Strange Acquisitions

People do the strangest things and you wonder why? Most annoying thing is you never find out unless you ask. However, I do not think people will take kindly to questioning as one might be seen to be nosey and a peeping tom. Can one say peeping tom if you are not looking through windows at people going about their lives but just seeing what’s happening in front of their house? Surely if I live nearby, I cannot be called a stalker either. If there is a word besides nosey neighbour maybe someone can tell me.

So, one afternoon this large van draws up and parks cross the road. I did not pay attention as often the guys come home for lunch and bring their work vehicle along. But then 4 men got out of the van. They open the shutter, and one or two get in. Now I am curious. What are they up to? Then I see a chair being handed out. Its one of these office chairs with five wheels. I think oh they are getting some furniture. Then they set up a relay of 4 and start bringing out chairs one hands it out, next one takes it to the drive. The next one takes it to the front door and then the guys inside I presume is setting it where they want it. Now since I know there are 3 – 4 people living there the first 4 chairs were ok but then more chairs appeared. There was a total of 15 chairs that were downloaded and taken into the house. Who would need that many office chairs?

A few weeks later another van appeared and the process was repeated but this time with 6 or 7 filing cabinets. The cabinets however, were taken through the gate in the driveway to round the back. Are they being put into the garage that is being curtained off? What does one do with so many filing cabinets? Have not seen any of these items leave the house unless it was done on a day I was not there or after dark.

A couple of months back up drove another van and this time a garden swing made with rusty metal frame with a wooden seat is unloaded into the front garden. So, what is this for? Are they going to be swinging in the front garden? They are never out front unless it is to cut grass. Even that most often they do after it is dark. You wonder why you can hear a mower and then see this shadowy figure with a headlamp moving up and down the garden. A week later in the evening the men with tools were there undoing the swing. After that I think there was some polishing done as the next morning the metal frame was shiny without rust. Then the frame was left in the garden and disassembled seat and metal rods to hang the swing were placed on the veranda.

There they lay for a couple of weeks. Then one evening just as it got dark, I heard power tools buzzing again. I looked but it was dark and all I could glimpse from the light in the veranda that they were moving the tool up and down the metal bits. Next morning, we find all parts of the swing pained green. I have been watching paint drying since then! Wonder what comes next?

Truck Meets Telegraph Pole

One afternoon we were cutting grass in the front garden. It was a sunny and pretty warm day so was well covered with long sleeves and sun screen, hat, sunglasses and gloves to protect from the sun. We had reached the middle of the garden where there was a tremendous bang heard loudly over the lawnmower’s noise. I looked to see if something had gone wrong with the mower even though the sound was well above that of a mower dying. So, we stopped the mower and moved to the footpath to check up and down the road.

There was big 40 tonne truck across the road with the cab pushing over the telegraph pole which was at the corner with another side road. The truck engine was still running but there was no driver. Now on the same side of the road as my house, in the next block are a number of warehouses and trucks constantly arriving and departing from there. There is a huge drive and gate to this business area. The perimeter is closed with a fairly strong and high wire fence. The land inside the fence is a slope as we are on a hill. The road inside the site is higher than the road outside the fence. What happened was pieced together with comments from some neighbours and local news as well as seeing the site the next day when I walked past it. This truck apparently had been parked on the road inside the business park and the driver stepped out without engaging the handbrake. This truck somehow rolled literally sideways down the slope and through the fence across the road and slam into the telegraph pole which has major electricity cables. All power down hill from that pole was lost. We could see live wires trailing to the ground.  

The police arrived and road was hastily closed for traffic. The power company vehicles rolled in pretty fast and the engineers set to repair work. The power coming into that section had to be turned off so they went up the one in front of our house to disconnect the rest. This was the first time I had seen some of my neighbours as all came out to see the crash. There were pictures taken and one neighbour was videoing the scene. The cars coming down the road were diverted to the side road just before the crash site and of course people stopped to see what happened and some were u-turning and going back.  This happened around 3 pm and we were wondering how they would manage to get the truck off the road before dark. We were sure it would not happen till next morning. But no, they worked till late. They managed to straighten the pole, wires were reattached and last but not least the articulated truck with the cab at an angle was all removed and road reopened. That excitement was a talking point for a few weeks.

Mystery of the Broken Wall

In any neighbourhood people watching is interesting and neighbour watching is an edifying pastime. I can see how neighbourhood watch groups function now that I am home all day. I sit by the window and often watch the world go by. In my last home there was very little movement except for odd cars of people from the street as it was a side road and sometimes kids playing. Two of my homes have been on a fairly busy roads through the suburb.

One of the houses across the road is also a rent property, I think. There are a number of young men going in and out so it must be a shared living situation. I see a company truck and all wear some sort of uniform and so I presume they all work in some form of removal / storage company or warehouse. They hardly ever use the front door but use the gate down the drive to access the house. Now I know that from my house one can see all the way down their drive to the garage. They have some sort of drapes and screens to obscure the garage. Makes one wonder what are they up to go to such lengths to ensure privacy. Before the curtains were put on the garage, I think some evenings they were having barbeques with some music on but none of this was ever intrusive to the neighbours.

So, all in all they are peaceful guys who keep very much to themselves. One young man has a noisy motorbike which now and then he gets into his head to rev. One afternoon I looked over and saw that the end of the small garden wall with the letter box was broken and lying across the drive and garden. There was a car parked in the drive. To this day I have not figured out how that damage happened. There was no noise of a hit to the wall neither was there any damage to the car. Not that the drive is narrow or that car was huge. The guys were out and piling the bricks to the side, again none of the bricks seemed to be damaged. The repair was a lengthy process in that it was completed over several weeks a couple of bricks at a time. One weekend there was a crowd of there. About 4 young men who were watching / supervising 2 others rebuilding the wall and ensuring the letter box was fitted well. So was there a teaching of novice tradies going on? Excitement over!