I've taken, on my day off, to driving down to Lidl to do the week's shop. I try to make a list, and I go right after breakfast when I'm not feeling hungry, and by these means try to prevent myself buying a load of...well, basically chocolate biscuits, pastries, cheese - you know the kind of stuff.
It was cold yesterday, and I hadn't yet got my coat back after leaving it over at Margate last week. So I put on a big jumper, a scarf and my big snow gloves. I have a smaller pair of gloves, but these were in the pocket of my coat...and therefore not available. So big chunky snow gloves it was.
Only trouble is with these gloves is that, every time I take them off they take my wedding ring with them. And it either ends up languishing in the finger of the glove or, as happened yesterday, it flies off my finger as I remove the glove.
I'd parked up in Lidl car park and took my gloves off because I needed access to my trouser pockets. I was still in the car and, as I took the glove off, I saw it fly off and then, as it passed out of my sight, I heard metal hit metal as the ring went down the side of the passenger seat.
I immediately formed the impression that the ring may vanish into some unknown crevice under the seat. So I pulled the handle under the seat to move it backwards. As the seat went back on its runners I heard another metal on metal noise and, peer though I might, I couldn't see where the ring was. I moved the seat forwards and there was another metal on metal noise and I had another look. In my head, every time I moved the seat, the runners were squishing the ring and deforming it in unspeakable ways.
I got out of the car and went round to the passenger door and peered in from another angle. I could just about see the glint of the ring but I just couldn't fit my hand down into the gap to get to it.
I gave up. I went and did the shopping. But when I got back to the car I had built up a headsteam of paranoia that, if I drove home, in some way the ring would bounce around and slip down some kind of gap in the floor of the car. I don't know if such a gap exists but I couldn't shake the paranoia.
Luckily the biro that I had been using for my shopping list was just the thing and it only involved a certain amount of sticking my arse in the air out of the passenger door whilst I rooted around down the side of the seat. Also luckily, my arse is no longer as big as it once was. But neither is my ring finger and I fear this may be an ongoing problem.