Author: Allegra

Garageband intermediate lesson a success, thank you Lisa (also her fur babies Luna, Romeo and Chai, two chill dogs and a cat).  Drive out to Maple Ridge was HOT.  Even with ac.

While there found out that my Garageband IS gibbled, it’s not just my imagination and I should probably reinstall.  Also got an appointment for a job interview this afternoon.

Drive back was interesting.  Lisa gave me directions for taking the scenic route out of town but I missed a turn (v. typical of me) and got back to Lougheed and Dewdney Trunk Road (driving past Glenn and Maggie’s old place in the process and feeling kinda sadface).  After a turned onto Lougheed I saw a woman in a teal top and jeans (the colour drew my eye) HITCHHIKING.  I haven’t picked up a hitchhiker in 15 years but it was a fucking hot day and I recently challenged myself not to suppress every kindly instinct.  Feeling strongly that some good would come of it, I stopped.

I asked her where she was going, after she said OMG AIR CONDITIONING – she’d been sitting surrounded by concrete in the blazing sun – and she said Coquitlam close by IKEA, and I said, pas de probleme, I’ll drop you there.  What are you doing?  Picking up my grandson.  I have money to get him to his mother’s but not money to get back, so I’m hitching out.  Crappy deal sez I. Where are you taking him after you pick him up?  uh….. 8 blocks from your house in Burnaby.  Yeah.  Of all the people in the lower mainland who could have stopped for her, I think I was the correct choice.  She’s a cancer survivor undergoing a second round of chemo and radiation.  I expressed sympathy and hoped she had sufficient support.

The first place was the incredibly broken down and third world trailer park between Brunette and Lougheed (there are two, this is the one that looks like chickens should be scratching in between the trailers).

There were four feral kittens about 12 weeks old under the next trailer, which had busted windows and appeared to be unoccupied.  There were two little boys bouncing unattended on a trampoline.  Yes, my classism is showing, but I watched the boys for a while and somebody had obviously trained them to stay well away from the edges as they were playing for fun and not xrays.

As we pulled up I told the woman, It’s gonna take ages to get your grandson out, I had kids myself and I know, don’t worry, I have no place to be so don’t sweat it if it takes a while.  I’m looking at the trampoline and going Cazart it’s gonna be 20 minutes at least to pull those kids offa there.  It’s a beautiful summer day and the trampoline is in the shade and they are having more fun than a barrel of otters.

Finally we achieved cooperation and got the grandson, a sweet and intelligent little boy of five out of there and I drove them in to Burnaby and dropped them off (after I rolled through a stop sign I didn’t see…. oops.  It was a three way stop in a construction zone and the sign was behind a hedge in my defence).

I hope the next time I’m feeling impulsively helpful it works out this well.