Now I've caught your attention with the heading, I'll describe in more detail what has taken place over the past 24 hours.
It all started yesterday afternoon. Effie and the kids left our place late in the afternoon so they could get home before dark. They were on the road leading to their property when a kangaroo hopped in front of them and was hit. Nick (her eldest) saw something fly from the "roo". They turned around to check on it as she assumed it may have been a body part. They found the roo with a badly broken leg (it had dragged itself into a ditch on the side of the road) and a "joey" (baby) alive and well near to it. The joey was the object seen flying from the mother roo. They took the joey and were considering what to do with the mum when a neighbour passed by and said the most humane course of action was to run it over with Effie's large 4WD. As she could not do that (especially with her three kids present and probably a lot of emotions as you could imagine), she called another neighbour who went up and shot it after they had left. A member of a local organisation who cares for orphaned wildlife arrived in the evening and collected the joey. We learnt of the incident this afternoon when Effie called to inform us of another event, involving Maria's mum. Read on...
Maria's mum had a fall at a friend's home today and broke her arm. The doctor at the hospital treating their mum spoke with Effie (who is also a doctor) and said it was a spiral fracture of the humerus (upper arm), which should heal with a slab to hold it in place without the need for surgery.
We received a call from Maria's mum when she returned from hospital a little while later. She sounded a little out of it, but was able to relay the story. As her face seemed to cop the brunt of the fall, she said she was "very fortunate" (i.e. we say blessed) to have avoided even more severe injuries. Please keep Maria's mum in your prayers.
Later this afternoon Maria started to struggle with severe head pain and general unwellness. From experience it appeared that she was having withdrawals from the dexamethasone (steroids), which we stopped yesterday in line with medical advice. She took some stronger pain killers to see whether that would take the edge off. However, this was unsuccessful. Although it was around 7:00pm and Maria was reluctant to take the dose as it may disturb her sleep, we agreed it was the lesser of two evils and we'd address it with her GP (doctor) in a pre-planned appointment tomorrow.
