Confessions of a Reluctant Recessionista

Yellow Pages in our flat when we’d only lived here for a year? I found a local washing machine repair service on the Internet. Yes, they could come round, the call-out fee was £75 and they would then charge a further £66 an hour for labour (plus VAT). Parts would be extra. I rang another firm. No, they didn’t have a call-out fee, no, they couldn’t come round today. There was an opening on Thursday. But we have no sheets, no towels! Sorry, Thursday was the earliest they could do.
    My problem, I reasoned, is that I always try andspend my way out of trouble. That’s what everyone keeps telling me. Whatever happens, I throw money at the problem. How about this time I try to sort things out myself, using just my own skill and ingenuity? After turning the house upside down looking for the washing machine manual, I eventually Googled the make and found it online. I clicked on the trouble-shooting section. Various problems were listed: the washing machine will not switch on, the wash cycle does not start, the washing machine leaks. Nowhere did it say: the washing machine starts, the wash cycle starts, the washing machine makes a weird grinding noise, a red flashing light comes on. It did say that if the orange indicator light (perhaps they were colour blind) started to flash rapidly I should try switching the machine off, unplugging it, waiting for a minute and then turning it back on again. They always say that though, don’t they? Have you tried turning it off and then back on again?
    It was worth a try. I marched back into the kitchen but didn’t get as far as the machine: I skidded on a rapidly expanding pool of water accumulating on the tiles, slipped over and smacked my head on the counter.
    This just wasn’t funny any more.
    I looked up the symptoms of concussion on the Internet: headaches (not yet), dizziness (no), nausea (not at the moment), vision disturbance (no), memory loss (no), irritability (yes), anxiety (yes), low mood (yes). Three out of eight, but my irritability, anxietyand low mood could possibly be explained by other factors. I decided I would live.
    Back to the issue of the my non-functioning washing machine and the kitchen flood, which was about to become a living room flood. I needed to mop up the water. I needed towels. All the towels were in the washing machine. Crap. I dashed into Jude’s room and grabbed an armful of the sarongs she has collected from her travels to Thailand and Vietnam and East Africa. I managed to form them into a sort of dam on the border between our open-plan kitchen and living room. It wouldn’t hold for long. I needed to switch off the water. Where is the tap to turn the water off? Is it under the sink? I looked under the sink. Nope. The landlord would know. I scrolled through my phone, looking for the landlord’s number. Why don’t I have the landlord’s number? Because Jude always deals with him. The dam is about to break. Crap, crap, crap. I would have to call Jude. First, I ran back to her room and grabbed the remaining sarongs to shore up the barrier. She was not going to be happy.
    With mounting trepidation, I rang her number.
    ‘Hi, Cassie,’ she said curtly. We had barely spoken since the row over the dress for the wedding and despite my capitulation she was still pissed off with me.
    ‘Jude, I’ve got a bit of a problem. I need to call the landlord. Do you have his number?’
    ‘You can’t pay next month’s rent, can you? Christ, Cassie …’
    ‘No, it’s not that. It’s not that. It’s the washing machine. It’s not working.’
    ‘OK, have you called a repair service? Some of them don’t charge a call-out fee.’
    ‘Yes, I know, but they can’t come until Thursday.’ A trickle of water had made it over the barrier and onto the laminate flooring of the living room. With my phone wedged between my ear and my shoulder, I tried to pull the designer rugs out of harm’s way.
    ‘Well, Thursday’s OK,’ Jude was saying. ‘We can wait until then, can’t we? You could always go to the launderette if you need to wash stuff before then …’
    ‘No, you don’t understand! I’ve already started the wash. All our sheets and towels are in there … and the thing is … we need to do something urgently.’
    ‘Why?’ she asked nervously. ‘What else is wrong?’
    ‘It’s leaking!’ I wailed. ‘There’s water everywhere and I don’t know what to do!’
    ‘For God’s sake, Cassie, why didn’t you say that? Turn the water