What a blooming nightmare.

The Dragon Lady and I had to pay a visit to the hospital yesterday (that bit becomes important later in the tale) so we set off with me driving her Mobility car, a Citroen C3 Picasso. We parked up in the hospital car park and got back to the car about 2 hours later to find that the front/nearside tyre was flat. It's not just your standard slow puncture, there's a hole in the side of the tyre that you can stick three fingers into.

So I got her sat in the car while I had a look round for "stuff". I found the special nut that fits on the locking nut jobbie but there was no sign of a spare wheel of any kind, nor was there any kind of spanner for getting the wheel off or even a jack to lift the car. We were well and trully snookered.

OK, no need to panic. I ordered us a taxi to get us home for a brew and a think and, while waiting for the taxi, I had had a good look round inside the car for details of which Breakdown Service we were with but, as with everything else, no info found. So the first thing I did when we got home was get on the phone to the local Citroen dealer who leased us the car and he explained that, as far as tyres went, Kwik-Fit had the contract as far as Mobility vehicles went. He gave me the number and I phoned them. After a lot of, "Press 1 for this, 2 for that, etc" I got through to a real person who asked for the vehicle reg number and the 11 digit code from the edge of the tyre. I explained that the car was 3 miles away in a hospital car park and we couldn't just open the front door and have a butcher's. He wasn't interested. "I can't do anything without those numbers." he said. "I'll keep these details on record for the next 24 hours in case you can get the details for me." ..... and put the phone down. So I got a taxi out to the hospital and the driver was very good. It's pitch black by now and pouring with rain but he parked up so that he could shine his lights on the tyre and I copied the number down.

Back home we trundled.

Back on the phone to Kwik-Fit.

They will try to get to the car either today or tomorrow, giving us a call half an hour before they expect to be at the car park so we can be there with keys etc.

OK, here's a question. What would have happened if one of the tyres had died in the wilds of Scotland or Wales? What if it was 20 miles from the nearest cottage and there was no phone signal? It doesn't bare thinking about.