A balmy Queensland breeze was blowing out of the south-east, relieving the sweltering heat of the day that had been… . Okay, stop, that’s enough of the romanticised BS version…
An enormous bloody great industrial fan, that Dad bought from Bunnings for 99 bucks, (quite the bargain apparently), which by the way makes about the same amount of noise as a small aircraft preparing for take off. This is strategically placed in the dining room doorway to encourage the cooler air inside, where per chance the bleedin’ sliding screen door has recently become estranged from its tracks. Sadly, this may be permanent!
This is now allowing all manner of insect life into the Old Queenslander, (assuming they make it past the propeller blades of the giant industrial fan).
So now when sitting in the dining room if you have hair, which most people do, then you need either a shower cap, a hair net or a headband of some description, to keep your hair out of your eyes and mouth while you eat and speak, because there is a 40 knot wind howling past your head.
Then of course there is the issue of communication. If you want to talk to someone more than 5 cm from your face, you best get shouting, because otherwise they are not going to be hearing you. Now this is also dependant on whether you are upwind or downwind of the bloody great fan. And please, in the name of all things holy, if you are downwind, monitor your saliva!
And it doesn’t stop there either… When you’re on your phone the background noise from the fan when you’re on a hands free call, is apparently so distracting people can’t understand a single word you say. Not that it's much better face-to-face.
Now don’t get me wrong, I would not even consider for a moment turning the big mother off! Why you ask? Because it’s hot! In fact I’d go so far as to say ‘It’s damn hot’. So while my hair and skin are experiencing wind burn, and biscuits have been seen to blow right off the afternoon tea table, it does provide the best available relief in the current weather conditions.
"This is Australia" as GANGgajang so elegantly put it (or Queensland in our case) we don’t stop doing stuff just because its, well, hot.
So anyway, I had a friend over to give her a hand learning the ropes on Steemit (not sure I’m the best option, but she’s stuck with me). You will meet her soon (I hope) @pameladownunder (make sure you welcome her when she does her intro post) mind you with me helping her it could take a while.
@pameladownunder will be Steeming from her smartphone, and I have no experience with smartphone posting, being a strictly laptop person. So I asked @mumofmany to drop by and give us the benefit of her wisdom on the matter, as I know she only posts on her iPhone.
And indeed @mumofmany dutifully dropped by about 3:00 pm gave us both a smartphone tutorial, and @pameladownunder and I looked at her most recent post about her kids all having a stomach bug.
We all thought no more of that post. We chatted, messed about on Steemit had a Pepsi Max or 3 and shouted over the bloody great fan. Then @mumofmany returned home to her 6 kids with their tummy bugs.
My tutorial with @pameladownunder had started at 11:00 am (not that we hadn't digressed into other areas from time-to-time), but still at around 7:00 pm, I thought it was probably time to get some dinner on the table.
While I was preparing dinner, I got a phone call from @mumofmany’s phone. It was Miss 12, and she was a little distraught. Generally the thrust of her communication was that her Mum had fallen out of bed while vomiting was now sitting on the floor and requesting I bring over some of those ‘wafers’. ‘Stat’!
After a little bit of deep breathing for both of us, and some unscrambling of the message I got to the bottom of the communication. Poor @mumofmany, on driving home from my place had only made it about 1 km up the road, when she had to stop and hurl roadside. Not ideal!
She made it home, but apparently the hurling had continued unabated ever since. Clearly the kids shared their bug with Mummy. It was bound to happen! I had mentioned to her that my GP gave me a medication for severe vomiting, (a wafer) but nothing like a biscuit. When you can’t keep anything down these are fantastic, because you don’t have to swallow them, you just pop them under your tongue and they dissolve. Bingo no more upchucking .
So while Mr @mumofmany was running from room to room, cleaning up after most of the other members of the household while they continued to upchuck, (you can’t use the wafers for children sadly), I had been summoned to deliver the ‘cure’ to @mumofmany as a matter of urgency! Clearly the 6:1 ratio was not going well for Mr @mumofmany!
I pretty much threw dinner on the table for @pameladownunder and Dad, grabbed the anti vomit wafers and jumped in the car for the 10 minute drive to @mumofmany’s.
I rocked up to @mumofmany’s place, and drove onto the front lawn. Miss 12 squeezed out the front door trying to keep the little ones inside who were all at the door yelling ‘Nana’, and waiting for me to come in. Sorry guys, I love you, but you're currently in a quarantine zone. It's not happening!
I wound down my window, and leaning back, passed out the box of wafers and reminded Miss 12 to have @mumofmany read the instructions.
I made brief enquiries as to everyone's condition from Miss 12, albeit at arm’s length, just as Mr @mumofmany appeared in the doorway with a bucket and yelled 'Thank you', before rushing off to clean up the next crisis!
Having satisfied myself that death was probably not imminent for anyone, I rolled up my window and bolted home again, to find Dad and @pameladownunder just finishing up dinner. However, they very politely sat through the prevailing 40 knot gale, while I ate my dinner.
Post dinner, coffee and some really good nougat, a little more Steemit was achieved, until quite a late evening, when with the industrial fan from Bunnings still blowing away, we adjourned to regroup yet another day… Actually, Monday.
And that folks believe it or not is a fairly typical evening at chateau Aussiesteem... Never a dull moment and we wouldn't have it any other way.
Thanks for reading…
Steem on!