I Hope That's Not Our Car

    One of the reasons we like to take our dog for a walk at Horseshoe Lake Road is that there is usually no one else there, but Sunday when we went, we were a bit dismayed to see two vehicles in the parking area; a white pickup truck and angled behind it, a RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) SUV. 

    There didn’t seem to be any dogs around, so we pulled in and parked beside the white pickup.  The RCMP officer was sitting in his SUV, and so we just said hello and began our walk down the road.  We didn’t know why he was there, but sometimes people sit in the parking area for a little peace and quiet.

    We walked down Horseshoe Lake Road then turned around to walk back.  We were still maybe 250 yards away, when I started feeling a bit chilled from the cold wind, and so I zipped up my jacket.  I keep the fob to start our car on a string hung around my neck, and when I zipped up my jacket, suddenly a horn from a vehicle started repeatedly blasting.  It sounded like what happens when we accidentally press the “panic” button on the fob. 

     “Oh no,” I thought, “I must have hit the panic button when I zipped up my coat.” and I immediately unzipped my coat and (in a panic) kept repeatedly pressing the panic but to make the horn stop.  It didn’t stop, and the irritating horn continued.

    Then I tried to think about the incessant horn honking more rationally.  We were still really far away from the car, so surely our panic button wouldn’t activate the horn from such a long distant, but still it did begin when I zipped up my jacket.  

    It was then we noticed that the RCMP officer had opened the door of the white pickup.  Another pickup from a local garage pulled up to the parking area and together, the driver and RCMP popped opened the hood of the white pickup and disconnected the battery which caused the honking to stop.

    All of our worries and embarrassment then dissipated when we finally realized the loud disturbance was not coming from our car and not caused by me.

    I don’t really know what the whole story was with the white pickup, but the police can deal with that.

You can see my photo-realistic paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca