Rozzie has been claiming to be unwell for some time. I have been studiously ignoring the symptom for months. It usually indicates the petrol cap is leaking, and has already cost me a hundred dollars to replace said cap.
It is time, however, to replace the oil and filters. I passed one of these "lub job" shops on the way to Wilmington, and decided I should stop off and get it done. I filled up with petrol, and as I was heading for the lub shop, I saw a Mazda dealer on the other side of the highway. I mused for a bit, then thought I'd go back, see if they would check out the light cheap. And, do you know, as I was rehearsing what to say, I looked down at the dashboard, and the light wasn't on. Rozzie obviously remembered how cross I was last time.
So it was off to Wilmington again, this time to the Recorder of Deeds, to see if I can find a trail of transfers where the name changes. Of course, Wilmington is a big town, so they have large men with guns to look up my bottom; and off-street parking that costs $8.50 a day.
This deeds library is a good bit different to what I learned out west. In the first place, they don't have any indexes prior to 1930 or 40. And all the plots are described by metes and motes, rather than the military slicing-up that the western states use.
Fortunately, it still runs to a sufficiency of grown-up ladies, straining to offer help. One of them points out that the professional tracers all use a section in the deed which says the plot "being the same land as" whichpoints back to the record book reference of the previous conveyance. She also shows me how to do searches on the computer system, and pretty soon I'm off and running.
Most of the trails ran dry, for one reason or another, but it's really quite fun to do, especially if I get back to the nineteenth century, which is all microfilmed. I did spot the "Regal Cinema" in the Glasgow Shopping Centre, on what turned out to be a mortgage deed. I couldn't resist looking up the amount. To my astonishment, it said 370 MILLION dollars. I guess that's for all the Regal cinemas in all the world. But it was with some off-shore bit of Lehmann Bros. Weren't they the first domino to fall in the recent dificulties?
Later that night, on the way home, it being cold and clear, I was wishing on some stars when I realised I was looking at Sirius, and, looking up, saw Orion high in the sky. Of course I'm much further south than I'm used to, about the same latitude as Lisbon. And suddenly, it being on the way home, my mind suddenly filled with one of the worst stellar experiences of my life.
I was flying south from Tokyo to Sydney. The 747 being empty, I was stretched out along four seats, fast asleep. The plane hit a bad storm, with severe bouts of weightlessness, which wakened me up. I looked out of the window, and there, in all its glory, was Orion. Except, wait a minute, it's upside-down, and there's another surge of weightlessness: an oh-my-god-we're-going-to-die moment. Then reason prevailed (I have to say it took its time) and I realised, being on the other side of the world, it was me, and not Orion, which was upside-down.
Which, in turn, reminds me that the stars on the Australian flag are upside-down (or rather, they're not upside-down, but should be, if you see what I mean - the topmost star is the northernmost, the southernmost at the top being what you see in Australia).
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