A narrow escape
For reasons I will not bore you with, the Connolly clan is looking to up sticks and find a new home. Up until now, I’ve got used to the luxury of a driveway and have found it an absolute boon for cleaning and tinkering with the fleet, such as it is. It’s considerably better than wrestling for a parking space and carting my gear out to the kerb.
At this juncture, it must be pointed out that I do not live in a mansion with a huge driveway and certainly not in a posh area. It’s just an ordinary hovel in a typical town and the sort of place where cyclists are wary about making hand signals lest somebody nicks their watch.
As I was saying, my family is looking to move on and I would dearly like to buy a place with a garage. That’s something I haven’t had for a long time. I love garages – they smell good, they feel good and they provide a place to roll around in grease and generally have a spiffing time.
Most houses with a garage have either one en bloc (one of my absolute pet hates in life) or a tiny little box thing that must have been designed by somebody from Corgi. I mean, a man needs space for his 1950s Cadillac (well, it might happen one day).
One place did have potential. The garage was the full width of the garden (about 14ft) and something like 20ft long. Now, that’s what I would call a decent garage. It was also brick-built and had power. Everything was looking good. But there was a drawback. The garage could only be accessed along a dirt track and this was
narrow. Very narrow. In fact, I tried to get the PT Cruiser along it and, even with the wing mirrors retracted, there was about two inches of clearance each side.
It occurred to me that this could get you into rather awkward situations. What if you got halfway down and the engine stalled and wouldn’t restart? What on earth would you do? There wasn’t nearly enough room to get out through the door and even if you climbed through to the back seat and got to the load area, that would be no good, because the tailgate locking mechanism is completely covered with trim.
It reminded me of an old story involving a BMW Isetta bubblecar. Do you remember them? Cute little devices that offered incredible economy and great manoeuvrability in town. You got in and out of them through the front-opening door. They were, in fact, the first of the mass-produced bubble cars and found favour with motorcyclists. A loophole in the law meant that you could drive one on a motorcycle licence provided reverse gear was blanked off. So, any biker who needed something resembling a car, but couldn’t afford the full-size version, went for a bubblecar.
The story goes that a bloke bought one, drove it home into his garage and parked tight against the back wall. But he couldn’t get out, because the door was facing the garage wall and, of course, he couldn’t reverse.
Is this story an urban myth? Maybe, but I’ve heard it enough times to believe that there is at least an element of truth in it. Although, if it is true, I’m not sure how the story ever got to be told.