#002 Highways, wallets and strangers

For our second post I wanted to share a kindness done to me several years ago that I will never forget.

I was your typical everyday university student, surviving on 2min noodles, and home made moonshine (chilli ginger beer). In case it is not clear, I was broke. So broke that I would search supermarket trolleys for $5 shop-a-dockets pokey deals so I could hit collect and get some lunch.

Anyway.  We needed some furniture for our share house so my boyfriend and I decided to go bargain hunting at the tip-shop. We had finished looking around and I was putting my purchase in the back of the car, so I placed my wallet on the roof to use both hands.... and we drove off onto the highway.

Image courtesy of 'every day is a gift'

Now the people in the car behind us saw my wallet gracefully fly from the top of that car, hit the side of the highway and spray a fan of cards as it cart-wheeled along at 100km/hr. These kind folks stopped their car, walked back up the highway collecting all my cards and my wallet. They then began the arduous task of trying to find the silly goose of a girl who had left it on her car roof. It turned out that the only phone number I had in my wallet was the mum of a friend of a friend that I had not yet spoken to. So, through a series of confusing calls with a string of mothers asking their children who they knew in Townsville, they eventually found me, returned my wallet with all my cards, and my precious $20 for the weeks grocery run.

What struck me even more is that the lady suffered from lymphedema, causing massive swelling in her legs. So the simple task of walking up the highway would probably have been quite arduous and painful. I am eternally grateful to that wonderful couple, and became a regular customer at their market stall in Thuringowa (Townsville).

I was reminded of this act of kindness by my Cousin Jess who recently shared a similar incident regarding her hand bag, the back of her ute, and a very kind man who returned said handbag after she drove off leaving it in the dust. So a thank you also goes to "Michael" from Broken Hill who returned her whole handbag and as Jess put it “saved my butt!!”

#001 Wifey to the rescue

My wonderful husband and I have an understanding when it comes to creepy crawly critters. He deals with the cockroaches (I have an irrational fear of roaches) and I deal with the spiders (Europeans are not well known for their bravery in the face of Australian spiders, especially after a hit European TV series about "Australia's deadliest creatures"). 

On Sunday hubby was cleaning out the garage to make room for the sad hulk of our camper van whose engine seized a few days ago. All of a sudden I hear an almighty scream 'honnnneeeeey!!!!!!' 

Of course I came running to find a shaky husband pointing at an absolutely enormous huntsman spider. Now relocating this beastie is not really an option as he looked fit enough to cross continents and find his way back to our garage so I'm faced with a decision: Is my act of kindness to calm hubby by killing the spider, or to save the spider. I saved the spider.

Now to put this in context we have been getting a few white tip spiders and hubby has had quite a few unknown nasty bites which we suspect are from these white tips. Seeing that huntsman spiders prey on other spiders (and this fella looked like he could feast on a legion of white tips) I talked hubby into letting the garage resident stay... I guess time will tell if this is an act of kindness or a prolonged agony