Karma, non instant!

[Billhook]

I was at a neighbour’s wood yard yesterday and a couple of spaniels came out barking.  I calmed them down by offering them a Baker’s Allsort from a packet I keep in the glove box in my car.

I opened the small glovebox and could not understand why it was half full of pea gravel.  I opened the Allsort package and it too was half full of pea gravel and there was a small hole at the bottom where presumably a mouse or vole had been swapping a delicious Allsort for a bit of gravel

 I then reminded myself of a time when I was about six years old and I was in a lot of trouble.  We had a dear old gardener called Ernie who was a staff car driver in WW1.  He was gassed poor chap and not many people know that the symptoms came back every year, bit like malaria, and his faced turned black and he was bedridden for a couple of weeks.  He was never much good as a gardener, but father took him in as his own father, my grandfather, had been wounded at Arras and had to have his leg amputated, so generally there was a lot of sympathy for victims of that War.

Of course aged six I knew nothing of that, but what I did know was that Ernie hung his old brown coat up in the tool shed.  One day I spied a packet of sweets sticking out of a pocket and on further investigation they turned out to be my favourite pear drops!  Not content with stealing his pear drops, after taking one I replaced it with a worm!  I do not know what possessed me to do this as I liked Ernie.  He used to tell me stories about the trenches and one time he went to sleep in a bunker and woke up to find that a rat had crawled up inside his trousers and was nice and warm on top of his thigh!  He than graphically described how he eased it down his trousers but why he never just gave it a Karate chop I’ll never know!

But I digress.  There was only one possible culprit and when confronted by Ernie and father I had to confess.  Father gave me a choice of being beaten or going without sweets for a month and I chose to be beaten, but he never did beat me in the end.

So I think Ernie’s spirit has entered the mouse and exacted revenge!

[Haironyourchest]

Good story. Fascinating about the gas symptoms returning every year. Was it around the anniversary of the injury then? 

[Billhook]

1 hour ago, Haironyourchest said:

Good story. Fascinating about the gas symptoms returning every year. Was it around the anniversary of the injury then? 

Not sure, he died some time ago and it was only from something my father said and I just assumed it was a symptom of mustard gas but I have just looked it up on google which says

 

 

What are the long term effects of mustard gas?

 

 

The chronic consequences of SM may be observed as complications even up to 50 years after exposure. These complications mostly affect the respiratory system and can include chronic bronchitis, bronchiectasis, frequent bronchopneumonia, and pulmonary fibrosis, all of which become worse over time.10 Dec 2020

[Haironyourchest]

I looked it up as well. Bloody awful stuff. My great grandad reportedly took a lungful of phosgene in WW1, laid him out for a year but he lived to 98.

 

[Billhook]

Just thought I would add some photos 

I can understand a mouse putting a supply of nuts in a place for Winter but I cannot understand why it would take the gravel into the bag.   There must have been ten pieces a of gravel all taken through a tiny hole which seems to be an unnecessary struggle.

At our log cabin down by the lake , I had hung up a pair of chest waders on a nail, ready for use the following year.  When I came back to use them, my foot would not go into the left hand boot.  I took them off and shook them and a whole load of peanuts came out, stolen from the bird feeder.  This I can understand.  
But the little barsteward had the last laugh as I waded out through the thick mud, which was very slow going.

I suddenly felt a chill around my important parts and realised the waders were slowly filling with very cold water.

Because oh f the sludge it took me some time to reach the bank and found that the little fella had made a hole right in that vulnerable place out of sight. It was probably having a laugh from the comfort of the cabin saying “that’ll teach ya for nicking my emergency supply!”

[KateH]

5 hours ago, Billhook said:

Just thought I would add some photos 

I can understand a mouse putting a supply of nuts in a place for Winter but I cannot understand why it would take the gravel into the bag.   There must have been ten pieces a of gravel all taken through a tiny hole which seems to be an unnecessary struggle.

At our log cabin down by the lake , I had hung up a pair of chest waders on a nail, ready for use the following year.  When I came back to use them, my foot would not go into the left hand boot.  I took them off and shook them and a whole load of peanuts came out, stolen from the bird feeder.  This I can understand.  
But the little barsteward had the last laugh as I waded out through the thick mud, which was very slow going.

I suddenly felt a chill around my important parts and realised the waders were slowly filling with very cold water.

Because oh f the sludge it took me some time to reach the bank and found that the little fella had made a hole right in that vulnerable place out of sight. It was probably having a laugh from the comfort of the cabin saying “that’ll teach ya for nicking my emergency supply!”

I don’t understand about the gravel. A mouse with a sense of humour? The waders is proper karma though 😂

[surveyor]

When I was in highschool, my pal and I would go along a wooded lane deep into the the woods to visit a hermit who told us stories of the first world war.  He said that there was a platoon of black soldiers, and that after a gas attack they mounted a charge, which freaked the Germans out, as they thought the soldiers were some sort of zombie fighters.

[Billhook]

44 minutes ago, KateH said:

I don’t understand about the gravel. A mouse with a sense of humour? The waders is proper karma though 😂

Not only the gravel in the bag, but all that gravel in the tray.  Did he mistake them for nuts?  Perhaps he was just nuts!  (Must have been a He , a She would never have done it!)

[Moose McAlpine]

On 24/11/2022 at 13:03, Billhook said:

Father gave me a choice of being beaten or going without sweets for a month and I chose to be beaten.

 

Have to say, i like where you had your priorities.