A DRAINING EVENING OUT....

Last night I spent four hours (mostly on my knees) and the fat end of a hundred quid at a service station. Got home around 1am.
And if by some remote chance you’re thinking, ‘What’s weird about that?’, here’s the thing. It wasn’t totally hideous. Not the best night of my life, but it had its moments.
The plan was an evening at a friend’s place in Gloucestershire, the outdoor pizza oven was lit, the wine was chilling, the sunset promised to be glorious. It was a fun stopover on the way to a few happy days surfing in Wales.
I pulled in to a service station for petrol – and filled up with diesel.
I don’t know why I did it. My other car is diesel, I had a lot on my mind, I have no brain? – whatever - it was done in a flash. The cashier assured me it happens every day and gave me the number of a lovely guy who would undo the moment’s madness for a mere £150. He'd probably arrive within an hour. I’d already spent £30 on diesel and I’d have to spend another £30 afterwards on petrol. Total: £210.
No.
I’m an easy-going, laid back kind of a girl most of the time, but I can be, as someone kindly pointed out recently, the stubbornest ass you’ll ever come across. Every now and then my brain simply says, ‘No’. And that’s it.
My girls learned very early in their little toddler lives that I don’t say no much, but when I do, there is no point arguing. If I say it, I mean it.
I was in France when the volcanic ash cleared the skies of Europe. We had booked onto Eurotunnel and usually you get two hours either side of your booking time to catch the train.
We'd driven from Morzine – eight hours, two adults and five children in the car and only one quick petrol stop (actually diesel, but you know what I mean). They’d been angels, not a cross word between them, despite being wedged in a car rammed with all the bulky bags you need for skiing.
We arrived ten minutes after our allotted check-in time which is usually fine. But because of the sheer number of people who suddenly couldn’t get home any other way, we were told we’d have to wait four hours.
I turned around and looked at the children. They'd been in the car since 10am. Leaving the port at midnight meant they would finally get out of the car and into their beds around 2.30am the next day. My brain said 'No'.
The guy in the terminal was useless when I told him my predicament. To be fair he’d probably had countless people saying the same thing all day.
I tried several more people, equally unsuccessfully, including a random stranger who said he’d ring a ferry and see if we could get back quicker that way. No go.
Everyone else tried to be positive about buying nasty burgers and chips and wandering round the duty free, but I had decided I was going home and nothing was going to stop me.
I found the office of the Chief Big Cheese, banged on the door and sobbed that I had one child with a broken arm who needed a doctor, who’ d sat in agony all day and another with the runs and I haaaad to get hooooommme.
I think they gave me the ticket just to get rid of me, but whatever – we were on the next train out of there.
The same thing happened in the service station. My brain simply said, ‘No.’ There was no way I was paying that much money for nothing. There had to be another way.
I rang the guy who looks after my van for advice. ’Do it yourself’, he said.
I laughed. I just about know where the engine is, but that’s as far as it goes. I was wearing a new coral-coloured sun dress and sparkly flip flops.
‘It’s easy,’ he said. ‘Undo the jubilee clip – you’ll need a screw driver - on the fuel pipe which is next to the carburettor and the fuel will just pour out. Reattach, refill and away you go.’
(For the record, ‘screwdriver’ is the only word in that sentence that means anything to me, and I don’t have one.)
But after more talking, nipping out to the van and coming back in to talk again (because you can’t use a mobile phone by a petrol pump), I was game.
First I rolled the van backwards – the only way I could move it off the sloping forecourt without starting the engine – until it was bang smack in the entrance but away from the pumps.
Then I bought all the petrol cans in the shop. I knelt down behind the van and unscrewed the fuel pipe with a pair of nail scissors (screwdriver indeed).
And then I spent the next four hours waiting for around 40 litres of fuel to trickle out of my van into my washing up bowl before periodically transferring some of it into the cans and some of it onto my new flip flops.
My angels bought crisps, played cards and hangman, took themselves off to Little Chef for a pancake and never once said, ‘When are we goooooooooooooiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggg?’
Three truckers bought me coffee and one donated his ten litre petrol can (or is it diesel in a lorry?) when I’d filled all mine and Shell had no more to sell me.
I heard the life story of the cashier – far more interesting than mine as it turns out and therefore another possible story. I have his number.
A bunch of guys on a stag night pulled in, filled up, got out, did a little dance and one sprained his ankle and had to be carried back to the stretch limo. Out of action before they even reached the night club.
I did 120 squats (30 an hour) and discovered that the massive ‘£19 a room’ advert for Travel Lodge only applies if you book online two weeks in advance. What use is that? If you come in because you have seen the £19 sign it will, in fact, cost you £55.
My eldest daughter hoola-hooped around the forecourt as darkness fell with her new LED hoop, and at 11.30pm we put the beds up and the girls went to sleep on a slope. I think the punters thought we were part of a travelling circus. (Well, you are a bunch of clowns, said my sympathetic mother).
Still a few travellers stopped by and I got used to people staring at me, standing in the middle of the entrance in the dark surrounded by my little green petrol cans.
At midnight, I reattached the pipe, screwed the jubilee clip into place, filled my van with petrol and drove home. My girls had been asleep for over an hour.
I had been so stupid, I stuffed up my children’s trip, spent £30 on fuel I’d have to dump and £20 on petrol cans I would never use again, but as I drove home, having completely drained a car engine, flushed through the pipes and refilled my lovely van, I felt bizarrely proud of myself.
If anyone has any use for 30-odd litres of diesel with a bit of petrol mixed in, can you give me a shout? You’re welcome to it. And Andy - I owe you more than a pint.