Monday, August 12, 2013

The Third Thing

You know how things happen in threes...

and when one thing happens, you think it is isolated, just one thing...

and then another thing happens and you just start searching like crazy for that third thing?



No?

Okay, welcome to my mind.

This is the third thing.





It was also instrumental in the first thing - for being a little heavy.

In defence of the hapless right foot, the logic sector of my brain assisted it - along the lines of "roadworks, fair enough, like to slow down through someone's workspace, do de do de do de dooo - 4 km and nary a sign of any roadworks, mustn't be happening or be over, send the message to the appendage in charge of acceleration - oh, apparently it is still roadworks despite the lack of actual work going on on the road, appendage, hit the pedal to the left - too late, flashing lights, hello there officer".

Working out the cost of that little misunderstanding - 8 (in the end) km of "roadworks" (my definition of that term apparently isn't wide enough to encompass that of the legal establishment in the Sunshine State) at 40km below the usual speed limit = 5 1/3 minutes - so I need to earn the equivalent of $6,446.25 an hour to justify that sort of frittering...

Yeah, right.  Onya right foot.



The second thing - again, not completely the fault of the right foot. 

Driving along a lonely road with the girls on my way back to V - a long, lovely, sun-dappled, lonely road.  A long, lovely, sun-dappled, lonely road that was not the scene of the above.

The sun-dappled is the thing, though.  Weaving in and out of forests and hills and valleys so gorgeous, ensuring that the foot was not too heavy and heeding my father's sage advice "drive to the conditions" so the gravel road received far more respect than the above-mentioned "roadworks".

And then the sun-dappled malevelently tripped me up.  Threw a pebble in my path, if you will.  A large pebble.   Of rock-like proportions.

Until I was upon it, the sun-dappled was just doing its thing, and then I got a half-second glimpse of my doom - and then the underside of my car felt its doom and then...

And then the old right foot could do whatever it pleased, it no longer had control over acceleration because my car was mourning its transmission.

In the middle of a long, lovely, sun-dappled, lonely road with ABSOLUTELY no mobile coverage.

Right foot got plenty of time to contemplate.  As did left foot.  As did 'Salina and Paris - full kudos to 'Salina - she was a trooper in sharing the load (half an emergency kit we put together - warm clothes, water, food - darn, I am going to have a torch next time though!! - and half to the just woken from a much needed nap Paris).

We did see one car during our hike - a ute with a young couple - who we gave our details to so they could call for assistance in case we didn't find any mobile signal before dark.

We had to hike for several k along that  lovely, sun-dappled, lonely road - around bends, through gullies and up, up, up hill - one hill, one HUGE expletive deleted hill - until, miracle of miracles, 'Salina found a magical spot where we got 2 bars!!

Those 2 bars of signal meant we could call for roadside assistance, for friendly reassuring voices, for quelling fears of loved ones and for entreaties for a tow-truck.

At first, I was promised the towie would call me "as he was out on a job".  When the call came through, it was from the town of our destination - over 120km away - and he had NO CLUE where we actually were but thought he could wing it and would be there in a few hours - and could I stay WITH the vehicle, in the dark, away from my precious 2 bars of mobile signal with the girls?  He conceded that was foolish, but still expected us to wait several hours on the side of the lonely road with looming shadows playing with the Twilight-gorged mind of  'Salina.

We did see several other vehicles after this promise - all were warned of the car and the possibility of rocks, and all were (thankfully) normal pleasant people.

As we were working out the logistics of transporting ourselves to safety as well as the car, the bright flashing lights of a tow truck approached from the town we had travelled FROM - only 45km away - which was SUCH A RELIEF.



So a broken toe-nail?  So claiming it for my third!!

6 comments:

Debby said...

Yikes. Jeanie and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

I am glad that there was a light at the end of the tunnel...even though it had to be the tow truck.

jeanie said...

I am bloddy glad there was a tow truck at the end of our day!!!

BB said...

No one is as relieved as I that that flashing light belonged to someone we know and trust... I have quite the imagination ( I have discovered) when it comes to sun dappled forests and my family at dusk!!!

BB said...

Did it work that time?

Jayne said...

Oh, what a horrible time for you!
Hugs xxx
So glad you all got home safely xxx

mrs figstuff said...

Stick to the bitimun for while eh? Maz