Driving Miss Dulcie V

The appointment today was at 9.30.Unusually it was a wet morning and had rained quite a bit since breakfast and the sky threatened more showers.Dulcie sat at the kitchen table looking like the ‘Godmother’ in her black sunglasses.“Could you just get a bag and put that box a’ biscuits in ready to go?” she said.Who was I to argue with the ‘Godmother’?At 8.55 she said “Right, I think we’ll go. It will take me 5 minutes to get in the car.”It didn’t, though we did go carefully down the steps because they were wet.Off we went...me concentrating on driving carefully and she commenting on the world passing by.“What’s he doing?” It was actually a guy giving the brothel a new coat of paint. I didn’t enlighten.“There’s a lot of bloody big trucks about!”“That’s a good fence...it’ll keep the buggers out!”“I’ve passed that house for years and never seen a window open.”Somebody pipped us to a really good parking spot at the Eight Mile Plains shopping precinct. We found the next best thing and walked hand in hand to the doctors. I could see people looking and thinking how lucky she was to have such an attractive toy boy.Marie was on the phone when we slipped in. I quickly slipped out and went to pay the electricity bill at the post office. There was no one in and so I was quickly back to the surgery. Dulcie was sat waiting.“Morning!” said Marie as I went in.“Morning!” I echoed just as cheerfully.I sat down next to Dulcie.There was a small Asian lady peering closely at a bag full of papers on her lap. She was slowly leafing through them...they must have been very interesting or important. Her spectacles were very thick and I was jumped slightly when I noticed that one eye appeared to be looking at me while the other was fixed on the papers.The phone rang. Marie answered professionally, laughed and then started speaking in a strange language. It sounded a bit like Klingon only with less spit.‘Oooooh, she’s bi-lingual’ I thought.The phonecall ended and it all was quiet except for the rustle of papers by their myopic owner.A door opened and a woman limped out of the surgery.“Do we have to amputate?” asked Marie with the glee of an enthusiastic butcher.“No,” said the woman, “but I have to go for blood tests.” She looked at the myopic paper shuffler. “You ready?”The little Asian woman got up and went and stood by the limping woman at the counter, and immediately went back to pouring over her papers, standing up.“We have to go to hospital,” said the limping woman.“Hospital?” said the myopic paper shuffler as if she’d never heard of such a thing, but good eye never left the papers.Off they went.All was quiet. No one spoke...then the door opened and an elderly Japanese man staggered in.“Hello,” he said.“Hello,” answered Marie.“How many persons?” he asked.“Well, there is one patient to be seen before you,” said Marie.“Ah, good,” said the elderly Japanese man.“But you are a bit early for your appointment,” sniped Marie.He missed it, he was preparing to sit down. He groaned and moaned as he bent and then was down and sighed with relief. He put his head back and closed his eyes. All was quiet again.After a few silent moments I detected a slight subsonic sound and Marie got up and said“Dulcie, would you like to follow me?” and off she went, in her sunglasses.I knew the routine now....Marie came back, picked up the biscuit tin and disappeared round the back again.When she came bag she handed me an empty tin in a bag and said,“ I always feel guilty handing the tin back, it’s as if we are asking for more.”“She loves to make them. “ I said.“When Dr Hew’s son comes he always asks ‘has the lady who makes the biscuits been yet?’ “ she said.Suddenly there was a loud sound as if a child was starting to sob...but it was the elderly Japanese man coughing. He pulled out a packet of pills from his pocket, took one out and popped it in his mouth, and continued to cough. I was directly opposite across the magazine table. He did not cover his mouth. I hoped it wasn’t infectious...and fatal.“Would you like a glass of water?” asked Marie.He did. She fetched it and he drank it noisily, placed it on the table and then settled back, with his eyes closed.I leaned forward and looked through the magazines for something interesting to read...and also something that I could hold up as a barrier, should the coughing start again.“Wildlife Matters” was the one I chose.I was happy to see that Stick Nest Rats are thriving at Mount Gibson. I was also introduced to the Numbat! I never knew a Numbat existed.Is it too late to call this blog “Numbat’s Galore?”A door opened and Dulcie was back. I joined her at the counter as she signed a piece of paper. And then we left. I glanced at the elderly Japanese man as we walked out. He had not moved. I wondered if the pill he had taken was cyanide. He looked like he’d passed over.

I shouldn't...but I couldn't resist.

Dulcie did not leave me to get her naval oranges like last time from the fruiterer. She was not impressed with the ones I got, ‘not juicy’ and ‘American!’.She settled for Valencian oranges from Australia. She leaned against a  the display of wombok for a rest. They were 99 cents.“Bill likes these,” she said, “We’ll have one.”Then we had to find bananas. My arms were full of oranges, wombok and bananas by the time we got to the till.Next stop was the butchers for stewing beef, pork steaks and kidneys.We left Eight Mile Plains and headed to Aldi.“That’s good. We’ll have that ‘chong’ instead of cabbage,” she said. I think she meant the wombok.The shopping list for Aldi was thankfully short and there was no sign of the ‘nutter’.  I did notice that all the staff were male though and if you caught anyone of them you probably would not throw them back in the sea.Perhaps I have been applying to the wrong supermarket.We called at Woolies on the way back because Dulcie wanted a brand of tea that you can’t get at Aldi. She waited in the car while I went in to get it.I thought I knew what brand it was.“What’s this?” she said when we got back home. It was the wrong brand.Thankfully she quite liked it.I spent the rest of the day in Hollywood at the Oscars. It was shown live here. I used to stay up all night when they showed it in the UK. I really enjoyed it.“12 years a slave” was Best Picture...I am glad but I wouldn’t watch it again.When they make a film of ‘Numbat’s Galore’...I will play myself obviously, Jared Leto would be Will...( I would insist!) and it’s a toss up between Dame Judi and Meryl Streep....to play Dulcie.I think I’ll go and get my acceptance speech ready