any of those vehicles in any of those stand out mad bright colours.
Until today that is.
Today I wished my car - which I think might be silver under the dirt - was electric blue or canary yellow or shocking pink – anything except, well except silver under the dirt.
You see today I was in a carpark.
Carparks are great. I mean if you are driving a car around and you need a place to park, a carpark can be really handy.
But there is a downside to this and that is that lots of other people are usually thinking the same way.
This can often lead to there being a lot of cars in a carpark at any one time.
To be honest, this in itself is not necessarily a bad thing either, it’s just that well, usually the cars are all those kinda normal colours.
You know blue or red or black or white or silver under the dirt.
And I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed this, but a lot of cars are pretty much the same shape these days too.
This can cause great confusion in a place like a carpark, because, well it can sometimes be difficult to find your car.
If you are now shaking your head in disbelief and saying to yourself what kind of fool would not be able to find their car in a carpark, then I know you don’t drive.
Everybody who drives has, at one stage or another in their lives, walked into a carpark and thought to themselves – ‘oh oh, now where exactly am I parked again?’
In fact this is such a common global phenomenon, that around the world things have been developed to help unwitting motorists – like huge big signs.
These are often colour coded and usually have big numbers or letters on them. Say an Orange sign with the number 5A on it.
It’s a good enough system in theory. I mean all you have to do is look around for the sign when you get out of the car, remember what it says and then when you get back you’ll know you are in the right general direction when you see that sign.
I never remember to look.
Well, when I say never, I mean hardly ever. Sometimes when I have very organised passengers with me, like my wife, I daren’t forget to look. And what’s more I’ll even write it down somewhere so I don’t forget.
But usually, I never look.
I mean I’ve just parked and I’m only going to nip into the shop for five minutes, I’m not going to forget where I left the car.
Until I’m returning that is.
It’s usually then when I get that kinda uneasy feeling that I should have looked for the big sign and written it down somewhere.
Thankfully I know I am not alone.
On more than one occasion in the past while in my car I’ve had people come over, open the passenger door and sit in, only to jump out again apologetically because they’ve realised that they are in the wrong vehicle.
This has usually given me a sense of real satisfaction – mostly because it confirms my assertion that all people don’t wash their cars every week - is right.
I mean how else could somebody mistakenly think my car was theirs unless theirs was silver under the dirt too.
And yet overall the whole 'not being able to find the car thing' is quite an uneasy and unpleasant experience.
And it is at times like that, when I am walking around uneasily in a carpark hoping for clues, that I think how much more civilised walking is.
I mean when you walk, you don’t have to worry about the whole parking thing – no matter how big your feet or your shoes.
In fact the more I thought about it on my way home (after I eventually found the car) the more determined I was to cut back on the amount of time I spent in my car and instead planned to use my two feet when I could instead.
And it was all going to plan too until this evening when I decided I would walk to the shop for some milk.
Only to discover... I couldn’t remember where I’d left my shoes…
No comments:
Post a Comment