Shane and the Shunter

Since writing my last blog this morning about Mom's home remedy and Guy's scalding, I've had my second youngest brother Shane on my mind. Shane was born while we were still living in Wankie, Southern Rhodesia (forgive me for using the old names but I grew up with these names so my fondest memories are inextricably entwined with them). In fact Shane was born shortly after Guy's scalding/burns incident.

Shane now lives with his family in the UK and I was able to catch up with him and enjoyed his company for the whole of September 2011, this is relevant because I hadn't seen Shane for 30 years 5 months and 11 days. That is another story in itself and I'll tell that another time suffice to say we created a whole new batch of awesome memories.

About six months ago Shane had a nasty fall off a ladder and shattered his right ankle. It has been touch and go ever since, as to whether he will lose the foot because of the severity of the injury but I digress - back to our story.

As I've mentioned in my last post, my Dad worked for the Rhodesia Railways as a Telegraphist at that time, down at the shunting yards. We lived at the time in Motherwell Street, the number escapes me but we lived directly opposite the only house on the other side of the street just up the road from the Railway clinic (I was already a frequent visitor, as were my brothers to a lesser degree but "frequent flyer points" or "flybys" as they are commonly known today hadn't been thought of at that time - pity, haha!). The Taggarts lived opposite us in that house, I always thought of the nursery rhyme 'Jack Sprat' whenever I thought of them.... come to think of it I still do. They were a lovely family who had their fair share of trials and tribulations as most families do.

I probably shouldn't mention this but I will anyway as it seemed so comical to me at the time. Dad would often get home from work in the evening, get out his guitar and mouthorgan (harmonica) and play (between sips of coffee) on the veranda. Mom would sometimes sing if we didn't have an audience which wasn't very often. The neighbours would always come out and ask Dad to play various tunes. 

Frequently during these impromptu sessions Mr Taggart would arrive home from the pub which was up the road at the top of the hill. The neighbours would snigger as Mr Taggart made his way on wobbly legs (there had been a tragedy and he no longer drove, I suspect this was the reason for stopping at the pub on his way home). Mrs Taggart would politely escort him into the lounge from their veranda, their curtains were seldom drawn so we could see quite clearly into the lounge and Mrs Taggart would give Mr Taggart a clip across the ear which would always send him sailing across the room past the picture window. She would be heard saying "...and that's for not coming directly home" then as she helped him up "..now come and have your dinner pet". This usually signalled the end of Dad's playing and bath time for us kids.

I was an early riser regardless of the time I went to bed and this holds true to this day but as a child this was problematic because I was one of those 'hyperactive' kids I think they call it 'ADHD' these days, anyway I couldn't stay indoors I had to get outside and play. I loved westerns which Dad would read to me on occasions and we would sometimes go to number three colliery to watch silent black and white 16mm movies of 'Hopalong Cassidy' or 'Buffalo Bill'. These were my hero's and I would enter my fantasy world and play on my own for hours. 

While I was allowed to go outside to play early in the morning I had strict instructions to make sure I closed the door properly and to play in the back yard. I usually did this however on one particular morning I was coming in the back door when there was a loud banging at the front door. Dad was right there and opened the door... I had a clear view through the passage to the open door.

I'll never forget the big Dutch shunter standing at the door thrusting his right fist forward and asking, "Is dis yorn?" (Is this yours?) and dangling from his huge fist was a little dirty bundle looking like a little puppy that had been dragged backward through a coal shaft... it was Shane!, he was about a 10-12 months old (from memory) and had yet to master the art of walking. "I fond him zitting by the trak at the yardt" said the Dutch Shunter in his thick guttural accent.

By now the whole family, servants included had come along to see what all the fuss was about. Mom took Shane from Dad who had thanked the Dutch Shunter before closing the front door and beckoning me to come closer. "How did your brother get out Peter?" asked Dad, without waiting for a reply he stated, "Didn't close the door properly, did you?". I know now that the questions were rhetorical but Dad was a man who believed that sparing the rod would spoil the child and a lesson needed to be learned - it was fortuitous that a tragedy had been avoided when Shane was saved by the Shunter and so I learned a valuable lesson on responsibility that day. For that I am grateful to both my parents.

Red - Our Home, Green - Dads office, Blue - where Shane was found.

To this day we have no idea how he managed to cover such a distance as a baby, and in less than two hours - incredible!

Till next time, God Bless.

Burns - Guy's Incident.

I came across this interesting post this morning on Facebook;

A young man sprinkling his lawn and bushes with pesticides wanted to check the contents of the barrel to see how much pesticide remained in it. He raised the cover and lit his lighter; the vapors ignited and engulfed him He jumped from his truck, screaming. His neighbor came out of her house with a dozen eggs and a bowl yelling: "bring me some more eggs!" She broke them, separating the whites from the yolks. The neighbor woman helped her to apply the whites onto the young man's face. When the ambulance arrived and the EMTs saw the young man, they asked who had done this. Everyone pointed to the lady in charge. They congratulated her and said: "You have saved his face." By the end of the summer, the young man brought the lady a bouquet of roses to thank her. His face was like a baby's skin. A Healing Miracle for Burns: Keep in mind this treatment of burns is being included in teaching beginner fireman. First Aid consists of first spraying cold water on the affected area until the heat is reduced which stops the continued burning of all layers of the skin. Then, spread the egg whites onto the affected area. One woman burned a large part of her hand with boiling water. In spite of the pain, she ran cold faucet water on her hand, separated 2 egg whites from the yolks, beat them slightly and dipped her hand in the solution. The whites then dried and formed a protective layer. She later learned that the egg white is a natural collagen and continued during at least one hour to apply layer upon layer of beaten egg white. By afternoon she no longer felt any pain and the next day there was hardly a trace of the burn. 10 days later, no trace was left at all and her skin had regained its normal color. The burned area was totally regenerated thanks to the collagen in the egg whites, a placenta full of vitamins.

This reminded me of a few incidents when my mother's home remedies were used to great effect and I thought that I might share one of these today.

When my brother Guy was a toddler we lived in a little coal mining town called Wankie in the north west of Southern Rhodesia, I think the name(s) have been changed to Hwange in Zimbabwe. My father was a Telegraphist working for Rhodesia Railways at the shunting yards on the west side of town. I was fascinated with my Dad's ability to communicate using Morse code and loved the almost musical tapping of the telegraph.

My mother was the home maker as was common in the 1950's with usually only one breadwinner in a family. Yes we had 'servants' as the black Africans were commonly referred to, but truth be told every person regardless of colour felt that it was incumbent upon them to alleviate poverty and unemployment and so would employ as many people as possible, of course the pay was pathetic and that was why these 'servants' would be supplied with life's necessities (accommodation, clothing, food, detergent's etc.) in addition to the meagre pay. For the most part those who could do more - did.

We had a housemaid and a gardener, not that they had much work to do since we didn't have a garden and my mother preferred to do her own housekeeping, but the housemaid could make tea and baby-sit from time to time and the gardener could water the fruit tree's twice a week, thereby assisting with feelings of self worth. (These people became family members over time.)

Early one morning the housemaid had made a huge pot of tea, placed it on top of the tea trolley and wheeled it through to the passage and left it outside my parents bedroom door. Guy and I shared a bedroom opposite and I was an early riser (this would prove to be problematic from time to time as I often woke my siblings) and woke my brother Guy. After helping Guy escape the confines of his cot, I left him to his own devices and went off to explore the yard (remember - no garden) and enact my favourite fantasy while playing the part of my favourite western hero 'Hopalong Cassidy'.

A short while later I heard a blood curdling scream from Guy and raced indoors to find out what had happened. I came upon the scene of my mother, handing my screaming brother to my father calmly as she instructed the almost hysterical housemaid, "Kajima - boysa lo baby powder and lo Vaseline" ("Quickly bring the baby powder and the Vaseline") as she stripped off Guy's clothing. The tea trolley was laying on it's side, the teapot had lost it's cosy and was laying in a mixture of tea, sugar and milk upon the linoleum. It was apparent that Guy who was just starting to learn to walk, had crawled over and tried to pull himself up by using the tea trolley. He had managed to pull the tea trolley over emptying it's contents onto himself, including a teapot full of boiling hot tea.

My mother righted the upturned tea trolley, and gave it a swipe over with her dressing gown just as the housemaid returned. Taking the canister of 'Johnsons Baby Powder' Mom removed the top and emptied the contents onto the tea trolley, then she took handfuls of Vaseline and started mixing it with the powder which she then applied as a paste to Guy's burns.  Guys screams abated to sobs as the soothing paste was applied to his entire body. Mom then grabbed a crepe bandage and bandaged Guy so that he looked like an Egyptian mummy. This whole incident had taken less than five minutes and although Guy was taken to the General Hospital as a precaution immediately after, it was my Mothers calm quick thinking and her home remedy that had saved Guy.  

Guy has absolutely no scaring as a result. The home remedy was continued for several weeks as it was a very soothing balm which I can personally attest to having used it on my own second and third degree burns after an afgas explosion - but that's another story for another day.

A Telegraph similar to the one my Dad used in the 1950's

Till next time - God Bless.

Genealogy

Well it's been quite a while since I put anything up in my blogs and I must apologise to my followers. There has been a lot happening to and around my family and so I thought it appropriate to say a few words about the family - no sorry ....no airing of my family's dirty laundry here and any skeletons will stay in their respective closets.

I've been researching my family and their history since I was 15 years old and one thing I learned very early is that one relies very heavily on the yarns and confidences of various family members in order to gather some of the facts. If one repeats a harmful yarn to another living soul, not only is unwarranted pain and destruction released but one loses the trust of others and that is no small thing. In fact it makes 'Genealogy' impossible so I have a simple rule, I will reveal an individuals history only when i.) that history has become public, ii) they have requested I reveal it or iii) sufficient time has passed so as to have no more impact than the odd raising of someone's eyebrows.

Family history is fascinating, there are literally thousands of yarns and we would all like to be related to a famous, powerful or wealthy family however that is rarely the case. We are in fact more likely to be related to a notorious bad-ass and often criminals or assassins. Bet that got you to the edge of your seat.... sorry I seem to come from a long line of unknown battlers who have had a few minor successes and some major setbacks, just average everyday folk. 

So how did I get started on this lifelong quest? Well, whilst the story probably doesn't rate printing in the local rag it was a big deal to the family and brought about unwittingly by my father. Dad's still alive and doesn't mind my relating the story. Amongst other things there is a family tradition of birthright, blessings and inheritance straight out of the 'Old Testament' from the Holy Bible, literally!

The birthright and blessings in our family had some strict rules as relayed to me by my Great Aunt Jo (Johanna), our family 'Matriarch' and my father had bent/broken (depending on one's perspective) one of the rules,, but wait... I'm getting ahead of myself. First strict adherence to birthright and blessings - The recipient of these must be the oldest surviving first born son or his son or his son's son and that son should be named after his grandfather or father in order to receive the blessing of that relative or the family. Along with the blessing came a responsibility to the family. One of those responsibilities is the safekeeping of any family heirlooms such as the Family Bible (Ours is about 400 years old - 20" x 14" x 4", leather bound, illustrated and written in Old (High) Dutch).

My Father was the benefactor of this birthright, also he is today and was at the time, a 'Jehovah Witness' (this is not an invitation to enter into a theological debate over doctrine, I might add!). Well one evening Great Aunt Jo (a wonderful lady with a heart of gold) was visiting and wanted to verify one of the names written into a partial family tree in the last pages of said Bible. My Father advised Great Aunt Jo that he had lent the Family Bible to the 'Kingdom Hall' (Church) and assured her that it was in good hands. I can tell you the term 'Matriarch' was indeed apt, I was beckoned forth by Great Aunt Jo as she instructed my father to retrieve the heirloom forthwith in the strongest and severest tones I had ever heard from anyone of that generation, whilst she maintained total decorum. I think that this was my most memorable if not very first 'Note to self' experience - "Don't EVER get on the wrong side of this lady", I thought.

While Dad was off recovering the Bible, Aunt Jo advised me of the tradition and it's responsibilities and when Dad returned home Great Aunt Jo instructed my Father to hand the heirloom's and the blessings on to me being the eldest of his four sons. 

I took that old Family Bible and scanned every single page, I found a wealth of goodies in that old book, locks of hair, land deeds, receipts, newspaper clippings in three languages and a portion of the family tree - what a treasure trove. It was the dates of these entry's and the beauty of the writing along with the fact that they had been entered in the mid 1800's, probably in a small house of possibly two or three rooms late at night by candlelight while the large family slept goodness knows where. This was the beginning of my fascination with family history and the origins of our Family Name.

It has until recently been a very slow and often tedious job of searching, inaccurate records, dead ends, back tracking, learning and re-learning. When I married, I started searching for my beautiful wife's family ( my Bonnie Ronnie was an orphan). In 1979 we managed to acquire a copy of Ronnie's full birth certificate in Salisbury (Harare), Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) which gave us Ronnie's mothers name 'Joan Magdalene Breytenbach' and in almost 40 years I have not been able to uncover even one single fact about her family.

Now whilst I struggle with my Bonnie Ronnie's side of the family I have had great success with my 'Lombard', 'Lombaard' side of the family and have a solid history complete with citations and source documents going back to Aurel, Vaucluse, Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur, France and the birth of my Great Grandfather x 10 Jean Lombaard born in 1603. 

Very satisfying - My Great Grandfather is depicted in uniform.

Petrus Stephanus Lombaard 1870-1962

A challenge for you - What uniform is this? (Country, Army, Regiment & Period - if you can)

Till next time - God Bless.

Old wounds

I don't know what it is but my family seems to be in the wars at the moment. Bonnie Ronnie chipped a tooth a few days ago, brother Shane shattered his ankle when he fell off a ladder which is the one that will take the longest to heal once all the plates and screws are in place, a bit like putting Humpty Dumpty back together. 

If that wasn't enough my brother Guy's son Heath was collected from the rear whilst he was on his motorcycle, fortunately it seems that nothing was broken but he lost some bark (skin) and his muscles will feel as though he has just survived 10 rounds with the 'Rock'. He is young and he will recover quickly but it will be back to haunt him in the future.

Now it's the first month of winter here in Queensland and the weather is always mild so I love winter.... ordinarily! This morning is a little different since I was very warm when I went to bed at 1am (I get wrapped up in my work/art and lose track of time... but I'm having fun so no foul). This morning however I woke with my whole body cramped in the foetal position chilled to the marrow. It took me an age to straighten my body and get out of bed, which brought to mind my brother and my nephew. I took a long hot shower in the hope of loosening my joints, muscles and bring about a little mobility.

Thankfully my Bonnie Ronnie was here to look after me, helped me into the sunshine to see if that would help. This situation was brought about by my cavalier attitude when I was young, it didn't help that I was accident prone. These aches and pains are as a result of many incidents that would see me in hospital for lengthy stays at least twice a year until we migrated to Australia, I slowed down a bit and became a little more responsible and cautious. These incident's included writing off one bicycle, three motorcycle's,  five cars, explosions, shootings, stabbings, burnings, a car jacking where I was left for dead on the side of the road with a broken face and neck. Broken bones include both legs, both arms, pelvis, left hip, the loss of a patella (twice), a portion of my jaw etc. etc. Today the lot came back to haunt me painfully.

I certainly pray that my nephew doesn't follow in my footsteps in this regard, too late for my brothers, as they too had their fair share of grey hair contribution's to my late Mother (RIP Mom - Love you to bits) and my Dad who is still with us and as sharp as a tack. Dad would always be the one to come and pick up the pieces once we became teenagers - Mom told me once that she just couldn't handle it anymore. I remember her piggybacking me as a seven year old up to the surgery and back everyday to have coal shards removed from my burnt feet and before that there was a time that Dad couldn't look at me after I managed to crush my forehead at age five. She would walk (she never did drive) six miles to visit me in hospital for over three months when I was six, had a burst appendix, hospital mucked up and forgot something inside me, became infected and I lost the right kidney as a result.

My family keep asking me to write a book but I wouldn't know how and my memory is not the greatest. I may however elaborate on some of these incidents and many, many more at some point in the future. For now my thoughts are with my Brother Shane and my Nephew Heath praying for a speedy recovery for both. Bonnie Ronnie is booked in for Thursday to have her tooth repaired.

Till next time, God Bless!

Mothers Day

I find that the older I get, the more appreciative I become of my Mom and Dad. Sadly my Mom passed away a number of years ago but I am very pleased and relieved to say that I honoured her and expressed my love and gratitude to her while she was still with us. This of course is not to say that I didn't give her plenty of grief over the years and I take full responsibility for the majority of those grey hairs.

Everyone's mother is special to them for all the obvious reasons and we all have a million stories to tell of the not so obvious reasons. I'm telling some of mine right here in memory of my Mom on this particular 'Mother's Day' because she is very much on my mind lately and I have awoken on occasion to her odour. I'm sure that everyone is quite aware that one of our strongest emotional triggers is our sense of smell and that our Mothers each have a very distinct sweet odour ('scent' is probably a more polite word but 'odour' is far more personal and descriptive in my opinion). I actually love waking to that and wish for it more often. I can honestly say that the only thing I really regret in my life is not having more time with my Mom before she passed on. We spent the last 18 years of her life on separate continents and although I would phone her frequently, I never even got to see her face as she aged.

Today though is to celebrate Mom and not a time for sad reflection but some of the joys. I am the fist born child and remember how my Mom would tell me that as first born I was greatly honoured but that along with this great honour came great responsibility to my siblings (3 wonderful brothers). She would often say, "..they will follow your example Peter, so be sure to set a good one." Needless to say I did my best to lead them astray with wine, women and song :) lol.

As a teenager and I'm talking about my late teens (mid teenage years I was a nasty piece of work but back in the early 70's everyone did National Service, best thing that ever happened to me at age 17 - made a man of me). I loved to spend time with my Mom, she was my best friend. I would often take her on my motorcycle to visit her friends and relatives. She would always sit side saddle (which is probably illegal today) and say, "A lady never sits astride anything" oh yes! Mom was a bit of a prude but she was most definitely a lady.

Mom always supported me, even when it seemed that the whole world did not, even when I thought she had given up on me, I once asked Mom why it was always Dad I saw first when I was bent and broken (a frequent occurrence in my younger years). "I can't take it anymore" she said through her tears and we never spoke of this again. I loved the way she would not let us leave the house even for a moment without a kiss goodbye 'just in case the good Lord stopped in to take one of us home'.

We would talk about everything and anything, Mom never had the daughter she always wanted so we boys were not spared the things that mothers do with their daughters, we were taught knitting, crocheting, cooking and all the other niceties of home making and I was Mom's confidant back then as she was mine. I loved teasing her especially in 'Haddon and sly' a rather up market department store where I would fall behind then call out to her, childishly "Mommy, mommy... where are you?" She would turn bright red, get the giggles, rush over and playfully slap me with "Peter, Stop-it! you're embarrassing me!"

She loved to sing and dance while my Dad played the guitar and mouthorgan. Some of my fondest memories are of us (the whole family) on the verandah in Marula Avenue and also Spreckly Road all singing and dancing or rollerskating while Dad played. The laughter was awesome. I remember one night when Mom sang with her brother Joe to Dad's music while we all lived at Marula Avenue and the singing was truly awesome, boy they could sing!

I would spoil my Mom at every opportunity even after I married, my wife is the love of my life and the mother of my children but she is not my Mother and I am truly blessed because my wife has never been jealous of my Mother and in fact came to love her as her own Mom. I was and am therefore able to express my love for my Mom openly and fully as every child should, regardless of age. I know that you are smiling down on us right now Mom.

<3 Love you Mom <3

Hand Brake

I was just reading QPS "What the? Friday" which reminded me of three incidents involving the hand brake on vehicles, all quite funny after the fact but not at the time.

1) Many years ago while out camping with Ronnie, the kids, cousin Gary and his family at Charlie Moreland camp site in the Kenilworth area in South East Queensland, we were approached by the Ranger. He had come to tell us that we owed $'s for a shortfall in our paid up fees.

The Ranger had parked his 4 wheel drive on the hill facing away from the river, had left the vehicle in gear but had not engaged the hand brake. We were standing at our camp site so 20-30 meters away from his vehicle while discussing the fees. I was facing the direction from which he had come while he had his back to his vehicle when suddenly I noticed that the vehicle had begun to roll back down the hill. 

I yelled out as Gary and I gave chase after his vehicle. Fortunately I was able to grab on to the door handle on the drivers side with my right hand, launch myself from the ground as the door opened and then used the door as a fulcrum to swing myself through the opening, using my left hand I grabbed the steering as I stamped on the brake and stopped the vehicle. Needless to say the Ranger was very grateful that disaster had been averted and decided to waive the shortfall.

2) Again a long time ago, Ronnie and I were living in Carara on the Gold Coast of Queensland and had rented a couple of video's whilst a work colleague and friend Brett (we were both Regional Managers for a national regional security firm) was visiting while we upgraded a number of Branch computers to ensure that they were millennium compliant. As with all PC's of that era there was a lot of hurry up and wait so the videos were a nice distraction.

Anyway it was a Sunday, our computer work complete, Brett had left to return home and Ronnie and I decided to return the video's. As was quite customary (since I do all the driving) I sat in the car in the car park while Ronnie ducked into the shop to return the video's.

While I was waiting a fellow pulled up in one of those little convertible Jeeps at the apex of the driveway which led off the main service road at Carrara, hoped out and dashed into the video store. No sooner had he disappeared inside than I noticed his jeep beginning to roll back. There was no way that I could get to that vehicle before it would disappear behind the retaining wall so I ran to the corner and leapt off the retaining wall hoping that my judgement was accurate. Fortunately I landed astride the drivers seat and managed to grab the roll bar and windshield to prevent myself from exiting on the other side just as quickly. I was then able to jump on the brake, thus preventing the jeep from plunging over the embankment to the freeway as we (the jeep and I) had already crossed the main service road without incident fortunately.

The owner had come out to find me seated in his Jeep across the road (I was shaking quite a bit after the adrenaline rush and was in no hurry to go anywhere) He came charging down the hill while yelling back at the store for someone to call the police as his Jeep had been stolen.  I don't think he believed me as I never did get any thanks for saving his precious Jeep - the Jerk. Quite a few people had witnessed the whole incident and confirmed my story BTW.

3) This happened in the late 80's whilst I was on Patrol for MSS security. I had just finished servicing what was then 'The Brisbane Fish Board'. I drove up the driveway in my little Patrol Car (best not mention make and model here) I grabbed my run chain (Patrol Client Key Chain) with the padlock still attached (one of those locks that the key cannot be extracted from unless it is in the locked position) - I never locked myself in if I could help it, just in case I needed to make a hasty exit, I'll relate some of those anecdotes another time.

I pulled on the handbrake, put the vehicle in neutral, stepped out leaving the drivers door ajar as I went back to lock the gates. Whilst my back was to the vehicle and as I was about to remove the key from the padlock after snapping it in place, I felt a bump at the back of my knees and was immediately pressed hard against the gates. The handbrake had given way, the car had rolled back and had me pinned against the gates - I quickly realised that unless I acted fast I would lose circulation in the legs and be up the proverbial sh*t creek without a paddle. Fortunately (God Blesses me always) the key was still in the padlock (can't tell you how many times I had cursed that style of padlock till that moment). I managed to release the padlock with difficulty and hung onto the gate as the car pushed through on it's way to the river.

As soon as I was clear of the car I released the gate and gave chase albeit on wobbly legs. I didn't think I was going to make it and had visions of me and the car in the Brisbane River. The car had to cross a level car park and the wharf after descending the hill and I was able to catch it and stop just over a meter from the river - phew!

I hope you get a chuckle out of these, I know I do - now.

Till Next Time - God Bless.

Grizzly Bear's

and things that should go "GRRR"...

I worked in the security industry for many, many years and was unfortunate enough to come across many shocking and some times fortunately funny situations although truth be told there was nothing funny about them at the time. There are a number of people who will remember these incidents and in order to protect the living parties, I've taken the liberty of changing their names. This is an account as accurately as I remember actual incident's that took place in the 80's whilst I was working as a Senior Patrolman for a national company.

One evening whilst I was on patrol in the southern suburbs of Brisbane I received a radio message advising that call sign S40 needed some non urgent assistance at an 'alarm client', his location was given by the control room, radio operator in code. I advised the operator that my ETA (Estimated Time of Arrival) would be 22h10. 

On my arrival at the 'alarm client' (A very well known and very large department store at an inner southern suburb) the patrolman whose call sign was S40 and who we shall call 'Dave' approached me as I was getting out of my car. "Do you have any spare rounds?", he asked. Ding, Ding, Ding went the warning bells, "why the hell is he asking me if I have spare ammunition" I thought as I tentatively asked "Why?" not sure if I really wanted to know.

I have to be honest, I didn't trust Dave, I had recently submitted a request to have him banned from carrying a firearm because of an incident at another client's premises that I had stumbled upon. I'll elaborate - I was carrying out a safety check on a small group of employees at a well known factory close to the city a few weeks earlier and happened to time my call to coincide with their Smoko (Tea break). The smoko room was upstairs on a mezzanine floor overlooking the factory and as I wandered through the factory and found that there was no-one on the floor, I made my way up to the smoko room where I found two of the three employees at a table opposite one another. We were passing the time of day as was customary when I noticed a small angled hole in the table and whilst we were talking I subconsciously stepped back slightly to look through this angled hole. The employees noticed my curiosity and became very quiet as I spied through this hole in the table to a hole in the mezzanine and it dawned on me that these holes were perfectly aligned and about the size of a .38 calibre round. "I don't recall seeing that, the last time I was here" I commented. "What happened?", I asked as I noticed that the faces looking at me were rather flushed.

One of the ladies explained that Dave had been showing off his quick draw with his .38 Special Revolver the previous night when it had accidentally discharged sending a round through the table and mezzanine before ricocheting off the concrete floor and out of the open emergency door which was open at the time because the third co-worker was down there having a smoke outside as was his custom. It had been purely good fortune that the round had not wounded or killed someone.

"Hard to explain, but I'll show you in a minute... got that ammo?" Dave says. "Give me your firearm, I'll sort it out" I said. I didn't want him behind me with a gun which may or may not be loaded, I told him that we would worry about the ammo issue later, first I wanted to know what the heck was going on.

After handing his firearm over he led me through the back door into the department store, down through the isles and downstairs toward the children's department and as we were nearing the toy section I was wondering "Don't know how many times I've told this fool not to draw his weapon every time he attends an alarm activation. What the heck could this idiot possibly have done with six rounds from this .38 Special?... one round... maybe another AD (accidental discharge) but six?.... there is nothing accidental about that... no way!". As Dave is about to take a right turn into the toy section he taps his foot twice, stops and points down the isle to an eight foot Grizzly Bear standing there with it's arms akimbo... "So what?" I said.

"This is a pressure mat" he says as he taps his foot again, and begins to demonstrate how the Bear had moved and growled at him on his arrival. Dave had almost lost control of his bowel and bladder as he had raised his firearm and spent every round at this huge monster that he was sure was about to devour him. Well! .. I'm sorry but I simply lost it.... I was falling about and laughing almost hysterically. The thought of big bad Dave emptying his revolver into this oversized toy was just too funny for words. I think that it was relief that he had not killed the cleaners or night fillers or some tradesman... that had me in hysterics. Certainly there was nothing funny about shooting up the toy section of a very prestigious department store in the middle of the night but thank God no one was injured.

"How are we going to explain this!" demanded Dave. "WE!....WE! How the hell did this become WE! you bloody moron!" I demanded. I was a company man through and through, though many would argue otherwise so my mind was racing, "How the heck am I going to fix this?, if I just walk away and drop this fool in it the company will lose the contract for sure" I thought.

I called the control room from a land line, well aware that all call's were recorded and explained that we would be delayed for some time due to a technical fault and would require a particular technician who we shall simply refer to as BN to assist us. The control room operator arranged for BN to attend our location explaining that I had specifically stressed that no other technician had the skills required for this particular fault.

BN repaired the wiring of the Grizzly bear as best he could while Dave glued back tufts of fur. In the meantime I used polly filler expropriated from the hardware section to repair the holes in the wall caused by the through and through rounds from Dave's revolver and by 03h00 we had everything back to normal..... well almost... apart from a slight stutter from the Grizzly Bear. I thanked BN for his time and trouble, had his assurance amongst chuckles that the incident would not be reported. I sent Dave on his way with an empty holster and much protesting, as I called clear of the site with the control room via radio. The client never mentioned any issue and our company was never the wiser.

Dave never carried a firearm again whilst we were both employed by the same Patrol division.