Greatest Day

I am parked outside my home 45 minutes before yet another 'promising' viewing is undertaken on our over priced flat. He's off at the rugby again. With the house keys. So I need to get our spare set once the flat has been viewed. There is a group of lederhosen-clad gents swigging beer and jagermeister against a tree 2 feet away, I can smell the Austrian apres ski bar through the 3cm 'breathe-safe' opening in our car window. The local stray cat just marked his territory on our rear wheel. My phone is on silent, I can't move in case the beasts wake, I am trapped - and it is BLISS. Silence, peace, forced inertia. Listening to the faint hum drum of drunken boys (and admiring how lederhosen seem to tailor the rear with exceptional accuracy), Smashing Pumpkins on the radio, catching up on emails interjected with the odd Daily Mail article (it is important to keep abreast of Kendall Jenners breasts). Its warm, its quiet and I have nothing to divert my attention from doing nothing. In a past life I could think of nothing worse than a wasted hour sitting, trapped in the car but this is better than gin or wine or even gin followed by wine.

Oh, and there's the agent. I slink very low in my seat (the simple thing would be to wave or say hello but I am floating in a bubble of euphoria and I don't want it burst), I feel like I am spying..... But I actually don't care one jot. . . 

Until the youngest wakes.

Ordinarily I would start the car and get the movement to rock him back into a slumber but I panic, I don't want to be seen and think that leaning back and stroking his nose will help. He screams at not being able to have a cuddle, the window is open the agent looks over, the noise is so loud the oldest wakes up and joins the chorus, I am flushed, it's boiling. I try singing 'wheels on the bus' (again) it doesn't work, I fish out the half banana rejected earlier, its flung against the windscreen, I try to intercept but accidentally nudge the radio into full pelt 'GREATEST DAY' by Take That, just as the agent DOES clock me, heads to say hi and then sees an eager couple cross in front of the car of chaos.. With a slushy banana-slug trail down the middle of the windscreen.

Moment of tranquil bliss flipped into trapped chaotic melee in one swift moment. I drive off as soon as my front door has been slammed shut and pass 2 dead rats on the pavement where my potential purchasers have just walked. It's a sign. 

Gary, Mark, Howie, Jason - not today I am afraid. Best head off to the sand pit in the rain.