For a little while now I've been thinking that my time with this
magnificent beast is drawing to a close. There is no problem with it,
and I do enjoy driving it (probably too much be honest). I'm probably
not even really done with it if the truth be known. It's just, with
petrol the price it is, it's just too damn expensive to run.
As
such,
just lately I've been using it less and less. I do love driving the
StreetKa Named Desire, but I feel that really I should be driving this
more, and the StreetKa less. Because I know that my time with this is
limited, whereas I'll probably keep the StreetKa for a little while yet.
I'm still not finished with it, not that I'm really finished with the Bentley
yet either. But I have had this thought in the back of my head a little while if I'm
honest which came to the front the other day when I was filling the 90litre fuel tank of the Bentley which at the time was
pretty much completely dry.
I found myself filling up at a petrol station
in Wales for the return journey back to BelongaClint and paying a
whopping £2.01.9 for a litre of go-go juice. This meant that my tank
full was over £180.00! All this from a petrol station that had the
slogan "Driving down the cost of motoring" across the door! Hmm, to be
fair to them I did stop at the services for a wee on the way home and
the petrol there was £2.08.9 a litre, so I guess they were cheaper, but
still, to me, it sounded like a lot. I was feeling pretty irritated
already, but something that's been bugging me forever is that it was
£2.01.9. Why do we need that .9 of a penny, are they trying to make it
out like it's cheaper or something because it's not a whole penny? Just
call it what it freakin' is, £2.02... Idiots! Perhaps I was feeling
particularly grumpy this day, but it just got to me, and I felt like I was on the verge of a proper Basil Fawlty moment! Anyway, with the
best part of £200 worth of petrol on board I set off for home...
Gingerly! I carry next to nothing in the Bentley in an effort to save
money by carrying less weight, I'm even starting to wonder if driving
naked might be an option? Of course this means walking out to the car
naked, and walking from the car to the house naked, because there'd be
no saving if you took the clothes with you, the weight would still be
there, and if that's the case you might as well be wearing them. The
problem with this however would be the day I tried it would most likely
be the same day that I broke down beside the motorway and had to call
out the RAC. Imagine that conversation. "Erm, hello, I've broken down
beside the M4, could you please send someone to collect me, and have them bring
a pair of boxers, a T-shirt and some trousers. I was trying to
save some money by making the car as light as possible, so I'm not
wearing any clothes!" Yeah, not good, although it should give everyone from the person answering the phone call at the RAC to the patrolman a good chuckle.
So instead of this
potentially embarrassing situation I figured that a better way forward
may be to travel late in the evening, or early night when the air is
cooler, and therefore more dense, but more importantly the roads have
less traffic on them. However, as the car weights about 2.35 tonnes, even with my most economical driving shoes on I reckon I'm probably only getting
more or less about 15MPG, or to put it another way, about 3.30 miles to
every litre. This means, at 60mph, every minute on the way home I was
burning through about 70 pence worth of petrol, that's like the price of a Twix... Every minute! I know that doesn't sound a lot, but when you
think about it, that's about £42 an hour, and that's not ideal is it?
Especially as that's about three times what I earn an hour. I know it
sounds like I'm complaining about my self inflicted wound, but I'm not
really, I knew this was going to be expensive when I started, and I
accepted that. But still, this means my trip to the secret hideout in
Wales cost me about 52 litres of go-go juice each way, or if you like
just over £100 each way, plus of course the fuel I used while I was
there, which is why, really it's probably time to sell this thing... (at
some point soon... perhaps!)
Arrgh! I know I'm far from being
done, and my feeling that if I don't get to the point where I feel I'm
done I'll keep wanting to revisit the idea of having a Bentley, much
like the StreetKa. I think the StreetKa Named Desire is the fourth one
I've had as every time I've had one I've sold it before I had been
fulfilled, so then I feel the need to buy another one. Unlike the
StreetKa I can't really afford or justify just getting another Bentley
on a whim to satisfy the urge to have one again. It needs to be fully
out of my system... ish. Besides which, it's not really fair on her
Worshipfulness because since getting the Bentley she has been paying for
pretty much everything, even going so far as to pay for bits for the
ongoing StreetKa Named Desire project. My feeling is that not too many
wives would put up with this nonsense for too long, there's no way
Girlfriend would. I could see if her Husband came up with something like
this it would be shot down straight away. I know that my Brothers wife
wouldn't allow it either, so I guess I got pretty lucky with Mrs Clint,
but even so, I probably shouldn't extract the urine too much. I probably
shouldn't bite the hand that feeds me. So probably it's time to give it
some serious consideration...
Soon! But how soon is soon? I
dunno. I had originally planned to keep it for a whole year, and that
would've been nice, however there were several problems that I didn't
take into account. Firstly, I knew it was going to be thirsty, but I had
no idea really just how thirsty it could be. To put this into context,
my Mustang, which is the same sort of sized car just with a smaller
engine, does over twice the MPG that this does, and actually, I miss
driving it. But I don't drive it because I'm driving this. Secondly,
when I originally got this I was getting petrol for around about £1.48
per litre, which although still not good, it's nowhere near as bad as it
is now. At this rate, the way things are going I'll be having to ask
Mrs Clint for petrol money just to run the thing. That won't be a good
day!
So it's time to put my sensible head on really, and come to
terms with the idea that my days of Bentley ownership are drawing to a
close. I've got a couple of things I want to do with it first, including
a school prom. Then after that, and short of a big lottery win, then I
think it'll probably be up for sale. I'd like to keep it for the school
Summer holiday, but the reality of that is that if I do keep it, then we
probably won't go anywhere or do anything as the funds will be low, and
I really don't want that. I like to take my two little Monsters out
during the holiday, and actually I wouldn't mind going away for a week
or so even if it is just to the secret hideout in Wales one last time, at least it'll
be a bit of a break away. But I guess we'll have to see how it goes.
Updates as they occur.
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