The most incredible, amazing thing happened today: THE PLUMBER TURNED UP. Not only that, he ACTUALLY FIXED SOMETHING. The hot water! I have hot! water! Fortune smiled upon me, because last night was the first truly cold winterish night this year and I could no longer describe my cold morning showers as "refreshing".
In true Meeka style, the plumber visit was achieved not by phone calls but through hunting and lurking. I cornered Mark round the back of the hospital and he managed to come round inbetween major sewage repairs (he's the only plumber within about 400 km).
Now, Mark has a patchy reputation in town - a lot of the blokes reckon he's "a prick", that he overcharges and so on. But he's bought me several beers at the pub and today he refused to charge me anything for fixing the hot water heater, AND he did the repair without explaining how the sixteen mill conflagulator wasn't synched to the reverse-inversion pomposifier so he's all right in my books.
However, they say that animals "know" - and when Mark turned around to get something from his truck, Boy barrelled out from under the house and tried to tear his hamstrings out! Mark was quick and got out the gate with just a bit of a bruise to his knee, but it was close. Like the Airedale in the James Thurber stories, Boy was immediately sorry and went off to sulk under the house. Who would have guessed that the big sook would ever act like a proper guard dog? I sounded exactly like the mother in the Thurber stories too - "It's all right, he just gets a bit excited, he doesn't mean it - look, he's sorry already." I had to lock him in the house so Mark could finish up.
Gary, who doesn't like Mark, was in fits of laughter when I told him. He went out and patted Boy profusely - "Good dog! Good boy for biting Mark the prick! Go for the lower intestine next time."
Boy has been naughty all week. He's awfully smart. He waits under the house where I can't see him, and just as I'm about to close the gate, he comes out at rocket speed and hurls himself through the gap. Then he runs out of reach and turns back with this sort of laughing look, pleased with himself. "Woof!" If I'm driving to work, he follows along the creek and short cuts up to the hostel. It drives me nuts.
The other day as I was weeding out front, he snuck out and I looked up at the sudden sound of exhaust brakes to see that he had bailed up an entire road train right in the middle of Main Street (ie, the freakin' major highway route out of town) and was barking at it as the driver sat at a dead stop, wondering what to do. At least he stopped, not an easy task with 3 monster trailers of flammable gas rumbling behind you! Crazy fool dog. God help me if he ever figures out how to drive the bus.
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