Enjoy the Ride

Sinead Shents

4 down and 11 to go.

I had an early appointment this morning, and for the first time managed to navigate myself to the hospital without the use of the sat nav. The car is learning to find its own way there.

I actually quite like spending this time in the car. I had a good blast of Fleetwood Mac this morning, and sometimes, you see entertaining things out of the window. Today, there was a lady with 2 young dogs waiting at a pedestrian crossing. She was holding one of the dogs in her arms, and the other little dog was on a lead, proudly holding what looked like a tree in its mouth. There's been a good bit of wind recently and a big branch, about 15 times the size of the little dog, must have got blown down - much to its delight. Its tail was wagging like hell... A bit like me when I found the magnum of champagne from my brother in the greenhouse. Far too big for little me...but hey, lets give it a go...

When the green man lit up, the lady set off across the road, but her dog just couldn't balance the branch properly, and refused to move. I could see her trying to rationalise with her little pet. 'Come on, my darlin -just leave the tree.' He would not let go. She was running out of time and was beginning to panic. The beeps were ringing out loudly. She had to act before she was flattened by 100's of impatient commuters.

Struggling to keep the other little dog in her arms, she somehow managed to lift the branch. The determined little dog still wouldn't let go of his prize though, and he ended up hanging from it by his mouth - all across the road.

They made it. She was happy, the dog was ecstatic, and everyone seemed to be having a damned good laugh in their car - me included.

I drove home from the zapping without a hat, scarf or wig on. As I got closer to home, I passed my hubby on his way to a call in his car. He was travelling in the opposite direction, and was past in a flash, but I could see he was grinning. He rang me up.

'Hey baldy,' he said cheerfully, 'I'm turning around - let's have a coffee.'

They warned me that the radiotherapy bit would be tiring and that the travelling would be a pain in the ass - but hey, sometimes you can meet some canny people in your car - today was one of those days.