Normally I tell you about what Alfie wrote on exactly this date in different years, but when I sat down to look this time he was looking over my shoulder and bouncing up and down. Yes, even at his age he can still bounce. Anyway, he said ‘I know what you should remind them of’, so here it is from the 3rd February 2008 – basically it’s the then year anniversary of Mum and Dad moving back to the UK from Belgium and this is what happened when Mum left Belgium for England:
2008
My mistress finally told me the whole story of her Thursday. It had been tough leaving our house in Belgium, as I had found on Monday. She cried when she came away. Then she cried again in the bank. “Why the bank?” I asked, but apparently they made the mistake of asking if she was looking forward to going back to England. Then she cried when she crossed the Belgian border into France and finally left Belgium as her home. You would think that would be enough for anybody’s day, but no, that was only the beginning of the trauma.
The weather was really bad on Thursday. It was cold with very high winds. My mistress heard that the Port of Dover was closed so she thought she would head for her tunnel crossing in plenty of time in case they were busy with all the ferry traffic. As it turned out they weren’t and she went straight through to the train. If only she had stopped for a coffee on that side of the Channel!
My mistress arrived in England at 3pm British time and drove to the first service station at Maidstone for a coffee. She turned onto the One Way slip road that went to the car parks and the lorry in front of her stopped. My mistress stopped about 20 metres behind him, in case he did anything stupid. Sadly he didn’t settle for stupid, he went for very stupid. He started reversing the wrong way down a single carriageway, one way slip road. My mistress pushed the horn. He reversed. My mistress pushed the horn. He reversed. My mistress pushed the horn he reversed into her car and carried on. There was nothing she could do as she had another lorry behind her. He eventually stopped. Now my mistress, who was very shaken has the following situation to sort out. Her car is still on Belgian number plates but was on the first day of British insurance on a temporary cover note. The driver of the HGV that reversed into her was Polish, spoke no English and had a truck with a Polish front end and a French back end. The witness, the lorry driver behind her, was German and also spoke no English. She resorted to calling Kent Police, who were wonderful.
Welcome to England!
Have a great Friday
Wilma
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