Old Banger, New Mobile and Amnesia.

Since arriving back in Sri Lanka, we have hired a really clapped out old banger. Old even by Sri Lankan standards. I am quite pleased with it actually, (inverse snobbery) because everyone rolls up to the School in massive SUVs, with huge chrome Roo bars etc, tinted class, and then we bumble along in an old station wagon with zero suspension, wobbly wing mirrors and a rear view mirror which keeps altering its position, locks with a mind of their own, a leaky radiator, inadequate air con and no power steering, the latter at least means my upper body has a good work out driving it. Might as well burn my bra now... It reminds me of the cars I used to drive when living in South Africa. Still it's half the cost of a normal hire car.

I lost my phone on Saturday. Another example of my scatterbrained-ness, when looking after the children. I put it on the car roof whilst buckling our daughter in her seat and answering my 6 yr old's questions about dinosaurs, and drove off up our very steep drive and off to our son's swimming lesson at school. Worse than that, I have absolutely NO recollection of doing this. It was only M saying I had done so and he hoped I had got my phone off the roof before leaving, ha ha, that I knew I'd done it. Worrying. Anyway it was a pleasant surprise after the 6hrs or so it took M to set it all up in the 1st place, it was remarkably painless to sort out, AND I got a new £30 phone out of it (yes, you can tell I didn't buy a state of the art one can't you, despite the salesman's desperate pitch. I always fee,l as a "rich" foreigner, I am a disappointment on the shopping front to most shop assistants) Anyway it was good really as my old phone had 2 keypads which only worked intermittently, one of which was the one to change predictive text words, so quite important. Now people will be able to understand my texts again, in theory.

AND of course some lucky Sri Lankan, walking along the very populated route to school, must have made a special trip to Buddha's shrine with an extra large basket of petals to thank providence for the mobile phone which flew through the air into his waiting arms. I still can't work out how it managed to stay on the roof as we drove up our drive and through the gate, it's so steep.....