HOW TO CHANGE A TYRE

Di turned up, aged Mother in tow, on an expedition to Waitrose.  J decided to join them.  I saw them into the car which had, I noticed,  a flat tyre.  Not an auspicious start, I thought.

Now changing tyres is one of the few things I can do.  Ten minutes, I said.  I asked Di to pull the car forward and off the road. Unfortunately, off the road was on a slight slope.

We helped aged Mother, a week short of her ninetieth birthday, into the house.  “Would you prefer a cup of tea or a glass of wine,” I asked her.  “Whatever is easier for you, Pet,” she replies. She is the only person in the world that calls me ‘pet.’ Aged Mother hails from Cullercoats.

I poured the glass of wine and gave her a mince pie, apologising for its ramshackle appearance. I change tyres better - or so I thought.

Outside it began to rain. I put on a coat and loosened the wheel bolts.  One was a locking nut, necessitating a fruitless search for a tool.  Eventually Di called her husband and we discovered that the locking nut thingy lay in a glove box between the seats.  I undid the locking nut and removed it completely.

I then screwed up the jack.  The car rose.  All was going well when there was a crunch and the car subsided the jack now impossibly wedged under the car.  “I’ll get another jack,” I said. 

Now I was sure that in the the garden shed could be found two jacks with a third in our own car.  Rummaging in the shed produced no jacks. 

I looked in the maintenance book for our car.  Find the jack under the boot lid it said.  But when I pulled up the boot carpet, which appeared as though not designed to be pulled up, there was no secret jack compartment.  The rain fell faster.

I reported my failure to Aged Mother who was now on her second glass of wine. “I’m enjoying myself, Pet,” was all she said.

It was time to call the professionals.  This required another call to Di’s husband to dig out the relevant insurance.  I think he was watching some needle match.  Anyway he gave the impression of regretting the disturbance.  Aged Mother commenced a third mince pie.

The garageman rang to say he would be half an hour.  I wondered what that might mean in mince pies. Then he said he wouldn’t fit the spare unless it were correctly inflated.  Health and Safety, didn’t I know?  He rang off.

But what is the correct pressure, we asked? Aged Mother didn’t know, but wouldn’t mind another glass of wine.

Di rang a third time.  Eventually (when no doubt two vital goals and a penalty had been scored) came the news that 30 pounds might be reasonable.  We loaded the greasy tyre into my car and went to see Mr Jay at the petrol station. 

Jay’s air pump demanded 50p. Neither Di nor I had 50p. But Mrs Jay changed a pound in the middle of a helpful conversation about Bombay Mix.  The 50p inserted, the airpump clattered into reluctant life.

Nothing happened. Very little air came out of the pump: I could hold my finger over the valve with no problem.  The scale on the inflator wasn’t budging.  I went in search of Jay.  The pump died.

Jay, dear man that he is, has just has a kidney transplant. “It is the cold weather,” he explained  “you have to hit the inflator very hard against the wall. Then it will work.”  I pointed out that the pump had stopped.  “You need another 50p,” he said.

“It isn’t a fast pump. It is a slow pump.” Di looked incredulously at the beaten-against-the-wall-gauge:  it had now moved from 10 to 12 pounds.  “You see!” said Jay, disappearing.
The gauge crept ever so slowly up.  It was a very slow pump.

Back home we found the garageman fuming on the doorstep and about to go. He had arrived - in a vehicle that looked too small to accommodate his bulk let along his tools - in 20 minutes, not half an hour.  If looks could kill we would have been toast.

“There’s a nut missing,”  he spat out.  Luckily I had put the locking nut where it could be found easily.  “Never jack a vehicle in a hill,” he added, doing just that.  Di has a good line with angry men. “I expect you’re very busy,” she smiled.  “Flat out” he grunted in the first vaguely civil words to pass his lips. “Could do you a cup of tea,” I ventured.  But he had finished. Not in ten minutes but in two.  He raced away to his next job.

Aged Mother professed that she had had a most satisfactory afternoon, but J never got to Waitrose.