Edgemobile Epitaph

"If you can't get me a week in Mauritius with Katie Melua, I want a new car for Father's Day,” I said, but I don't think they were really listening.
 
Our whole family was together again.  Indeed in special father's Day appreciation, my son, The REE (Resident Expert on Everything), had popped home for the weekend….. with eight friends from his college.
 
It was an educational visit -  for me, that is,  because when my son had told me that in his class you could find ALL SORTS of personal ‘Anti-establishment statements’ -  tattoos, body piercings and even dreadlock hair, I  hadn't realized that they were all on one person -  himself.
 
Honestly, his eight friends seemed perfectly normal.  In fact I think they were quite disappointed when they arrived -  they had come all the way from Cape Town to see the weird dude's 'old ballies', only to discover that we were just average-looking Joes………..  (Mrs Ed’s Bon Jovi tramp stamp is still in its planning stages)

But I digress.  Perhaps I am still in shock.  Why was I asking for a new car?
 
Aaaahhhh. Because we have been struck with bad news.

Alas!  Alack! 'Tis  with a heavy heart that I have to tell you that The EDGEMOBILE is no more.  Yes!  Our lovely old, white (and rust) family / business Toyota Stallion was involved in an accident (or 'a little bump' as the driver called it at the time) on the way back from her fortnightly soirée to Port Elizabeth where she fetches our newspapers.   I won't go into the oil-thirsty details, but she and the barrier at the toll booth had a disagreement, and our old girl lost.

And I must say I do feel rather guilty…. Why?

Well, in last issue of this paper, indeed in this very column, I frivolously mentioned her without the due respect she deserved, without even the inkling of a hint of the love we have for her, for the special place she held in our hearts….

That was the same issue of The EDGE she was carrying when she took that fateful 'shot left' and rammed her front end into the merciless metal barrier.  Perhaps it was intentional?  Perhaps she was tired and thought that the 300 000km+ she had on the clock was enough mileage for one 1800cc motor  and, with no retirement in sight, it was time for her to take drastic measures....?

The driver called me early in the morning to tell me the tale, but instead of shocking me out of my deep slumber with such tragic news, he 'Zimmed' it for me.  I'm not even sure if he is a Zimbabwean, - maybe he knew I was, and did it as a sign of respect.

“Zimmed”? 
 
Oh.  Let me explain.  We Zimbabweans hate bad news.  Obviously there's been a fair amount of it in Zim for the past 20 years, in fact, world over, life has refrained from being a  'bowl of cherries' for some time now, but that doesn't mean we have to like it just because we are used to it. Bad news, that is.

 No, we still hate it.  And there's only one thing a Zimbabwean hates more than bad news (actually there's two, but I have to refrain from saying 'Robert Mugabe' in print in case I get into trouble)  and that is giving bad news. So we avoid it all costs.  We look on the brighter side wherever possible,
“Well at least your OTHER eye is still in its socket!” you'll hear us say. 
Or “What about ALL THE OTHER buildings in New York that DIDN'T get hit by planes?”

But what do we do when we get caught in a position where we HAVE TO deliver bad news?  Well,  then we simply modify it so that it is 'mildly bad news' , or 'a little annoying news'.

For example: When living in Zimbabwe, one should not ask about distance.  I remember once, when I was about 20, running out of petrol (actually I remember doing it at least 28 times, but that's just me).  After climbing out of the car and rummaging round in the boot for an old coke bottle, I  stood on the road wondering whether I should hitch hike or walk to find fuel.

The problem was that I had no idea where the nearest petrol station was.  Indeed, if the truth be told, I had no idea where I was:- Sometime the evening before I had been persuaded by a rather drunk friend-of-a-friend to drive us to a fantastic, free-beer, whopper of a party on a fantastic, whopper of a farm* in a place called Marandellas, just outside Harare, and now I was just trying to get home. 

*(PUBLIC HEALTH WARNING: If by chance you ever get told, late at night, about a fantastic,free-beer, whopper of a party somewhere out of town, chances are it's just some swine wanting a lift home. So be warned - you may end up being thrown out by his rather peeved, pajama-clad and pistol-bearing parents, because spotty cousin Beatrice found you in the kitchen innocently wolfing down their precious port and the three old sausages from the fridge.)

Any way I digress.  Again.  Where was I?  Oh yes, standing next to my car.  So I asked a man going past on a bicycle where the nearest petrol station was, and his cheerful answer was
 'It's just around the corner, sir!”
And off he went.  Off I went too.  A quick walk would do my port-pounding head the world of good, I thought. 

Of course you will have guessed by now that the petrol station was not just around that particular corner.  In fact it was about 15km away. 15 long, hot, blistering kilometers.  But it gave me time to ponder his motives for telling me such an untruth, and, after getting a few dozen profanities out of my system, I ended up thinking he had merit.  I had asked him a question and he had two choices- to make me unhappy or to make me happy.  He had chosen the latter, and been rewarded with a brief smile of appreciation.

It was the same with the Edgemobile.  “Mr Webb,” the driver had said on the phone, “You need to come here.  We had a little bump with the car.” So off I went, thinking oh my word, I hope he hasn't cracked a headlight or something.

I suppose it was a little bump -  sort of like the Second World War was a small argument.

 We towed her back to my brother-in-law's workshop, poor thing. And, though we did all we could, the insurance assessor had the final say, and he could not be convinced.  Like a hardened battlefield medic he simply looked at her front end, shook his head and growled “It's no good, she's gone.”
“No!  I cried, jamming the keys into the ignition and frantically cranking her over “She'll be ok!  She has to be!”

The engine barely turned once, and a grinding metallic noise choked out,

“You don't understand!” I wept, “ She's not just a van, she's one of the family….
she's…..   
 …. our…..
….. edgemobile…..”
But he strode off into the sunset,  (actually it was into the Wimpy, but that doesn't make for good romantic writing, does it?)  and as Mrs Ed put her comforting arm around my shoulders,  I slumped into a dejected heap. 

The assessor had been right about the Edgemobile, of course, there was nothing we could do.  It was beyond our bank balance to repair her, and even if we did, she would never be the same again.  It just wouldn't be fair on her, would it?
 
But I had also been right.  That assessor really didn't understand.  I guess in his line of work he has to steel himself against getting too personally involved with the lame and dying vehicles he sees everyday, but I'm sure if he knew that she had been a close family member for 11 years, he would have been more understanding of the tears in my eyes ….

So did I get a car for Father's Day?  No!  Though Mrs Ed generously suggested we 'just get one and put it on the credit card',  and my son and daughter said that if we went to a dealership and bought three - we would probably get enough discount to pay for a holiday.
 
But obviously I have to look at it from the more serious, adult angle.  We need a car, and as the head of the household I should come up with a plan to make sure that happens.  Fully prepared to sacrifice my own personal time and energy to solve the problem,  I have sent off an official letter of request to someone who I know has the means to provide us one.

After all, she’s a mega star, and I have no doubt that a week together in Mauritius will be plenty enough time to persuade Katie to buy me any car I desire....

Our Appliance Graveyard

We've had guests for the last couple of weeks -   old family friends who popped down from Zimbabwe for a visit.  During their fortnight-long stay I learned that there's quite a few habits we’ve developed living here in Sedgefield that might seem somewhat strange to the average outsider.
In fact the more I think about it, the more I realize that our home has become, over the years, its own micro eco-system in which we have all evolved into doing things somewhat differently …. 

For example, one of the deep and meaningful questions asked by our guests was
“When are you planning to take the washing off the line?”

At first this struck me as an exceptionally queer query.  Of course the answer is an obvious, resounding:- “When it's dry”,  but then I realized that they were only asking because said washing had been on the line since their arrival, and they'd already been staying with us for nine days (actually, if the truth be told, it had been hanging there a week prior as well, but I wasn't going to admit that).
  Now I understand that wet washing is not the most exciting topic, in fact it’s probably more yawn-inducing than a politician’s promise, but bear with me, I feel a need in my very core to explain our heartfelt dilemma.  

You see, when we leave for work the washing on the line is understandably wet.  In fact at this time of the year it's more likely frozen. You can't blame it.  If I was in its place I'd be more than a bit miffed about being left on the line all night  -  and call me a wet blanket if you wish but the last thing I'd be doing in the first hour after sunrise is concentrating on being dry. 

Of course during the day the wind blows nicely, the sun shines and, at approximately three minutes past something around earlyish afternoon, Whoop Whoop! Our washing is dry!  But of course both Mrs Ed and I are at work.  We don't get to witness this seven minute spectacle, though we have oft heard people talking of it. By the time we get home the dew has descended and the washing is damp. Again.

Our wet washing record (you can check with Guinness) is six weeks, three days and 18 hours.... I’m thinking of writing a country and western song about it.

“Why don't you use your tumble dryer?” Is the next question our guests asked (I'm surprised they were still awake actually). Which led to the next realization.  Yes we do have appliances - probably as many as most people do in this town…. But do they work?  No, not all of them.  In fact most of them don't. .  But they will one day.  We think.

You see fixing appliances costs money.  It does.  And if you are trying to make a living in Sedgefield, chances are you won't have the money at hand, so you hang on, with the appliance remaining in its favoured position, until
a) a lotto win
b) a municipal 'Appliance Fixing Subsidy' is initiated,
c) a tax rebate
d) a long lost wealthy uncle sends a cheque

Being a particularly creative family, whilst our appliances are hanging about either dormant, or, as is the case with our one sided, timer-challenged toaster, on 'light duties', we waste no time in finding new uses for them.  Or more to the point, we put stuff on them… or in them.
And the more comfortable we get with their new-found duties, the less likely we are to fix or replace the appliance. Let's face it, even if money miraculously appears, the toss up between going out for a slap up meal with real meat and  'getting someone in to replace the magnet strips on the fridge door' is pretty much a no-brainer.

So, we have a lovely dish-washer which has become a dish-watcher:-  Particularly useful for storing crockery that we keep for special occasions (when our children are not within a 5km radius).   We also have a dormant tumbledryer in which we hide our day to day shoes…. so the dog can't steal them to bury in the garden.  Oh, and there's the white box in the kitchen which we like to call our Mic-no-ways oven - it’s the perfect thing to put a pot plant on top and we get to store spices, oxo cubes etc inside.
 
Some appliances are purely decorative and we just keep them around because, well, they’re like old friends... and we get to have a joke at their expense... like our seized borehole 'pimp' (it's going to need quite a bit of money  before it provides service of any sort).

But before you start thinking that our home is a veritable graveyard of appliances, I must add that though it's missing four out of five knobs, our stove works fine…. as long as Mrs Ed stays away from it.  And our home computer boots up very efficiently, we hear,  …. except the screen… doesn't.
 
The strange thing is that we just get used to these non-functioning devices.  As one by one they give up performing, we somehow learn to carry on without them, or at least make a plan so that we don't have to pay to fix them.

Our car radio is a prime example.

  One day, during our guests' stay, we decided to go along to watch a movie at the mall.  To save fuel we all clambered into the 'Edgemobile' which, as discovered by my son last December, can snugly accommodate 27 people and their surfboards and a banana each.

During a most surprising lull in conversation, visitor Darryn, who was in front, precariously perched on the patched up passenger seat, innocently leant forward and pushed the 'On' button on the  radio.  Of course nothing but crackling and hissing resulted:- how was he to know that our car sound system had some sort of short in the wiring ?

I decided to explain the drill. “Just wind down your window  exactly two and a half turns - you can use the vice grips under the seat.”  Meanwhile, in the rearview mirror I winked at my daughter and Mrs Ed who were each sat on the outer side of the back seat.  In conditioned reflex they grabbed their respective door handles and pulled (right door) or pushed (left door), - after all it was second nature to them.  For my part I took my right hand off the steering wheel and wedged my finger into the gap under the speaker cover on the door panel next to my knee (there's a clothes peg already there which makes it easier to get your finger in). 
With this combined initiative the wiring somewhere in the depths of the car all fell into place, the crackling and hissing stopped and the trusty old radio proudly spewed forth music. 

Of course it did, it works perfectly well, thank you!.

But somehow our guests were quite bemused by all this. 
“Why don't you just get it fixed?” one stammered a few minutes later, watching in white-knuckled disbelief as I steadied the steering wheel with my chin so I could change gear without interrupting the news.

This was a good question. I couldn't really say “Because we can't afford to,” could I?  Especially seeing the trip to the movies would probably cover the repair cost and more. 

How does one explain that somehow, over time, sorting out the car radio had simply dropped too far down the priority list to be worth spending the money on. 

And for goodness sake, Iron Man III was showing!

I must say, the guests had the last laugh in the end.  With my finger still in the speaker, I had had to slow down a bit as we entered Kaaiman's Pass, with only my remaining hand available to negotiate the bends. After tightening her seatbelt another notch (Mrs Ed showed her how to adjust it using the corkscrew provided) Darryn's mother checked her watch.  In the rearview mirror I saw her lips curl into a mischievous smile.
“The movie's going to start in seven minutes,” she said,  “If you don't want to miss the beginning, you'd better pull finger! "