PUSH THAT THING

After all of our gallivanting over the weekend it was time to buy more gas.  The needle was bouncing on empty. 

A group of us jumped into the car and started out for the ATAC to buy more groceries and gazole.  Oops!  We ran dry at the intersection, just on the outskirts of La Chapelle.  We all got out and pushed the car out of the traffic and into a safe wide place.  Then I wrote a note that said, in French, “I am out of diesel.” which I gave to Pauline in case someone asked why she was parked in their driveway.

Jerry, Don, Roger and I hiked off to the ATAC, now to buy a gas can, groceries and gas.  Sue and Pauline stayed in the car.

When we got to the store everyone fanned out, looking for gas cans.  Once that was handled I began the shopping while the guys got their gas and hiked back to the car.

In the meanwhile, back at the car, Susan struck up a conversation with a local guy who was working in the nearby farm office.  She was able to somehow communicate that the car was out of gas, so he gave her a plastic can to carry gas and told her to go around the corner and get some diesel.  Since she didn’t understand a word he was saying she got back in the car and waited with her container, in case the guys came back without a gas can.

Once the gas situation was handled everyone drove to the ATAC and filled up and picked Rog and me up with the groceries.  Roger had a successful visit with the ATM and was able to get plenty of cash this time. 

We returned home and spent the day playing cards, reading books and talking.  All during the day and evening we can hear the cuckoo birds calling.  Susan is quite taken with them and said she would really like to take one home.  To find out more about these precious oiseaux with the endearing call we looked up about the cuckoo in the nice nature book our hosts had left for us.  As I translated the French description into English for my audience I couldn’t believe what I was reading!  That cute little cuckoo bird is actually rather nasty.  The female hides in the bushes watching other, smaller birds building their nests and laying their eggs.  Then, when they leave the nest for a minute to get food, Ms. Cuckoo swoops in, lays HER egg in the nest, and flies away, a carefree and footloose fancy lady on the move.  When the mama returns to her nest she doesn’t seem to notice that she has an additional egg, and just sits on the whole brood.  Before long the cuckoo egg hatches and the baby cuckoo gets to work and pecks and pushes the other eggs out of the nest.  Poor adoptive mama feed and cares for her ungainly, big baby—the only one left!  The glutton eats and eats and eventually, as all babies must do, leaves the nest.  Dumb adoptive mama thinks she has done a fine job of rearing her baby and is none the wiser.  We tried to see the cuckoo, but never were able to find one, much to Susan’s dismay.

The gang made big plans for the following day.  Everyone would go to Paris by car and Pauline and Jerry and Susan and Roger would stay overnight.  Don and Cheryl would return to Acheres.