Sunday 12 February 2012

The Kamakazee Roo

During our usual phone chats during the week Damian informed me that the NT's biggest fire for Feburary was sitting just over 10km north of the station. On the drive home Friday night down the Buntine Highway I could see its glow illuminate the smoke. As I turned onto the beginning of the driveway I kept my eye on it so I could get an idea of the front on it. By the time my tyres rolled over the first grid onto Providence I had begun to think it was alot bigger then I had first imagined as straight ahead of me was a massive orange glow. All I could think of was "Oh no, Calvin's Paddock is on fire!". The last thing I wanted to do after working all day, running errands all afternoon and driving for three hours back to the station was fight fires all night. As I continued past Bob's Paddock turn-off it became apparent that the orange glow ahead was not a fire but in fact the moon. Set so low in the night sky it radiated the colour and intensity of the fire. It was absolutely mesmering. I was hooked on it... till something else caught my eye.
"JESUS!" I slammed on the brakes and "BANG!". I eventually came to a stop. I had hit a roo and he wasn't little either. The bullbar took the impact as he jumped straight in front of the car. I turned the toyota around to look to see if he was dead or alive and there he was in my headlights trying to get up. I'd paralysed him. I uttered another curse word as I turned back and kept heading for the station.
5 minutes later I pulled up at the house and marched inside to the bedroom and flicked the lights on.
"Damian!"
"What?" he whinged, trying to get used to the sudden, rude light.
"Is the gun loaded?"
"Yeah, what do you want the gun for?"
"A buck"
"A what?"
"A buck, a big f*** off roo!"
"Yeah, alright, be careful," he said as he rolled back over to sleep. Umm, whatever.
I went to the gunsafe to find only cobwebs. Well, that was money well spent. I figured since the gun wasn't in the safe it would be in the station toyota so off I went back down the driveway in a car a little more comfortable than my own. By the time I reached the kangaroo again he was already dead. No need for the gun after all. I dragged him off the road and apologised to him for hitting him. When I got back in the toyota Lacey was very enthusiastic about my testosterone scented, bloodied hands.
The next morning Damian inspected the damage and reported to me "You're not going to like what you see". The roo had smashed my dodgily installed bullbar into the bonnet in two places, he'd smashed off my main indicator on the drivers side and the indicator on my bullbar on the passenger side.
'Good timing you prick of a roo', I thought. Registration was due to come up on my car and in the NT with a car older than 5 years it involved a roadworthy inspection. This WAS the one year I thought that I didn't need any work done on it till now. I've got dents to smash back out and two indicators to replace. Thanks alot you kamakazeeing, death-wishing roo! It's times like these that I'm glad I drive a Landcruiser!

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