We’re having an Old Mates Shiraz from Dog Ridge today (already breathing), and a simple hard crumbly mature cheese from Mainland, with wafer crackers. I am starting today however, on the Adelaide Hills delight, Bird in Hand Pinot Noir, as I’m outside, it’s 21 degrees and glorious. I’ve added strawberry’s to the platter so we can pop them in our sparkling. Harry zooms around the corner right on cue, always entering the back gate (lucky I wasn’t getting some sun on my naked tits beforehand, gearing up for summer!). We do our customary hugs as I hand Zoe a glass of Bird in Hand and say “seems to me like you need this”
Zoe begins to cry. We sit down on the wicker outdoor lounge.
“Tell me” I encourage
“So Jed is spotting me on bench press, hovering over me, his biceps bulging, sunlight streaming into the PT room, enhancing the experience, when he accidentally spits on me as he’s talking! I mean like a projectile spit, not one drop, a water pistol spray, I kid you not, all over my face!.”
“Right in front of your face?” I exclaim giggling
“Shut up, I’m benching forty kilos so can’t wipe my face, he’s totally oblivious! I know, I know, it’s Jed , whose secretions are surely superior to the average guy, but still it’s spit Jay, gross”
“I would have spat back at him and said ‘I was enjoying the shower so much Jed I thought you’d like to join me!’” I get no response, she downs the Pinot Noir and I pour her another and top mine up, as I try and stifle the tiny wee from holding onto not spitting my own champas in her face myself, from laughing.
“So that’s all that’s wrong?” I ask incredulously,
“NO… I had another car accident this morning, I backed into someone at the gym and don’t know how to tell Luke”
“Oh Zo that’s like three in a month”
“Three in six weeks but who’s counting”
“Sounds like you and Luke are. Here’s an idea, just have a yearly booking with the crash repairer and get all your dingles sorted annually”
“Yes, very funny, ha ha” but she has stopped crying
“What’s really wrong, that shit just doesn’t get you down? And you hate conflict, so that episode this morning is just out of character, what is really going on with you?”
“Well I guess I’m just so tired from study, working, fucking JPT is giving me the shits, I’m sure I’ve put on two kilos and I don’t know… I’m just so up and down lately with my emotions”
“Perimenopausal?”
“Surely not, just tired I hope”
“Well this will cheer you up, my Ultrasound on my knee is all clear, no arthritis, doesn’t explain the pain though and typically it feels fine today, but still left with no answers”
“I think the only way you’ll know babe is if you get an MRI”
“I can’t afford $600, not with my car, I’ll just push through – all the golden oldies manage at the gym do so it can’t be that hard”
“Well don’t say the Doctor didn’t give you good advise, and what do you mean your car?”
“I won’t” I reply, then proceed to tell Zoe of our road trip from hell during the week, while Dash and I visited the family in the Yorke Peninsular for a few nights, and why my car is still at the mechanics, up to $1600 so far. We were travelling one hundred and ten kilometres an hour on the highway when suddenly the car slows even with the foot on the accelerator…we just start to plod along at about twenty kilometres an hour and there is nothing we can do about it, but turn our hazards on and stick to the left. Two and a half hours it took us to get home, but that wasn’t the worst of it. Of course Deputy the dog was with us and the window was down for him, and we realise in front of us is a random little white dog running along in our lane next to another car going slow (slower than us because we’ve caught up to it). We eventually stop, the dog’s not moving, someone has gotten out the car to try and help catch the little white dog and now all the other cars on the highway are at a standstill. And I think with all the trouble Deputy has gotten in running away all the time and jumping the fence, I should probably try and help and repay the kindness other people have shown our family. So I tell Dash to stay in the car and I get out my driver’s side. In the panic, I forgot to do up the car windows… and yep…..you guessed it – Deputy jumps out the car window and starts chasing me, then the little white dog! By now people are really screaming and I am so scared Deputy is going to run the LWD into traffic or get it lost in the bush, or run away himself because he is so mentally challenged. We chase them both to a creek bridge (we being me and the rest of the crowd who have helpfully hopped out their cars). Deputy is barking on our side of the bridge – the safe side, at the LWD who has crawled under the railing and balancing precariously on the unsafe side of the bridge (no water in the creek by the way, so would not be a soft landing). Oh My God one false move and he’s going to jump!! Then quick as a flash he squeezes through the railing and comes back to the safe side and makes a run for it, I lose him in the crowd of cars and people and when I turn back to see where Deputy is – he’s gone. Oh My God I scream, where is my dog. And some kind person in the crowd says ‘he’s in that car’ pointing to a car three down from mine that is still parked in the stand still traffic. I run to the car and when I get to it there is Deputy sitting in the passenger seat and the passenger is standing up outside the car yelling “there’s a dog in my car, there’s a dog in my car! We are visiting from Melbourne, does this always happen? Most exciting holiday I’ve ever had” I grab the dog, apologise profusely and drag Deputy back to our car to continue home at twenty kilometres an hour!
“Oh Zo I tell ya – this dog is troubled. When I get him back to our car, Dash is dutifully still sitting in the car and says “what happened to the little white dog mum?” and that’s when I realise – I have absolutely no idea. As with car it’s finally been diagnosed as BAD FUEL. Who knew? It’s ruined our fuel tank and that has to be replaced, hours in labour trying to figure it out has cost us a fortune”.
By this time the Bird in Hand and Old Mates is finished, so is the cheese and it’s 5.30 already. Troy walks in as Zoe and Harry are leaving, they grin at each other – weird?
Anyway that’s another TGIF wine and cheese Friday down the hatch so to speak.
Healthy, Happy & Whole 