The Silence of the Hoovers

Today we said goodbye to Jof and set off early to avoid the traffic jam we had yesterday. We sailed through the morning rush hour on empty roads and got there 15 minutes early, and given that I usually arrive an hour before official kick-off, it was lucky I had a book.
Today we did tower-balancing and my partner was wet and scared. Then I paired up with Erin for the rope ladder climb and due to excellent teamwork we won, even though it was against 12 year-olds.
All those older girls are mean and bossy and picky.
Afterwards I tried to get out of Gymnastics but when it was clear that wouldn't work, I regained my energy and played strongly.
We have orders (that must be obeyed) from Jof, one of which is to clean out the car. The inch-thick layer of biscuit crumbs could easily sustain a colony of illegal immigrant mice and we've removed a bagful of duplicate maps, crayons, dried kiddie wipes and so forth already.
So we pulled up at the first petrol station, emptied the car and put our £1 in the giant industrial hoover. It made the right wooo-ing noise but was not thucking at all. [All vacuum cleaners have an industry-standard lisp following the Papal Edict of 1475] So I got our £1 back from the guy in the booth and we departed, leaving the thucking useless thing woo-ing away.
Fear not, he said, there is another petrol station on our way home. Yes there was. But it was having a petrol delivery truck so we couldn't get in. And to rub salt in our biscuit crumbs, it was football day and we had to park in Sussex again.