2653. Collecting firewood

It was a cold winter’s day; no snow on the ground, but frigid nonetheless. Conrad warmed his house with a fire, but he was out of wood. He wrapped himself up as warmly as he could, got into his old truck, and set off in search of any twigs that might have fallen near the side of the road. The only trouble – and this perhaps explains why he hadn’t recently collected firewood – was that the truck had got a puncture and although he replaced it with the spare tyre, he couldn’t afford to get the punctured tyre fixed. Let’s hope he doesn’t get another puncture!

He drove about ten miles down the road and found bits of fallen branches. Potential warmth!

How often anyway does one get a puncture?

2652. Fabulous new car

Darren thought his brand new car was absolutely fantastic. All the other cars he had owned in the past were really old-fashioned compared to the features his new car had. For example, it had a little screen on the dashboard that showed a video of what was behind the car as he back-backed.

The first thing he did after buying the car was to drive to the centre of town and park right outside the busiest shop. Hopefully his girlfriend would spot the car and go all gooey with admiration.

She never showed up, so Darren backed out of his angle-parking space using his wonderful screen on the dashboard. Being on an angle he didn’t see the big logging truck roaring down the road because it was roaring down the road not behind him but on the side.

Dear Reader, you might well feel bad for Darren losing his fabulous car so soon after purchasing it. Fret not. He was killed.

2460. On logging trucks and cats

That’s my cat fast asleep on her pillow on the bed. She is now in her eighteenth year. It’s amazing, given the traffic that passes the gate on our country road, that she has survived all those years. She crosses the road frequently while going hunting across the fields in search of a rabbit or a field mouse, or crossing the road to take a shortcut to the neighbour’s half a mile away to visit their cat. This is the fifth cat the neighbours have had in the years we’ve had our cat, and they’ve had so many cats for reasons I’ve hinted at above.

But now our cat is safely asleep on the bed, which seems to be her favourite sleeping spot these days.

One of the things about this country road is that it is used by massive logging trucks and trailers. There seems to be some forestry going on somewhere down the road. At first we thought it was going to be temporary, but the logging trucks have gone back and forth all these years and they never seem to run out of logs to cart. You can hear a truck coming for miles – such is the quietness of our rural setting. In fact, I can hear one approaching now.

These logging trucks zoom around the corner right next to our gate. I swear they don’t slow down one iota as they make their sudden appearance at our blind corner. Goodness knows what would happen if there was something on the road – like someone’s car broke down with a puncture or something. Or even a cow or a horse that had escaped its field.

That logging truck is approaching. You can tell from the sound that it’s speeding and huge. One good thing about them not slowing down is that we don’t get those noisy air-brakes (or power brakes or whatever they’re called) all day outside our gate. Imagine if we had to put up with that all the time!

Here it is now! Oops! The driver applied those noisy brakes as the truck came around the corner. That’s the first time I’ve ever heard that in all these years. I wonder why that was. These ruthless truck drivers never brake.

Anyway, it’s time to feed the cat. There she is, as nearly always these days, still fast asleep on the bed.

1485. Ned’s old truck

Ned Grinter had an old truck. Some might call the old truck a pick-up and some might call it a ute. It was once white, and a bit battered. It was Ned’s pride and joy, although he didn’t use it much – mainly several times a year to gather firewood for the winter. The rest of the time he used his car. He would polish the truck’s tires, and even polish the black cover that stretched over the back of the truck. Some might call the back of the truck a deck and some might call it a tray.

Ned was out collecting firewood in the forest with his wife, Barbara. He was chucking the firewood haphazardly onto the back of the truck. He was doing mighty fine loading wood when Barbara suggested that if he packed the wood nicely he’d be able to fit more on.

He didn’t have time to pack things nicely. They could come back and get a second load. It was quicker not to be fussy.

Things developed into an argument and then Ned, firewood only half loaded, took off in his truck for back home. And when he got home he stretched the cover over the back of the truck and said, Stuff it; stuff the firewood; his wife could freeze through the winter for all he cared.

So Ned’s old truck stayed unused throughout the cold winter, parked behind the back of the garden shed. Come the end of winter and Ned needed to use his truck to pick up a beer fridge he’d bought online. He unloaded the firewood. But he didn’t have a clue what to do with his wife’s decomposing corpse.

1455. The song of the skylarks

Mrs Drogmire (everyone knew her as Dear Mrs Drogmire for no one knew her first name) lived alone in a cottage somewhere in the country. She had lived there since her husband died almost fifty years ago. For the last twenty years she had retired from her work with the Manufacturing Association where she developed flame resistant fabric for furniture and vehicles.

These days she read, gardened and knitted. Her husband had passed on before they had even thought of starting a family. But who needs grandchildren to fill in a busy day?

The country thing that Dear Mrs Drogmire loved the most was the skylarks. Their singing, high in the sky, brought a great deal of joy to her summers. These days, with her slightly fading eyesight, she could rarely pick them out in the bright sky, but her hearing was still acute, and their singing was as if made for heaven. She would sit in a chair outside with a good book and a cup of tea, and the skylarks turned life to bliss.

And then two youths came by with their slug guns and started firing at the singing skylarks.

“What are you doing?” asked Dear Mrs Drogmire.

“We’re practising,” they said. “These skylarks are good target.”

“Don’t shoot my skylarks,” said Dear Mrs Drogmire.

“Why don’t you go drown yourself, old lady?” said the youths getting in their old truck and driving off.

They came back the following week. Leaving their truck the youths walked up the road and into a field. They started shooting the skylarks again. Suddenly their truck burst into flame. It was a gigantic explosion. Bits of truck flew into the air all over the place.

“What happened? What happened?” exclaimed Dear Mrs Drogmire dashing out of her house. “Thank goodness you weren’t in the vehicle when it overheated.”

“The cause of the explosion is unknown to us,” said the visiting policeman. “Not even the sweet little old lady who lives nearby saw a thing.”

1298. Panel three of a tragic triptych

I have researched the life of Natalie thoroughly in preparation for a novel I am writing. Not that she is a real person, but I have researched the times, the places, and pondered her personality and foibles. I feel I know her well enough now to begin the novel.

She was born in…

Oh dear. I’ve just received the most tragic telegram. Natalie has been run over by a truck.

1297. Panel two of a tragic triptych

Rebecca may have been a mere twenty-three, but she loved that old Nat King Cole song:

You will never grow old
While there’s love in your heart.

Rebecca had every reason to sing that song. She was in love. She would never grow old. Her wonderful boyfriend lived just across the road. In fact she was singing that very song as she crossed the road to visit her boyfriend when she was run over by a truck.

1296. Panel one of a tragic triptych

Sasha was most fortunate. Her genes meant she would live until aged 116. For a few months she would be the oldest person in the world. It wasn’t just her genes that gave her longevity; it was her lifestyle. Hers was a healthy and stress-free existence.

How do I know all this, I hear you ask? Well, I am a writer and therefore omnipotent. I created Sasha. I know she has the genes and the way of life to live until she’s 116. So you can put that in your pipe and smoke it.

It was therefore most unfortunate when, at the age of 23, she was run over by a truck.

614. Herbie backs out

© Bruce Goodman 16 June 2015

Herbie wasn’t greatly liked because he thought he could do anything. He sweated confidence. When he was 20 he applied for a job driving a huge articulated truck and trailer.

Herbie had one disadvantage when it came to driving; he couldn’t drive backwards. He couldn’t drive backwards especially if it was an articulated truck. He couldn’t drive backwards especially if it was an articulated truck AND trailer. He didn’t tell them that when he was interviewed.

“No sweat,” he said. “I could do it blind-folded.”

He got the job. What he planned to do was to look at satellite pictures of where he had to go and avoid having to drive backwards.

The first day they loaded the vehicle and trailer. First it was a garden centre; then a factory; then another factory; then a…

The driveway had changed since the satellite picture. There was no way out except backwards.

Herbie took the bull by the horns and backed, ever so slowly, ever so carefully. He escaped! He did it! It was a success!

It was a success for Herbie. The owners of the three cars he’d squashed were none too happy.