I think I mentioned in a previous posting that I sometimes leave the house with my brain behind.  Today was another day like that.

I had arranged to meet a friend who I haven’t seen for over 6 months (there’s another story at all the attempts we’ve made and failed).  As we both have children we opted for McDonalds (personally don’t like it, but hey ho the children do) in a town half way between both of us.

I knew I needed to get some cash out, but with three children to get ready, time ran out plus I had a visitor at home just before I was getting ready.  No problem I thought, I’ll get the cash in the town we’re meeting at.

So as I approached the town heading towards the car park I suddenly realised that the car parks were pay and display.  I had the sum total of 13p in my purse.  My dilemma was how was I going to get cash to pay for the car parking when the town is pedestrianised.

On our way in we saw a garage up ahead with a cash machine displayed.  Great I thought.  I gave my son my mobile phone, gave him the hurriedly scribbled down mobile number of my friend and asked him to phone her to tell her what we were doing, as at this point we were late.

He did this while I queued in the traffic but realised that the mobile number I had for my friend was no longer valid.  She had changed her number, but I didn’t have it.  I just hoped she wouldn’t think we weren’t coming.

I pulled into the garage forecourt away from the petrol pumps and headed towards the cash machine to find that it was out of order.  Damn.

Plan B then.  I opted to drive past McDonalds and get my son to run in to my friend and grab some change off her.  We drove down the high street, before it becomes pedestrianised and there in the window was my friend.  I bibbed the horn and thankfully she saw us, so at least she knew we were around.

However, I couldn’t pull over because of other cars and there was a pedestrian crossing right outside McDonalds.  Oh well, at least my friend knew we were here.  I drove round to the car park found a space.  I now had two choices.  I could leave a note in the window saying I’d gone for cash, but would it be believed or I could pull my damsel in distress card.

I did the latter.  There was a man sitting in his van near us and I knocked on his window and asked if he would mind giving me 20p.  With my measly 10p I could afford half an hour to get cash out and take the children down to my friend while I came back to the car park.

This is what I did.  Luckily it all worked out and I even put the money back on the man’s window for him for when he came back.  The only thing is instead of costing me £1.20 in parking it ended up being £2.50 as the machine didn’t give change and I only had a 50p to give back to the kind man.  Small price to pay for reducing stress levels.

So to the man in the van, a big thank you and I hope you have a win on the lottery for being so nice.