2013 TO JUNE

The start of January saw John’s first visit to physio, for exercises for the reconstructed shoulder. He was told not to drive until early March, and that there would be no bowls until mid-April, at least. Shock and horror all round.

I was not sure my sanity would survive being the chauffeur for another two months.

John just couldn’t manage to obey the physio’s edicts, and was back driving again by the end of January – though he did try to limit it, a bit. He couldn’t help but try bowling again, too, weeks earlier than he was supposed to.

It was a very hot summer and the pool got a lot of use, by us and offspring and grandchildren.

Dog invented a new game. It was hard to leave her outside the pool enclosure when anyone was swimming – we wondered if the crazy barking and carry on was because she thought she should be rescuing whoever? But once let in, she soon began to drop a ball into the pool for the nearest person to throw out into the yard for her to fetch. Repeat….and repeat and……..Great fun for her, not so much for whoever was the target of her attention, because she would bark incessantly till her will was done. A couple of times, in her running around the pool edge, she cut a corner too much and fell in. Dog had no problem swimming to get herself out again, though.

One morning, I found Couey outside the back door, with the tail of a possum hanging from her mouth and that unmistakeable “have I done something wrong?” look. There was no way she could have dispatched a live and fighting possum without us hearing it, or her bearing some wounds, so had to conclude that she found it already dead and decided on an extra meal. Always an opportunist where food was concerned.

Early in the year, we had to take Bus for a service – to be done every six months in order to keep the warranty valid, even though it had only done a few hundred kms since the last one. We found a dealership that could handle Bus, in a nearby suburb.

I sent away for a set of solar shades for Bus. These screens  suction-capped to the inside of the front windscreen, and the two side front windows. We did not need them for privacy as a curtain had come with Bus that was on a wire and hung behind the front seats, when parked up. But I had noticed, on our shake down trip last year, that the large glass areas conducted cold on chilly nights. I hoped the solar screens would insulate us better. When they arrived, I was impressed with the quality and thickness.

We had a CB radio installed in Terios – partly for if we were day tripping with M tagging along. Could also see that, possibly, on a tricky road or really steep hill, we might drive Bus and Terios separately, and CB’s would be useful then.

John’s ongoing role with the Selection Committee of the bowls club kept him tied to home until the end of the season, but he really wanted to squeeze in a trip with Bus between then and Easter, which was at the end of March – two or three weeks. We had provisionally settled on a trip along the Great Ocean Road.

When John wasn’t working on bowls related matters, he was out in his shed, making a wooden table for my study. I spent much time in the garden, but also worked on a commission for another crocheted cot blanket. The one I’d made last year for new grandson was such a hit that the family had asked me to do another one, for a friend’s baby. As well, I was attempting hand quilting for the first time – both difficult to master and extremely hard on my wrist and fingertips (the pincushion effect….)

Mid March, another bout of the breathlessness that our GP couldn’t explain, saw John patronizing  the ambulance service again. Back into  Epworth Eastern for another couple of weeks. Two litres of fluid was drained from around his lungs, but after lots of tests the lung specialist could only come up with there being some sort of infection or inflammation, for an unknown reason. Once out of hospital, there would be fortnightly check ups by said specialist.

I commuted back and forth each day to visit the invalid. The dog fretted.

That put paid to the pre-Easter trip with Bus.

Actually, I could have a pretty good guess at the cause of the lung problem – but John forbade me saying anything to his doctors. He had been doing a lot of dust-causing woodwork and not wearing the masks and filters he should have been. Some timbers are really toxic, blackwood amongst them.

Back home again, John’s next project was to install a new, technologically up to date, Wineguard TV aerial on Bus.

I bought an e-book reader – a Sony. What a boon for travellers! No more storing bags of reading matter under the bed, and haunting book exchanges. I could load up the e-reader with three weeks’ worth of books from my local library and replenish same as needed – as long as I had an internet connection. Magic!

In June, with only a couple of hundred kms of day trips clocked up since the last one, Bus was back off for another service. So was John – and the lung man cleared him for three months before the next review would be needed – September.

A federal election was expected in mid-September and I had signed up to work taking Declaration Votes again – but that was three months away.

Suddenly, we had a window for travel again, so there was a mad flurry of preparation.