Madam, There is No Petrol

Coo, what a palaver. I was running late for my flamenco class this evening but thought I could just about make it as long as I didn’t hit any traffic on the way. However I had driven to work and back on an empty petrol tank so I urgently needed to fill up if I didn’t want to phut phut my way to a standstill two minutes into my journey.

So, off to my local petrol station… all the unleaded pumps were taped up. Shit! Off to another petrol station a mile down the road… again all the unleaded pumps were taped up… but, ooh, I spotted one pump without any tape over it, so reversed speedily backwards and shunted myself into place next to it. I unhooked the pump from its slot and stuck it into the petrol tank of my car... pressed the lever to start the petrol flowing... one clunk, and then nothing. Shit again!

A man came running up carrying a piece of tape to stick over the pump, “Madam, Madam, there is no petrol left.” Yes I had gathered that thanks! I jammed the pump handle back into its slot and turned to get back into my car. Buggering hell, I was probably going to run out of petrol on the way home now and have to abandon my poor car in some ditch to rust until I could find a St Bernard with a barrelful of petrol on its collar to come and rescue it. However, joy of joy, the man then pointed me to pump number 11 and said he had just a teeny tiny amount of petrol available in that one pump and I could take £10 worth. Pheee-ew! I took exactly my allotted quantity and went inside the garage to pay. The girl at the counter said that BP have run totally out of petrol, and therefore all the garages they supply – BP, Jet, Sainsburys, etc – can’t get any. Erk, panic! My little slopful of petrol won’t last me more than a couple of days, what will I do then?

One final place to try – a Shell garage up the road. Maybe they had run out too but you never knew. As I got close I could see long queues of cars lining up to enter. I took this as a good sign and joined a queue hopefully and, sure enough, I was able to fill up the rest of my tank there. Thank goodness! It looks like Britain might just be about to run out of petrol once we’ve sucked Shell dry too, but at least I can keep going for another week now, by which time with any luck everything will be back to normal. I have vowed never again to let my petrol tank get to empty though, it’s too scary!

And, no, I didn’t make it to my flamenco class.