_ian

As the topic says! My car is parked outside. I live in Central London and was lucky enough to find secure parking that's reasonably priced, but it is outdoors.
It's now evolved into a two part question:

a) What's the best way for me to clean it up and get rid of the green bits that now are appearing near the bottom edges? I'm guessing a good scrubbing with vinegar (bleach sounds a bit ott) would work?

b) I'm happy to take it to a professional shop as I was debating giving it a proper tidy up anyway. However I can't seem to find anything that falls in the middle ground between "£20 Hand Car Wash" and >£1k 3 days of detailing your car. Does anyone have any suggestions here? Ideally London or easy reach in Kent.
thanks

New bonnet struts. A little thing, but being able to load the frunk with both hands was a surprisingly pleasant change.

After a few days away in Wales it’s reminded me how wonderful the 987 Boxster is. After a 6.5 hour drive from Central London to St Davids on the West coast, it was just great on all the small roads along the coast. Suspension just soaked up all the bumpy bits of the B roads, great brakes for avoiding running over rabbits and stopping quickly into wider bits of the road when there wasn’t room for two cars, enough acceleration to squirt through quickly when other people had stopped in wider bits. Roof down to enjoy the sun. A much better 5.5 hour drive back home with only a couple of slow-downs on the motorways.
best of all, one of those “oh shyate” moments on the drive back from Wales turned out to be nothing. On an uphill 2 lane stretch while passing 3 big trucks I spotted the dreaded flashing lights and Heddlu Police writing on the front of a 4x4 coming up fast. Much to my delight he appeared to be on the way to deal with some kind of major crime rather than giving me a ticket for doing 93 in a 70 zone.
It was a delayed birthday gift for my better half, who has wanted to see puffins for years, but we've always missed the season. This time, thanks to some uncharacteristic forethought on my part in buying tickets for Skomer Island 9 months ago we got to see them and it was a lovely visit to Skomer.

We're off to Wales tomorrow morning so I drove it from it's parking space in Shad Thames to somewhere close to our place so we can leave nice and early.
Why is this worthy of a mention, I hear you ask. Well normally when the car sits for over a week and a half, it requires a jump start. The last time I drove it was 5 weeks ago when I ragged it up Prescott Hillclimb circuit. I've been away on business for several weeks and was shocked beyond belief when it put the key in and the windows didn't drop down and all the gauges didn't go nuts and it started first turn of the key. Not only that, it did that awesome burst into life within a fraction of a second. I guess the hot weather suits it.

join the club! mines on 108,000

New rear disks and pads at Tower Porsche. Back side of the disks was pretty rusty and that accounted for the noise i was hearing when driving with the windows open.

I just had a phone call from the building concierge from where my car is parked and he said that he'd spotted my car lights were flashing but there was no alarm sounding. He'd looked at the car and didn't see anything untoward. By the time I phoned him back he said it had stopped. Does the 987 have one of those alarms that has a "detected something minor" stage that might do this rather than having the siren go off fully?

Has anyone ever had this happen before? 

Decided not to sell it!

I'd planned to sell the Boxster now, then buy a Cayman S in the spring. Phoning WBAC to cancel my appointment this morning. Their initial estimate was ~1,300 more than a couple of used Porsche specialists.

I really can't mention this to my partner, because she'll go mental, but I do need to share it. Not too long ago I mentioned to my father that I'd only driven the Boxster about 600 miles in the last year. To which his response was "so how much is that costing you per mile?"

I got the car back from the shop yesterday and it's just amazing. I winced while paying the bill, but 2 minutes later I was thinking "this is how the car is supposed to be".

Just did the back of the envelope math. It looks like we're at about £7/mile (insurance, parking, two visits to the garage). It's paid for so I'll ignore cost of capital. Off to the Lake District next week, so we'll bring that per mile figure down a long way.

But it does make me think that if I'd sold it 3 years ago and bought more Square shares I could have bought a GT3. Though Square shares paid for my MBA so I can't complain too much...

Picked it up from Tower Porsche after new lower control arms and rear shocks. While they were in there the exhaust gaskets and bolts that were rattling were replaced. They also spotted the noisy startup and found that the water pump ready to let go at any time. So it was a largish bill, but the car is lovely to drive now. Soaks up the London speed bumps and is super planted when accelerating around a corner. It's also makes only the right noises, squeaks and rattles gone.
 

On holiday to Lake District next Monday and it's going to be a lovely drive up there.

Booked it into Tower Porsche for new coffin arms and a battery next Monday. Heading off for a few days in the Lake District a week later, so wanted to get it sorted in advance.

Picked it up from Tower Porsche where they'd replaced my drivers side window regulator and switch. 

Today I looked at the dusty keys and wondered when I'm going to drive it again...

I walk to work in Central London so mine doesn't get driven daily. I hadn't started it in a couple of weeks so took it for a quick spin.

Roof down and 7000 rpm through a tunnel near London Bridge made me giggle like a child and reminded me why I love it.