Ladies and gentlemen of the brewery, I give you, the N-C-T. The National Car Test. Taaa daaa!
A test introduced in 2000 offering us safer, cleaner motoring. It appears from the NCT website it also offers whiter teeth and prettier children. That’s what we all want, right? To be able to drive our beautiful offspring around in safety, smiling confidently in the knowledge we’re not screwing up the planet?
It seems to be working. No more do you see clapped out wrecks chugging along our roads pumping out black smoke. Does she burn oil? Aye, she would, if she got it. You don’t hear that gag any more. The last time I heard it I fell off my dinosaur laughing.
You seldom see cars broken down at the roadside. Unless they’ve run out of petrol, which the Automobile Association cite as their main cause for call-outs.
And people born since the year 2000 have whiter teeth. Fact.
So it is working.
The garages love it. Hi. I’d like to book a service. Is your NCT due? Why does that matter? Well, we’d need to check extra things. So you mean if you give my car just a regular service it isn’t safe to drive? Eh, no, it, eh …
[On slow days I call garages at random just to have that conversation. It cheers me up no end.]
In the eight years since it was introduced there have been changes to the system. Some good. Some less so.
Some things remain the same. The garages are still making a killing.
The one thing that has never changed, and probably never will, is the marked difference between the sexes while their cars are being tested.
Men
Men arrive all hot and bothered. They fumble in their pockets for the paperwork, glancing down the hall trying to judge the length of the queue. Are yez busy today? Will it be long? Take a seat in the waiting room, sir. We’ll call you know when we’re done. Ah, right. Ok. Grand so.
And they make their way down the corridor. It’s painted a dirty green. The lights are dim. You can see them noting this. You can hear them mumble. Fekin Green Mile.
The waiting room is brighter. MacDonalds bright. With MacDonalds red and yellow plastic seats. The men don’t sit. They ramble about studying the drinks machine; the fire exit; the window; the cracks in the plaster. They seek out a new best friend. That your yoke I seen outside? The oh-five Mondeo? Yeah. That’s mine. Should be okay. Bit worried about the front shocks though. Ah, these fekers always find something. Here, reckon I’ve time for a smoke?
A group stand around the entrance puffing away. First go? No. Retest. Done her for emissions last time. I wouldn’t mind but she was fine otherwise. Christ! There’s yer man taking mine. I’d better go. Good luck anyway. Right. Good luck.
The waiting room has large widows looking out onto the test-floor. Men peer through at the cars. They point out theirs to the others. Like in the movies when new fathers pick out their babies through the glass of a hospital nursery.
Uh oh! Don’t like that. He’s putting mine back on that machine. Can’t be good. I’m shagged, lads. Ah shur, €49 is a cheap service. They’ll tell ya everything that’s wrong. Better than paying a fortune to a garage and ending up failing anyway. Yeah, I suppose. And they all laugh nervously. But briefly. No time for laughing. There’s staring through windows to be done.
The final test station checks the suspension. The cars are shook; vibrated; rocked. The men suck air through their bottom teeth and quiver. It’s like watching another’s scrotum being slowly clenched in a vise.
Then the hardest part. The wait while the cert is printed. Pass or fail. Nothing to look at. No more small talk. This is it. The moment of reckoning.
The tester calls out a name from half way down the corridor. The man nods his farewells and makes his way slowly forward. The others stare after him. They see his shoulders slump. They see the tester walk him to the car and point to something. They failed the poor feker. Those remaining get more nervous now. Fidgeting. Furtive glances. Only a belch or a fart will break the tension. Someone obliges.
Women
Women drop the car keys off at reception and sit down with a magazine.
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