Day 549 | Calperum Information Bay parking area: feeling rather dampened
34 km | zzOz total: 17,625 km
The observant will notice I, like many, do things in threes: three adjectives, three events, three, well, anythings.
This is natural as things tend to come in threes, today it was three situations, tending on the frustrating end of the scale, giving my newly proclaimed grace under pressure a severe workout: ants, electricity and rain.
Near the river those small black ants are thick on the ground, streams scurrying hither and yon, when disturbed by footfalls they have a tendency to spread out, coating the ground like Vegemite on toast. These creatures don’t do damage, they are just nuisance value, tickling as they run over your legs, I’m packing up quickly, very quickly, once out of the secure confines of my tent.
Despite my lackadaisical travel method I’m rather well organised, I appear at the Renmark Library just after opening with a List of Tasks: tapping out and uploading four blog entries, replying to some emails that have been gathering digital dust, modifying that website I’ve been working on, some more bits and pieces that could keep me occupied for the whole day.
Here’s something new, a razor wire barrier to my plans, the librarian announces with little warmth in her voice that it’s officially too dangerous for me to plug my trusty laptop into the power outlet, can’t be done, I have to have the electrical cord certified by a registered electrician, then there would be no problem.
Life often has that twist to make the future turn out quite differently from what you might imagine.
I’m, shall we say, surprised at this, I haven’t heard of any recent public electrocutions in Renmark but nevertheless I’ve stumbled onto World’s Best Practice in this little hick town.
Pointless arguing that the transformer is integrated with the plug meaning the flow is only 19V, or that the building’s electrical safety switch will trip if the cord is indeed faulty or that my last electrocution was sticking a knife into a toaster 40 years ago.
I refuse to give the librarians any pleasure in having me express my, err, disappointment, just move on to find a stray town power outlet.
A few minutes later I’m sitting with my feet in the gutter, computer plugged in to some electrical box, arse mingling with the local ant population. I’m heading remote for two or three days and I’d prefer some juice to at least answer some of those emails. A shower puts me out of my misery, I decide to spend the next few hours looking either for one of the town’s two electricians who could whack a tag on in about 1.5 minutes, or a more sheltered outlet.
In my travels around town I find that most useful of items, a drinking water tap, it’s under a huge shade roof, picnic table and bbq all under shelter. As I fill my water containers I also notice a string of power outlets in the roof structure, there’s even 3 phase, problem is they are 8 feet up, right at the limit of plugging in. Unfortunately my cord is only 6 feet long but being the resourceful type I park my trailer underneath and packing under the computer I’m fully connected, none too safely in my opinion, with the nation’s power grid.
I manage to hold this position, sitting foolishly on a bulging pannier, until the computer, plus the camera batteries are fully charged, my List of Tasks not fulfilled, passing showers managing to have sprinkled the keyboard from time to time.
My time on the road has trained me well in the resourcefulness department.
As I ride out of town just as the shops are closing the showers become more persistent, my glasses fog up but I’m not on the Sturt Highway side of the river, not much traffic out here.
At least the rain might subdue the ants tonight.