The AJ Chronicles: 3 May 2024
Family rift, old car, vehicle tax, anniversary trip, Fred Dibnah videos, plus my latest Medium stories
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Recent Moments
Medium Stories
Recent Moments
My sister came to the UK but didn’t see me ✈️
Driving my old car again during the warmer weather ☀️
UK vehicle tax is unfair 💷
Anniversary trip 🧭
Fred Dibnah videos 🪜
1. My sister came to England but didn’t see me ✈️
My sisters are both older than me. The eldest has lived abroad for almost 20 years and the other lives near me in England.
For this story, I’ll call the eldest one Aggy, and the younger one Harmony.
A couple of weeks ago, Aggy’s daughter funded a rare trip for her mum to visit friends and family in England.
Even though Aggy must have come within one mile of my home, she made no attempt to contact me. But that was no surprise. We don’t get along, and I came to terms with the situation years ago.
Despite that, I couldn’t help but feel a little sad that it might have been our last opportunity to meet, given Aggy’s age and health problems. It was also sad to think I’ve not seen Aggy’s daughter for years. Perhaps she feels the need to remain loyal to her mum by cutting me off.
Harmony lives locally. We meet up regularly and get along okay. This week she filled me in on the details about Aggy’s visit.
Both my sisters have one daughter, and the four of them spent most of the day together. It sounded stressful!
Aggy was unpleasant and critical, but Harmony somehow managed to remain polite.
It was ironic that Aggy, whose life choices resulted in poor health and financial hardship, mocked her sister’s wise choices as boring. (Is it boring to retire with a decent pension and your own home?)
Shockingly, Harmony said Aggy insisted on visiting our aunt who will soon be 101 years old. They stayed for a gruelling three hours, no doubt delaying our aunt’s evening meal.
Despite her age, our aunt knows what Aggy is like, and remembers how she only seems friendly to people who might prove useful. (Could she have been hoping for a mention in our aunt’s will?)
After Aggy left, it felt like a cloud had lifted.
I felt tired after listening to Harmony telling me all the details. One thing that surprised me was finding out that Aggy came over here during my late wife’s illness. I had no idea at the time.
It always stuck in my gut that she never sent any kind of ‘get well soon’ message, and it’s even worse knowing she had been in our town while my wife was so ill.
🔗 For more, see The AJ Chronicles: 29 March 2024 and It Is Hard for Me to Say This, but I Do Not Like My Eldest Sister (on Medium).
2. Driving my old car again during the warmer weather ☀️
When I got a newer car in 2022, I kept my old one because my son hopes to own it one day. Running two cars is expensive, so I stored my old one away for the winter last year.
This week, I put it back on the road again for the warmer months, and driving it was quite an experience!
It’s funny how you get used to things. Two years ago, when I first got the newer car, I wasn’t used to having an armrest and it annoyed me. But I got used to it. Worse still, I came to expect the armrest to be there.
That’s right —
When I got in my old car, I leaned over, expecting the non-existent armrest to support me. The result was I nearly fell onto the passenger seat! 😂
Another modern feature I’ve come to rely on is auto hold, instead of a manual handbrake. All was well for the first minute of driving, but my mind must have switched back to the newer car. When the traffic lights changed to green, I forgot to release the handbrake! Oops! At least it only happened once.
The visibility in my old car is so much better! The pillars are thinner and the windows bigger. No wonder the newer car has parking sensors and a reversing camera. It needs them to compensate for the poorer visibility!
3. UK vehicle tax is unfair 💷
Cars that cover a low mileage
Putting my old car back on the road for the warmer months meant taxing it this week.
Here in the UK, the vehicle tax system seems unfair. Even though my old car only covered 700 miles last year, its CO2 emissions mean it costs £335 per year to tax.
Someone in a newer car might pay just £100 per year because their car produces less CO2. The price is the same regardless of mileage. Surely driving 50,000 miles a year produces more pollution!
At the end of the summer, I will declare it off-road again and claim a tax refund. That means I’ll only pay for 5 months, which makes it more affordable.
When transferring to a new owner
The way vehicle tax refunds are issued is unfair when buying and selling cars.
Both the old and new owner pay vehicle tax for the whole month in which ownership is transferred!
Is it too much trouble for their computers to calculate it on a daily basis to minimise the overlap?
Older hybrid cars
At some point, I might downsize and get something cheaper to run and more fuel-efficient, but unless I buy an electric car, options are limited.
For example, the 2016 Toyota Yaris hybrid is free to tax. But if I got a newer one with Apple Car Play, it would be £180 to tax. So I might as well stick with what I have.
4. Anniversary trip 🧭
This week marked eight years since Stephanie and I got engaged. Talk about the longest engagement ever!
We usually celebrate anniversaries, but she forgot a few years ago. Another year, she surprised me with an unusual and thoughtful gift. It was a spoon engraved with the details of our special day. (I proposed in a cafe — hence the spoon. Sadly, that cafe closed permanently a few years ago.)
Anyway… back to this year!
I was a little upset that Stephanie wasn’t bothered about seeing me on the day itself because she had other plans. Our anniversary coincided with the anniversary of her friend losing her husband, and Stephanie took a gift to her friend’s house.
The following day, at last, we spent a pleasant day out together exploring a small town that neither of us knew — Northwich, Cheshire, England.
The weather was warm and dry, and I took a few random photos of buildings to try my iPhone 15. Two ducks landed in the street but refused to pose for a photo. 🦆
We found a nice cafe for drinks and a shared toasted teacake. Then we wandered some more and stopped for lunch.
Stephanie made me buy new oven gloves from a charity shop because my old ones were worn out and offered no protection. In the shop, she handed them to me and said, “You need these!” 😂
Overall, it was a quiet and relaxing day together and we both enjoyed ourselves.
5. Fred Dibnah videos 🪜
Around 15-20 years ago, I watched TV shows in which Fred Dibnah travelled around England on his steam engine.
I remember feeling sad that he was not in good health. He died in November 2004 at 66 years old, and he had sons who were only around 13 and 17 that year.
Earlier this week, YouTube recommended a Fred Dibnah video to me, but it was from a much earlier time — 1979.
Although I knew he used to be a steeplejack, I didn’t remember seeing much of him on TV in the 70s and 80s. (Perhaps his shows clashed with Coronation Street in the days before we had a video recorder!)
I’ve watched several videos and each one is astonishing.
In this one, he is dismantling a very tall chimney brick by brick, with no safety equipment! He didn’t even wear gloves.
As I watched, I wondered how the ladders and scaffolding were attached to the chimney. Then I found videos showing him erecting scaffolding, attaching ladders, and installing a weather cock on a church.
It’s amazing stuff!
Thank you for reading 💛
Alan
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Medium Stories
They Moved One of the Libraries in My Area, but I Preferred the Old One
I admit that I don’t always embrace change, but sometimes the so-called improvements are a step backwards
The new place will look more modern and impressive on their brochures and website, but it doesn’t have the same feel.
Getting Through the First Summer After My Wife Died
I was in denial because it was too painful to face
I threw myself into being as active as possible so I would rarely have time to stop and think about the reality of the situation. That is, apart from when I was alone in bed each night.
By "weathercock", I assume you mean what in North America is usually called a "weather vane".
Jethro Tull did a song called "Weathercock", and when I heard it, I thought it was something vulgar.