Enough already

I sat down to a quiet dinner last night and went to take my shoes off realising it would be another quiet nite of duty at the beach. I have lots of jobs at Waihi but when on duty at the beach usually there's nothing. Infact in the last 10mths I've had a total of two jobs! I just finished my dinner when *beep beep beep beep* my pager went off. I rang in to get the details and realised the seriousness when COMMS told me that both Auckland Eagle helicopter (police) and Auckland Westpac helicopter (medical) had been dispatched to a guy missing off the beach. We were directed to the coastguard headquarters and for the three hours we waited. The guy had been trying to get in a long line (fishing), stepped in a hole, lost his footing and got swept out, in HUGE waves with a strong rip. After hearing the details of the guy I made the realisation that he had been in our shop that morning buying bait. Very eiree feeling.

We walked up and down the beach while 2 coastguard boats and 2 helicopters weaved their way along the 10km coastline. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack. As time ticked on we realised we were now looking for a body. He was only wearing shorts so hypathermia was a certainty. After four hours they called the search off. Disappointed ... we all went home. I'd just got my uniform off and pj's on when *beep beep beep* my pager went off again!! Unheardof ... 2 waihi beach jobs ... IN ONE NIGHT??!! So throwing on my uniform again I headed out the door to be picked up by my partner.

COMMS weren't 100% sure of the address. It was at a camp ground somewhere at Waihi Beach. There are 3 camp grounds here and with being the first day of the school holidays they were full of people!! I suggested trying the top 10 one first. We got there to find complete darkness with no one looking like they needed any help. So we informed COMMS that we would be relocating to the other camp ground ten kms away at the other end of the beach. By this stage Waihi ambulance (sent to back us up) met us and we both went on our way. Arriving to find another campground in darkness ... no one seeming like they need our assistance. COMMS told us to look for a "white campervan ... ehem ... goodluck with that!!" he laughed. The campground was filled with white campervans!! We beeped our horns to see if the person on the other end of the phone with COMMS could hear us. Nope. But he did mention that he saw us going past about 10 minutes ago and hadn't seen us since. Oh nooo ... he was back at the first campground!!!! So off we trotted back 10kms to the original campground! And when we arrived this time there was the campground manager there to meet us and guide us to the right one where we found a very patient man lying in the back of his van with dislocated artificial hip. Poor guy!! Lucky he wasn't in too much pain or too seriously injured ... we found him ... eventually!

I finally sunk into bed at 12.30am ... not too bad considering the eventful night.

This morning I woke thinking to myself ... that was enough drama last night ... now for a nice quiet day. Hmmm ... don't ever say that ... cuz the ambulance I was on duty with, I ended up calling myself for my son Malachi!!!

He was riding his bike down at the school when the wheel came off and he went face first onto the driveway! Two broken front teeth! Poor little man! Given it was the weekend I really didn't know where to take him so rang it in as a job.

So this afternoon we took him down to Tauranga to have temporary caps put on. He was very brave my poor little man!

Now ... honestly ... that is ENOUGH drama for one day!!! Wonder what tonight will bring!