1511: A story to advance cultural understanding

I from another country but I visit as tourist. I do not understand some of the strange way you foreigners have things. I will furnish you with example.

My wife and me we hire car to see the views around the country. We see big waterfall and wife photographed. We see other things. And when we pass through town the car ran over a cat. Of course I stopped and picked up cat and took it to house next to road.

“Oh,” screamed the lady. “That’s my Fluffy. Oh my poor Fluffy! You’ve killed my Fluffy!”

Very emotional lady. I thought it might have been the cat belonging to the house, which is why I came to ask if we could take it back to motel to cook for dinner.

1506: Bernard’s disorganized wife

Bernard’s wife does nothing other than complain. She’s a stay-at-home mother, which is a luxury most of us can ill afford. She complains that there are not enough hours in a day. Not enough hours in the day for what? Lounging around watching the soaps while the kids are at school?

Being a well-paid consultant I asked her to write down what she does in a day, so improvements can be made and then she’ll have no reason to complain. Here is a typical Wednesday – or so she claims:

Get the kids ready for school – 1 hour
Tidy the house – 2 hours
Prepare meals- 1 hour
Get the groceries – 2 hours
Do necessary odd jobs, e.g. take the car to get fixed etc. – 2 hours
Mow the lawn and weed the garden – 1 hour
Do the laundry – 1 hour sometimes 2
Pick up the kids from school – 1 hour, sometimes less, sometimes more
Take the dog for a walk and feed the dog and cat – 30 minutes

The list for Wednesday went on and on, but I won’t bore you with more details.

Look, I said to her, just get yourself organized and stop the complaining. Do some of these jobs on another day of the week.

1407. Fate in a flash!

Kelvin Farquhar entered every competition he could lay his hands on. Businesses were forever running promotions with attractive rewards and prizes. Kelvin had never won a thing. He would love to win a car. But what he most wanted was to win was a house. Once a month the Heart Foundation ran a raffle for a house!

Kelvin Farquhar didn’t have that much money. There was no way he could afford a house on his meagre income. His old car rattled and puffed. When that stopped he didn’t quite know what he was going to do. Winning a house would help him get by.

There’s no doubt that Fate can change everything in a flash! Today was the day the house draw took place. Would the phone ring? Kelvin Farquhar had worked out that they would probably phone the winner in the afternoon, so he drove to get the groceries in the morning.

On the way his car overheated. It was no good for anything after that except towing away. And he never won the house either.

1394. Winner of a car

Travis was excited, but worried. He had entered a win-a-car competition at the supermarket. It was a promotion. And although he had never won anything in the past, at least entering automatically by buying $50 worth of groceries gave him a chance. Indeed! It was to be his lucky day!

This was the day the keys to the car were to be handed over. It was a bright red car. Travis had already seen it for it was parked near the entrance door to the supermarket so that everyone would see it and spend at least $50.

So Travis was excited! Why he was worried was because the Press would be there taking photos and he didn’t really know what to wear. He wondered if he should get a nice pair of trousers with a brand new pullover. Modest in colour – not too bright and not too dull; casual yet appropriate.

So he did that; he went to town and got himself fitted out. It was more expensive than he thought it would be, but not to worry.

Now all he needed was for his name to be pulled out of the hat.

1364. Stella’s foul mood

Stella was in a foul mood. For several weeks she had planned her little Easter Sunday party for her daughter, son-in-law and their three young children.

They came to lunch quite often, but this Easter Sunday would be special because… because it was Easter Sunday. Stella prepared the menu meticulously. She spent hours painting and decorating eggs for the children. And now all was ready!

Early in the morning, Stella wandered her garden hiding chocolate eggs for the children to find. She had prepared the vegetables. The rack of lamb was on the bench ready for the oven. For dessert they were to have blackberry pie with her special homemade honey ice cream!

Late morning Stella’s daughter phoned. Arnie the son-in-law was feeling off-colour. Could Stella come and pick her and the kids up? But Stella’s car was broken down. I thought I told you. Not to worry, said the daughter, we weren’t that keen to come today anyway as they had been invited to a friend’s place and Arnie was keen to go there. Not to worry, said Stella.

Stella didn’t quite know what to do. She went over to the neighbours on the left hand side who had two young children. Would they like to come and hunt for Easter eggs in her garden? We’re not Christians and we don’t believe in all that stuff.

Stella went over to the middle-aged neighbours on the right hand side. Would they care for some chocolate eggs? Chocolate is chocolate, they said. They came. They hunted for the eggs. They stayed for a delightful rack of lamb and a blackberry pie. A convivial time was had by all. They had recently won millions in the lottery. Their win was a secret. They bought Stella a brand new car.

1362. Flora’s foul mood

Flora was having a bad day. She lived in a house set on a sharp corner of a busy road. She hadn’t slept a wink. All night, well at least until 3 o’clock, teenage hoons were hooning* with speeding, burnouts, doughnuts, and screeching tyres around the corner next to her house. After that she was so angry she couldn’t sleep.

When she did rise she discovered she was out of toothpaste and cleaned her teeth using salt. She burnt the toast at breakfast, tripped over the cat, and couldn’t find her reading glasses for a good ten minutes.

There was only one thing for it; she would do what she always did when in a foul mood: she would get out her book of recipes from The Australian Women’s Weekly and cook something wonderful that she had never tried before. Flora settled on making an Apricot Sour Cream Pie. She had all the ingredients in the house already, and it looked delicious.

First she made the base with crumbled cookie crumbs and melted butter. While that was cooling in the fridge she prepared the filling – with apricots, sugar, flour, eggs, sour cream and so on. She sprinkled the uncooked masterpiece lightly with nutmeg, and placed it in a moderate oven.

Thirty minutes later she removed the pie and sat it on top of the bench. The smell was glorious! Flora’s foul mood had disappeared.

That was when a hoon’s car left the road, flew through the air, and plunged onto Flora’s front lawn. Taking the pie, Flora scurried out to investigate. It was the most satisfying pie she had ever baked.

* Hoons and hooning are common Australian/New Zealand terms meaning teenage louts with cars!

1278. Yes, Sir

“The thing is,” said Dad… He was driving along in the car.

“The thing is,” said Dad… He was teaching his three kids in the back seat how to survive in this dog-eat-dog world. Mother was happily dozing.

“The thing is,” said Dad, “if you’re stopped by a traffic cop for speeding or something, just call them ‘Sir’. They like that. They’ll give you a warning and tell you to drive on safely. It works every time. Just call them ‘Sir’ – they’re as thick as a mud in a Washington swamp.”

“What’s this? Why am I getting pulled over by a cop? Kids, here’s your chance to see how what I said works.”

“Good afternoon, SIR.”

“You were speeding. Doing 70 in a 50 area.“

“Oh but, SIR, it’s Sunday and there’s little traffic about.”

“That makes no difference. Here’s your fine.”

The cop got in his car and drove off.

“Kiddies,” said Mother, now awake, “I want you to block your ears. Daddy’s about to say something you shouldn’t hear.”

985. Fat, tasteless, and a sore loser

When Tristan entered a competition to win a car, he was pretty sure he’d be in the running to win. You had to say in seven words something clever about a certain brand of king-sized chocolate bar. Tristan knew he’d come up with an unbeatable seven words.

Anyway, Cesaria, the fat lady from down the road, won the car. She was a great big fat lady, and Tristan wasn’t surprised she’d won because she was so fat she looked like she’d been eating nothing but king-sized chocolate bars for half a century.

There was a choice of colour when it came to the car, and Cesaria picked the yellow one. It was bright yellow; sort of the colour of baby’s poo. How tasteless. Cesaria wasn’t just fat, fat, fat; she also had no taste; no aesthetic sense whatsoever.

She said in an interview that she’d entered competitions for years and never won anything before. Sore loser. Tristan hated sore losers. She was fat, tasteless, and a sore loser. Tristan hated her guts.

Listen to the story being read HERE!

946. Harriet’s car

Harriet had been a widow for quite a number of years, and still had the same old car as when her husband died. It was getting on a bit and seemed to still go well, but she knew as much about cars as a blow fly. When an advertisement in the paper said the local car company was doing trade-ins, Harriet thought “Why not?” and drove off to the car place.

A young man approached her, and she asked how much would she get off the price of a new car by trading in this old one? The lovely young man said he’d need to take it for a quick spin around the block, to ascertain its worth. So he jumped in and took off.

And he never came back.

To listen to the story being read click HERE!

909. Kissing in the front seat

Come on, baby. Get over into the back seat.

Nah, I don’t want to.

(Smooch. Smooch). Come on, baby. Get over into the back seat.

Nah. I don’t want to.

(Smooch. Smooch). Come on, baby. Get over into the back seat.

Nah. I don’t want to.

Why not?

‘Cos I want to be with you.

To listen to the story being read click HERE!