The mechanic hooked the Volvo up to his special laptop. He had kindly offered to come to me in order to diagnose the different warning codes that were flashing on the dashboard. After about an hour, I asked him if he was sure he didn’t want a coffee.
‘No, I’m fine,’ he shouted from inside the car.
‘Is everything alright?’ I asked. Silence.
I knew there were a lot of warnings. I had counted about ten different messages on the dashboard from ‘Transmission Service Required!’ to ‘Engine Service Required!’ to the terrifyingly ambiguous ‘Immobiliser!’ which had been flashing for the past few weeks.
This was in addition to the usual running commentary. ‘Driver door open!’ it says, every time I get in or out. ‘Passenger door open! Right rear door open!’ it bleats whenever anyone else gets in.
It’s capacity to make an issue out of everything makes me feel that one of these days it is going to flash: ‘Your Hair Looks A Mess!’ or ‘No Make-up Again? Do You Seriously Think You Are Going To Meet A Man Looking Like That?’
In the end, Karl the mechanic shut the laptop and pronounced: ‘There were 72 warning codes on there.
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