World gone mad

Do you remember when you were a child? Playing on your scooter, push-bike or strap-on roller skates outside the house? Round and round you'd go for hours. Mum and Dad had told you where you could go to and you daren't go beyond those limits.

My brother and I were allowed to go over to the woods. A small crop of trees on the edge of a playing field across the road from our house. He was allowed to go into the field with his friends and play football while I was to stay in the woods, climb trees (yes, I climbed tress) or made Mud Pies.

We would be out of sight of Muv and/or Dad for hours. Muv would be inside cooking up a storm or out in the back garden tending the veggies, while Dad would be servicing the taxi.

Just to prove how crazy the world has become a woman, Tammy Cooper, has been arrested for letting her children (aged 6 and 9) play in the cul-de-sac outside her house unsupervised. Shock horror!

I wouldn't want to be the neighbour that reported her to the police for abandonment.

Is the world really such an awful place now that a mother can't watch her children from the kitchen or the comfort of a lawn chair? Do we really have stand over our children 24/7?

I'm so glad I was given the chance:

- to play in the mud without being told, 'get out.'

- to learn the hard way that sticks do not make good imitation cigarettes. I fell over and landed on the stick injuring the back of my throat.

- to learn, never borrow a bike from a kid you just met and ride it really fast down a hill, because the brakes may not work. Cue fat lip, grazed knuckles and scabs covering the right side of the face.

- Stinging nettles hurt a lot when you fall from a tree into a patch.

- and don't jump into the deep end of the pool when you can't swim, it get really ugly real quick until that 10 year old saves you.

Kids have to learn lessons. They only get some lessons when they go out into the world. The front garden and safety of the cul-de-sac you live in is the very edge of the world and needs to be explored when you're in running while crying distance from home.

The police need to question the intentions of the neighbour and how they reacted. Surely when the woman you've come to arrest approaches you because she's seen you arrive it's clear she hasn't abandoned her children in her own front garden.

Charges have been dropped and Tammy is going after the police by suing them. Only in America?






Picture borrowed from here, I had nothing to do with creating it!

Fast One?

At 2.20pm yesterday afternoon I received a phone call while I was at work. On the other end of the phone was an Asian sounding lady saying she was from my Real Estate agents and that I was required to be home at 12noon today for an assessment. As I live in a rental property and this is the time of year that my annual inspection happens, I was a bit miffed at the short notice, but could cope. I tried to explain that I work during the week and that would be difficult could it happen on the weekend. I was told, ‘Thursday is the day for your suburb’.

So I arranged to work from home today.

This morning I got up, flicked the hoover around the house, put away a few things and got to work.

At 11.58 my mobile rang, it was a man called Mohammed (I think) he told me he was outside and wanted to come in. I walked out to the front porch to see a pale blue car parked on the road and out climbed a man of Middle Eastern origin dressed in jeans, a blue and white striped casual shirt and dark trainers. He was clean shaven and carrying a roll of white paper.
I waited on the porch for him to get closer; I greeted him with an outstretched hand. Before he could say anything I asked if he was here for the annual inspection. I had made this assumption yesterday during the conversation with the girl on the phone due to her insistence I be home and her repeating of the word assessment. Actually I only really caught one in every five of her words due to her heavy accent.

He told me ‘No, I’m here to do a Green Loan Assessment.’

‘What’s that then?’

He explained that he would come into my house and look at all my appliances, find out when I use the lights and whether I have energy bulbs (I do and can’t use my dimmers because of them) and generally check the house out. I asked if this was a compulsory check and who was asking for it.

‘It’s a Government form, I send it in when it’s completed and you get a letter telling you if you need to replace any appliances, and they’ll loan you the money if you need it’.

I asked if he had any ID.

He told me that he had the form that he had to fill in. He had no clipboard to lean on, so the form was all flippy floppy. I said, ‘if you’ll excuse me for second, I just want to call my Real Estate Agent.’

I popped inside and called my Landlord. I rarely go through the agent for anything except the annual inspection and rent payments. The Landlord, was furious and told me he’d get straight onto the Agents to find out what was going on.

I went back outside and the guy was still there, holding his rolled up Government form. I asked him for his ID again. When he failed to produce it, but say he had an assessor number, I let him have it.

‘You turn up here after giving me less than 24hours notice and expect me to let you into my house when you can’t produce any form of ID. You ain’t coming into my house, Mate!

And, you might want to reconsider turning up at the rest of the houses on the hand written list you’re holding with a rolled up form you could having printed off a website and without any ID. Bye’.

Well, there may have been a little more detail, but you get the gist.

This encounter played on my mind for much of the day. Especially after the Real Estate Agent rang me and told me that that had not arranged any such appointment.

About six in the evening I called the Police. They sent a couple of uniforms around for to give a statement. They thought it sound a tad odd too.

I still have his number saved in my mobile, under Dodgy Green Loan Guy.


PS. Green Loans are a real thing, but his lack of ID gave me pause. Having now looked at the website for the scheme I'm really glad I didn't let him in my house.

And it All Turned Sh*t

This morning was lovely. I woke at my own pace before getting up and showering. The sun was shining for the first time in a week. Then I got on a bus and went to meet Dr. Plod. My good girlfriend that has been sorely neglected since she started working shifts that include much weekend work. We met on the steps of the State Library before going and attending a seminar called Contemporary Fiction – Writing Sex, presented by four well known Aussie authors.

If I learnt one thing while listening to them all speak it’s this. Name the parts as the character would. If your character would call a cock, a cock, don’t call it a penis. You get me?

Anyway, after the seminar Dr. Plod had to get home to feed her kids (horses, dogs and budgies), so she left me to get some new contact lenses. Upon arriving were the Optician should be, they weren’t there. They’ve done a runner to god knows where with all my glasses history. I need new lenses you bastards and now I’m going to have to go through the whole laborious process of having my eyes tested etc, etc.

So, what with it being just after four, I thought I'll pop down to the 3 shop to see about getting my phone fixed. The nipple broke a couple of weeks back and it keeps cutting out mid conversation. The only place to take it is the 3 shop as it is still under warranty. I got to the door, It was locked, all the lights were on and there were people milling about inside. It was 4.15. CLOSED. God DAMN IT!

I walked to the bus stop and after seeing I had to wait twenty minutes for the next bus I decided the taxi would have me home in half that time, so I flagged one down. I didn’t want my day getting any worse.

Once I got home I remembered I had to procure food for Puss. So I waited a little while then went outside to get my grandma trolley from the shed. It wasn’t there. Had I left it in the kitchen, No. Had I left it in the second bedroom, No. I figured it had been nicked. Couldn’t think why or when, but picked up shopping bags from under the sink and resigned myself to carrying tins back from the shop. While walking I called Todd and told him about my mysteriously disappearing trolley and he said, ‘Is anything else missing?’

I hadn’t even thought to look, but there were a few things in there. After speaking with Todd, I called Dr. Plod. She recommended I call the Police Assistance Line and report it. When I got back from the shops (a round trip of twenty minutes) I looked in the shed (a small lean to tacked onto the back of the house). Missing was the Drop Saw, the drill, the cordless drill and really nice pair of secateurs. I’m most pissed of about the secateurs, because they had a perfect cutting action and could cut through nearly anything. But mostly I’m pissed off that the fuckers made me doubt myself.

I remember now, on Tuesday I took some rubbish out and the back gate was unlocked. I thought I had left it unlocked the previous night. I mentally scolded myself for being silly. I had a go at the cat for digging in the flower pots and spraying soil everywhere, when quite clearly that is were the fuckers landed as they jumped over the fence.

Anyway the police came round after I reported it. They told me to get another deadlock on the back door.

I’m so angry!