Until Michael was born, Phil would almost never use the car horn. On the exceptionally rare occasions that he did, the blast was so minute that it could be mistaken for a sparrow farting. One memorable incident springs to mind when we got snared in traffic in Heemstede town centre on a busy Saturday afternoon. We ended up needing to retrace our steps and Phil decided to do a three-point turn in a private driveway (bad Gleghorn!) The elderly owner was trimming her hedges at that moment and looked at Phil with some annoyance.
Phil's response?
He blew a raspberry at her.
Yes, ladies and gentleman, this hulking great 6 foot 3 tower of a man blew a raspberry at an old lady in her own driveway. Even thinking about it all these years later still brings a tear of mirth to my eye.
But... things have changed. The Dutch are notoriously bad drivers and even they seem to acknowledge this. Phil gets very angry that the reckless behaviour of other road users endangers Michael. One classic example was a couple of weeks ago when we were driving to Amsterdam for my baby gymnastics class. We were going down the motorway slip road when an idiot coming from the service station failed to give way and pulled out right in front of us. Phil gave him the most prolonged blast of the horn I have ever witnessed and continued to hoot at him for some way down the motorway. I helped out by giving him a look that could curdle milk as we overtook him (he looked very sheepish).
At this rate I may need to start playing new-age music and lighting scented candles in the car to soothe his battered nerves.
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