My father failed me.....

... at least when it comes to driving. You see when I was a young girl of 16 we only had one car on the road, an automatic Toyota Sienna. So I learned to drive start, turn, three point turn, stop in snow and parallel park that large lass (now being able to parallel park my F150 all over Boston and Austin doesn't seem to hard). Just before I took my test my dad put the '95 Accord he had in storage back on the road and I was good to go from them on. When I moved to Texas I left the aging accord to my brother and bought Reba, my beloved F150 which was also an automatic.

Now I life in a place where gasoline is more than twice as much as the states and not only are the cars ridiculously small, they have the steering wheel on the wrong side and they are almost all standard. Basically I am screwed. Essentially I will end up buying a car that I wont be able to drive and will have to completely retake a road test in order to be legal to drive.

So this weekend the boy and I are to set off to Sheffield to plan the big party over there and were going to rent so I can get used to the roads. On our way home we can stop off at my rugby game and it will all be good right? So we check into cars and enterprise has a special on for £65 for a three day rental (ie we can actually function like normal people who own cars and do a few errands too). So we book an automatic only to receive a call an hour later that there are no automatics anywhere in the city of Birmingham to rent. Ugh!

Now logically the easiest would be for Tony to drive right? Well I explain that I booked with them, they cant provide anything but manual, so in exchange I will provide a manual driver if they wave the fee.... this fee is an issue and ridiculous. Now because I am robbing the proverbial cradle, there is an extra charge of £90 for Tony to drive. This more than doubles the rate of the rental. Sadly, Enterprise did not buy my logic. Somehow its a better gamble to let an american who barely knows how to shift a manual or drive on these roads have a car then someone who has been driving here for 9 years. Basically boys under 25 just can not be trusted.

So its back to the train for us... cue up a movie, pop a bottle of wine and poof we will be in Sheffield to have a roast dinner and out with friends.

Introducing the Ford Ka- a great vehicle for a family of 4 in the UK (if you are clowns)