Conversations at the petrol pump

I obviously take after my mum, as random people always seem to start talking to me. (Can’t understand why, I’m sure I must have an ‘I’m on a mission’ face on – maybe it needs more work!)

The last occasion was at Morrisons petrol station. I was filling up my (extremely filthy – as it is even straight after a car wash thanks to rural roads) car – chatting to N sitting in the back seat, to hear a voice pipe up and ask “what do you think of your car?”.  Now, I love my car – it’s a Focus, it’s my third Focus.  I’m a creature of habit, me.  I find something I like and have the same again (when I was at school, I think I had the same pair of shoes in the next size up).  It’s a company car, and a Focus was a bargain compared to similar class of cars, which meant I could have top spec and cash to spare each month of my allowance.

So my answer to the guy who asked was “love it, although it’s due to be changed next month so I’m having to decide what to do next”.  Then of course we ended up having a discussion on how many miles to the tank I was getting, how much it was currently costing to fill up, any bad points.  His friend had told him with a Focus you need to be careful you don’t “rip it” at 2nd gear so he was passing the information on to me (obviously I look like I drive madly, although I have no idea what ‘rip it’ means when referring to driving!).  All very amusing…to be honest though, any car was going to be more economical than the low slung petrol sports coupe he was currently driving.

I don’t think N had any idea what was going on.  Thankfully pay at pump is always pretty quick so I was able to escape after not too long.  Not after the man told me he liked the colour of my car – morello cherry on the top half (looks blacky-purple), mud on the bottom half!

So now because there’s no company car choice open to me (they’re only letting me have the pool car that’s available – a basic BMW that isn’t too bad on fuel economy, but will be shocking in winter on these roads), I’m having to choose a car.  I’ve not had my own insurance for years now, so it’s going to cost me a packet as well as the premiums for women going up.  I want a nice family economical car – Golf Bluemotion, or the new Volvo V40 looks nice, although both are pricy to start off with and on insurance, but the OH wants me to get a 4 wheel drive.  All very well but expensive to buy, to service (one I’ve looked at needs servicing every 9k miles (that’s 3 services a year, vs a Golf at every 20k!), tax and to run.  Decisions decisions…and now I’ve got people ringing me to beat the online insurance quotes I’ve been given (which they then can’t even get close to!).

The last time I bought a car it was really easy.  I had 2 or 3 possibilities, looked at the prices, test drove a couple, then bought one.  Now it seems, either I’m a lot more fussy, or there’s a lot more in the mix to think about.