Honey, the cook is about to quit!
Host: Gallipoli Station
Written by Jacki Bishop – Overseer, Gallipoli Station.
This is my spin on an event that happened just the other day (a little tongue in cheek).
“Whaaaat? What have you done to her?” Was my initial response. Brolga (my husband) shot me an offended glance. “No, wasn’t me, I didn’t do a thing”. So he went on to explain what had happened out at camp, which was later confirmed by her the following day.
She had been busily working in the kitchen for the first half of the day preparing dinner fussing over the camp’s washing and the cleaning duties etc., and had decided it was time for a rest before the late afternoon duties began. She had retired to her camp bed, amusing herself with her iPad for a little while until she decided that it was time to put dinner in the oven and get things ready for the camp’s return. Well that was the plan until out of the corner of her eye she caught the stealthy movement of an eight foot King Brown no more than two feet from her bed.
She froze as she was, not daring to move in fear of aggravating this massive snake, she told me he flicked his tongue at her a few times and retreated back to the cover of a table which was a little further away, seeing her chance to make a getaway and with a spray of profanities she sprang like an antelope into the kitchen franticly grasping the pre-made dinner and with great speed and dedication, she whacked it in the oven and bounded up onto the tray of the truck parked just outside the shed door and that is where she stayed for the next three hours until the camp got back, all the while watching this great giant make its way around her kitchen, only getting down for the essentials.
As Murphy’s Law would dictate it was dark by the time she saw any signs of help, by this time she had decided that the camp could have salad with their dinner. As the lights of the camp truck came into sight she was filled with relief only to be diminished when the approaching truck turned up toward the yard to unload cattle, to which she responded with another spray of profanities and an attempt to attract attention using Morse code with her torchlight. I could safely make the assumption she was rather relieved when the camp finally arrived to rid the kitchen of its temporary resident that had made oneself quite at home much to our cook’s despair.
Our lovely cook after her experience with the snake.
The next morning Brolga (my Hubby) was met with quite an agitated cook who strongly vented her displeasure about the whole situation, not the greeting he was hoping for. It was decided we would look into some kind of snake repellant for camp if we wanted to keep the cook.
So goes the saying, don’t upset the cook . . . we may very well end up finding a few scales in the ‘stew’.
Until tomorrow, Cheers for now
Jacki