In my Humble Opinion
This month, the big fella talks a load of old scrap.
Now that lockdown seems to be a thing of the past (for now at least) I took a recent drive up to my local breakers yard for a nice quiet enjoyable walk – or so I thought. The plan was to see what Saab’s the place had quietly resting in West Sussex’s largest car cemetery. Parking the Aero Sportwagon in the massive car park, I shoved a handful of tools into the various pockets of my work trousers and set off on the 200 yard walk from the car park to the entrance of the yard. Imagine my surprise and horror to find a large notice as you walk into the counter area that used to give you entry to the two massive yard areas stating it was all – ‘no longer accessible to the general public’. To say I felt saddened would be a serious understatement.
Wandering around scrapyards to your typical alpha-male gives the same relaxation and enjoyment as my sister-inlaw gets from trawling around out-of-town retail parks and shopping centres. With my long suffering other half, I’ve been quite lucky as she doesn’t mind a meander round ‘the scrappies’ and loathes serious shopping almost as much as I do. Asking the reasons why to the counter manager who I know reasonably well, it transcribes that lockdown meant they had to lay off quite a number of staff, and besides, their public liability insurance premiums were going through the roof, so they decided to operate a counter only service (or via the internet).
This is end of an era stuff too. Where now can we fill our pockets with copious amounts of second-hand bulbs and fuses – Ionly recently had to buy a pack of 382 bulbs, the first ones bought in years. No more can you peruse the cars and purchase all those bits and bobs your model did not feature – all in the idea of betterment. Components like speakers and bits of trim that have succumbed to the odd scratch or tear all obtainable with half an hour of spannering – and some token folding stuff handed over on the way out. In my locals heyday, you could even buy a cup of tea and a burger from the on-site snack bar or enjoy a browse through the reconditioned wood furniture one of the family members used to peddle – all on site.
It was a veritable trip out for all the family. You would genuinely see mum, dad and the little ’uns running wild and free amongst the dead cars – almost as if it was a kind of themed world at Alton Towers – and I’m not kidding you either.
Educating day out
When the in-laws used to visit us from Cheshire, I would have to toss a coin between either a day at the seaside with a Flake 99 thrown in for good measure or a few hours just up the road in Crawley for a wander around the scrapyard – her late father loved nothing more even well into his 70’s. It wasn’t just that either, the observant of us would notice father and son – with dad pati
