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description=10 posts published by beetleypete during July 2021;

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Text of the page (random words):
your phone to arrange the insurance i will take it today the phone call was obviously to the man s father asking him to add the cortina to his policy and insure the car for his son to drive he heard some mention of europe and that the car had to be insured to drive over there then he hung up trevor was handed three hundred in ten pound notes keen to hand over all the paperwork with the keys trevor started to tell him about the service history the spare wheel and tools and such but the excitable young man waved away the carefully prepared folder just the mot certificate please and the logbook i m not concerned about all the rest thirty minutes after he had arrived adrian was driving off in the car he didn t even notice trevor waving goodbye share this share on x opens in new window x share on facebook opens in new window facebook email a link to a friend opens in new window email share on linkedin opens in new window linkedin like loading a good runner part sixteen july 28 2021 beetleypete 40 comments this is the sixteenth part of a fiction serial in 790 words stella and trevor continued to live separately while his divorce was going through shirley did not contest the divorce on the grounds of her desertion and asked for no money or possessions that smoothed the process when the papers arrived just before christmas of sixty six they planned a small wedding for may the following year just the registry office in town nothing too grand stella s mum norma was completely supportive and had urged her daughter to get serious with trevor as soon as she met him don t let this one slip through your fingers he s genuine mark my words that april britain won the eurovision song contest represented by sandie shaw amy asked for the record puppet on a string and played it so many times stella got it stuck in her head the wedding was a small but happy occasion ken and his wife served as witnesses amy carried flowers as a bridesmaid and norma cried even trevor s gran and aunt marion made the journey from cirencester after the short ceremony they all had lunch in a nearby pub although he had often stayed over returning to the house as stella s husband made trevor feel very proud ken had managed to let the flat above the shop to viktor one of the drivers who was originally from poland and trevor had said he could keep his stuff so it could be rented as furnished stella still walked amy to school before work as he was usually out on his first taxi runs well before seven now he had a family to care for trevor took ken s advice and employed a local accountant to sort out his tax affairs then not long after the wedding they discussed whether or not he should adopt amy when they asked the girl she beamed a huge smile yes please i want a daddy that first summer seemed idyllic trevor made sure to never work on a sunday and they took trips all over in his green cortina picnics days at the seaside and even an outing to bristol zoo on the monday following that tiring day trevor turned up at work to find ken s wife peggy sitting at the desk at the back she had been crying and looked like she was about to start again oh trevor ken s gone he had a funny turn at home early yesterday morning and i had to call an ambulance they took him to oxford to the big hospital but he didn t make it they think it was a brain haemmhorage but there has to be a post mortem i didn t know what to do i thought i had better come in and tell you all he went to make her a cup of tea and when he got back he was calm and reassuring peggy stella will be in soon you can leave it to us to run the place until you sort things out i will get viktor to run you home in a minute you should be with your family don t worry about the business you can count on me and stella she put the tea down and started crying again so he walked up to the flat to ask viktor to come down and take her home they went to the funeral leaving just a few drivers to cover the regular runs at ken s house following the service peggy pulled them both to one side i don t know anything about ken s business but i know he always spoke well of you and relied heavily on stella too how about you buy the business off me we can make an arrangement with the solicitor and you can pay so much a month it will give me some extra money and take the worry off me too i will throw in ken s new car i can t drive and he would have been happy for you to have it stella turned and looked at him an almost imperceptible nod passed between them trevor kissed peggy on the cheek consider it sold just a few weeks before his death ken had treated himself to a burgundy coloured jaguar 3 4 saying as he would never use it as a taxi it didn t matter that it was a luxury car now trevor had the keys and paperwork which he sent off to register himself as the new owner taking over the taxi office meant that he would almost never be driving though the jag would do nicely for any upmarket jobs that came in stella was pleased that he would be selling the cortina now i never said anything before trev but green cars are supposed to be unlucky he shook his head well it wasn t unlucky for me love share this share on x opens in new window x share on facebook opens in new window facebook email a link to a friend opens in new window email share on linkedin opens in new window linkedin like loading a good runner part fifteen july 27 2021 beetleypete 43 comments this is the fifteenth part of a fiction serial in 717 words as he had never been to anyone s house for dinner trevor settled for overkill he bought a bottle of liebfraumilch even though he couldn t stand the stuff then a large bunch of roses believing you should always take flowers to the house of a lady as if that wasn t enough he added a jumbo sized box of milk tray chocolates and two bags of jelly babies for young amy the modern two bedroom house was neat and impressive as well as being in a nice part of town he wondered how stella could afford it but knew better than to ask her stella seemed to be impressed with what he turned up with even though she didn t miss the chance to pretend to be exasperated with him oh trev this is too much it s just a normal dinner at home little amy was shy at first but soon warmed to the good looking polite young man who asked her lots of questions about school pop music and things she liked to do the meal of pork chops and vegetables was nothing special but he enjoyed it just the same after dinner amy went up to bed and when stella came down she made coffee she hadn t bothered to open the wine when trevor had said he didn t want any i ll save it for another time if that s okay trev by ten o clock he was feeling awkward and checked his watch more times than he should have he had never been much of a ladies man and shirley had made all the running when he first met her at the roadside cafe unsure how to behave he eventually stood up thanks for a lovely meal stella it was so nice to meet amy too she s a lovely girl stella grinned sit down trev you don t have to go yet and i have some things to say to you he did as she said trev i really like you but we will have to take things slowly because of amy i don t want her getting attached to you if you are only looking for a fling i m sure you are wondering about the house so i will tell you we bought it when we got married and when danny was killed in the accident the insurance paid off the mortgage and left me with a bit over for later i m not looking to get married again not yet anyay but i also don t want to get involved in any pointless relationships or one night stands is that alright with you trevor told her about shirley running off with a salesman and he was honest about his lack of experience with women stella patted the sofa she was sitting on why don t you come over here and kiss me trev just kissing though no more not yet driving home just before eleven trevor was grinning from ear to ear stella was perfect for him he could feel it in his bones real dates followed with stella paying for a babysitter so that they could go to the cinema or for a nice meal out in oxford sometimes they settled for a drink in a pub in witney followed by fish and chips eaten in the car neither had spoken about love and their romance had never gone past kissing then one saturday night as trevor stopped the car outside her house stella turned to him would you like to stay over tonight trev he felt awkward but nodded what about amy though stella grinned you idiot don t you know amy loves you not as much as i love you of course but enough he kissed her there and then in the car with the most passion he had ever put into a kiss that sunday morning amy was awake early she ran into her mum s bedroom and leapt onto the bed trevor woke up wondering what she would make of him being there but she acted as if everything was completly normal as stella woke up and smiled at her daughter amy had a question is trevor my daddy now stella didn t answer instead she turned to hear what he would say lifting the girl up above his head trevor laughed as he spoke not yet amy but soon i promise you share this share on x opens in new window x share on facebook opens in new window facebook email a link to a friend opens in new window email share on linkedin opens in new window linkedin like loading egypt 1989 part three july 27 2021 beetleypete 41 comments back at the hilton we had time to reflect on how much we had enjoyed the cruise it had seemed too short and yet it had genuinely been relaxing and enjoyable so perhaps after all it was just enough the next day we had arranged to make the trip to see the colossi of memnon opposite luxor this giant pair of statues is all that remains of the once grand temple of amenhotep iii and they are both representations of him dating from around 1400 bc they are quite damaged and the features are worn away despite this they are very impressive towering sixty feet above the ground the only things visible for any distance around them the large bases have carvings in the stone and one of the statues is known to have been rebuilt during roman times after being damaged by constant floods it seemed to me that they must have been something very special at the time they were erected as they still had tremendous power as i gazed at them that morning that afternoon we returned to the centre of luxor for a better look around it was as dusty and dirty as we remembered though so we didn t stay there very long besides we had our trip to abu simbel to anticipate a taxi collected us the following morning for the trip to the airport we had paid extra to fly to abu simbel to avoid the long drive in the heat and to allow more time at the site there was little or no procedure at the airport as it was an internal flight we just walked across the tarmac to the aircraft and were met by a pleasant young man who introduced himself as our guide for the day there were no flight attendants no safety briefings and the pilot and co pilot sat in a cockpit with no door the plane was a relatively modern jet and there was only a handful of other passengers after take off we flew surprisingly low and soon came in to land the guide informed us that we were not there yet just collecting more tourists from other airfields around the area this happened twice more before the half full aircraft gained height and headed for abu simbel to the south west on the way we flew over the aswan dam and lake nasser this was purely for touristic enjoyment and the guide told us when these spectacles would appear and on which side of the aircraft we should look to get the best view as we approached our destination we moved around to get the first view of the monument and even from that height it was duly impressive a coach awaited our arrival at the airport and took us the short distance to the site we were then informed that we would have two hours to explore before the flight back the present site of the statues of ramesses ii is a huge artificial mound containing a cave like exhibition within the statues were moved here to avoid being lost to the floods after the creation of the dam between 1964 and 1968 the blocks were all cut and individually numbered they were then moved over 200 metres away from the water and elevated to almost 70 metres this is acknowledged as one of the greatest modern feats of engineering it is hard to comprehend the scale of these huge structures the four statues of ramesses ii at the entrance are so large that just one of the toes is bigger than my head as well as this there is the small temple not that small with six narrower sculptures around the door inside the wonder continues with carved columns and the unesco funded exhibition showing how the massive feat of engineering to save the site was carried out two hours was not really enough to appreciate everything on offer but it was very busy with more tourists than we had seen anywhere else previously i took lots of photos but made the mistake of over compensating with the polarising filter due to the strong sunlight i was still using film then and when i got the results back eventually i was devastated to see that i had almost turned the skies black nonetheless it was a completely overwhelming experience and well worth the additional expense of the flights paid in advance in england which added around 100 to the overall cost of the holiday we flew back to luxor and returned to the hilton with only one more day left that evening we dined well eating all the most expensive items on the menu before retiring to the gardens outside to relax in the cool of the night air the following morning over breakfast we considered the options for our last day we decided to get a horse taxi into luxor and to visit the temple on our own taking more time and unencumbered by even our small tour party the feeling of having to return to england in december cold and wet industrial action overshadowing my job and christmas a few days away was hard to shake off we haggled over a few trinkets bought the last souvenirs and enjoyed our wander around the impressive monuments for the final time we returned to the hotel to start packing leaving out only what we would need for the evening and the trip home we did not get away unscathed though my wife had a bad stomach upset during the night which resisted all medications and continued into the following morning hanging around at the airport didn t help and the public conveniences left a lot to be desired as toilet paper had to be purchased from an attendant once on the flight home my wife was further embarrassed by being allotted her own personal toilet in case she had anything contagious even on our return to england this condition persisted long enough for her to have to see her doctor i had to go back to picket duty on a strike with an unseasonal tan but i would go again do it all again because it was truly memorable in less than two weeks we had stepped back over three t...