A Bank Holiday of pleasure

Just think - you've gone off for a nice afternoon's fishing, but ... corks! there ain't half a strong breeze coming off the water ... and you're more than a mite chilly.  What do you do?  Of course, call the wife, get her to organise a courier to bring you a nice bagful of woolly socks, sweaters and stuff.  What other remedy could there be?  Well, that's what one chap thought this afternoon, and guess who the courier was that got called in to do the deed?!

I've never been amazed at the jobs we couriers get - not since the day I collected some live baby tortoises, along with their 'passports', and was asked to check the passport numbers against the numbers written on the tortoise shells ... but that's another story, for another time.  There's a lot of pleasure attached to the courier life.

After warming up the fisherman this afternoon, I had an hour to kill before going to pick up my next job (nothing out of the ordinary about that one, so I'll not mention it), and I parked at a motorway service station, got some coffee and sat listening to the radio, 'people-watching'.  The thought crossed my mind just how selfish some people are, parking in disabled bays with no obvious need to use them, let alone official disabled badges on show.  A sort of campaign half-formed in my mind, of producing lots of leaflets to have at the ready in my van for just such an occasion, to pop under the windscreen wipers of offending vehicles - just to remind them what such spaces are for.

Just then there emerged from the service building someone who forced me to reconsider the black-and-white ideas I'd had about badges and justification.  Certainly the vehicle towards which this old lady made her way had no disabled badge, but clearly the use of a disabled bay was justified, for she was clearly blind.  She was accompanied by a very caring younger lady - possibly her daughter - and had a guide dog, a beautiful golden labrador (or was it a retriever: I never could tell the difference!).  I watched, fascinated, as the dog led the old lady to the side of the car, and waited obediently until the other woman had helped her inside.  Then the dog came round to the back of the car and waited for the young woman to open the rear hatch.  As she did so, I noticed inside a furry blanket and a woolly toy, characteristic of a dog-friendly environment.  The dog made no move towards either.  The young lady slowly removed the dog's harness, tossed it into the car, and had the dog sit on the ground, behind the vehicle. 

After uttering a word or two, akin to a sergeant-major dismissing a squad of troops on a parade ground, the woman stood aside, and what a transformation came over that canine!  A quick leap and not only was it playfully inside the car, but it had also grabbed the toy and was waving it around for a quick game of tug - just like any other 'doggy teenager'. 

I'm not sure there is any wise moral to this tale, save to say that it's always worth keeping an eye open ready to spot something warm and amusing, and to beware of making ill-informed judgements.