Guildford

Last night the Mercedes specialist mechanic came from the RAC to check my car at home. This is part of the Mercedes support service that we have with the car, we don't belong to RAC services. The mechanic was the most wonderful young man, he came very promptly and set about checking why I had that knocking noise in the front of my car which sounded like my wheel was about to fall off! He ran diagnostic tests and then jacked up the car, and after checking everything very thoroughly found that when our local Mercedes garage replaced the damaged shock absorber strut in the front of the car in November, they left behind some of the old part which of course was superfluous and they should have removed it - this old part was banging around against the new part and was causing the noise. He removed it and then we went for a test drive to check all was well and the banging noise was no longer. He was the most wonderful young man, super efficient and he delivered excellent customer service which was good to see.

Today was a glorious day, so sunny with blue skies even though it was fresh. We left home after breakfast and then spent far too long, over 3.5 hours at a car dealer looking at possible options for a new car. I test drove the car which was wonderful, and then discussing the various options and models was painstakingly long and a bit boring for me. We had planned to buy a new car but he had an excellent one year old special edition model of the car that has all the bells and whistles for a very good price, so we may get that instead. We took Xena with us as I had to check she fitted comfortably in the rear area of the car as it is smaller than our current car. She was not the only dog at the car dealer, there was also an enormous Great Dane there too - it seems taking your dog car shopping is not so unique after all, haha!

By the time we left I was gagging for a cappuccino and lunch, so we went into Guildford where there were really long queues at every cafe/coffee stop. I eventually had a coffee and we had two items to return to stores and then we came home. I really hate in person shopping, I am very much an online shopper from the comfort of my study chair. I had a voucher to spend at a store that can only be spent in person but I had run out of energy by then. A quick photo of the high street in Guildford.

Back home we googled what other cars were available in the model we want and it seems the one we saw is at a very favourable price - so favourable that I was worried why the others on the market were more pricey. Anyway, lots to think about and no decisions made just yet.

I mentioned the other day how there is little media coverage of the crisis in Sudan, the UK has particularly been very pro-Palestine focused in its news reports. On Meriel's work trip to Africa our Foreign Minister David Lammy joined them and so consequently there has been more about the Sudan crisis in the media, which is a good thing.