Near-death experiences
Yesterday I managed to have the second ‘near-death’ experience of my life. The fact I am here to write about it suggests, correctly, that I survived unscathed, but it added a bit of excitement to the day all the same.
Unfortunately this is a tale of panic and stupidity rather than seeing white lights in tunnels, pearly gates and visions of God, but all the same you might learn something from it. Not going in a car with me being the first.
It started when I drove to get a new tank of propane from the petrol station (gas station if you prefer). In rural France a lot of houses don’t have gas delivered directly, but have to buy it in large tanks – the ones I use are about 150cm high and weigh about 70kg when full. Anyway, I was returning from the petrol station with two of these (and a small child) in the car, when one of them somehow slipped a bit, and then rolled a bit. Unfortunately the ‘rolled a bit’ managed to unscrew the valve on the top of the tank.
Now this, you would think, is impossible. I thought the same. Nonetheless it happened, and within about 0.1 seconds the car was filling up fast with propane gas. This is not generally a good thing in a moving car. Propane freezes the air as it comes out, so it was visible as well, which added to the panic.
Screeching to a halt, shouting at my daughter to get out and run, while trying to decide whether to turn the engine off first or close the valve on the gas tank, it all passed in a flash, and all was well soon after. I did close the valve, turned the engine off, retrieved my daughter, and after a few minutes of ventilation it even seemed safe to drive home.
Although I drove with my head out of the window, and my daughter did the same, so we must have looked a bit odd if anyone saw us. But it does make you wonder. How long do you have to close the valve and get out of the car before it explodes? 5 seconds or 20 minutes, I’ve got no idea. But it certainly seemed scary to me. A bit like being in a Die Hard film, when you know the car is about to explode with the villain inside, and I was the villain.
I mentioned this being the second ‘near-death experience’ so I had better explain the first. That was a few years ago, again in a car. We had a lovely picnic on a cliff top (in Italy, I think) and were just setting off again. The car was parked, facing the cliff top which had no barrier or fence and was about 50 metres away – a good safe distance.
As a little joke, I thought I would panic the family by pretending the brakes had gone, and drove slowly towards the edge of the cliff. Unfortunately Mrs B did panic, and shrieked so loudly that I was startled and managed to jam my foot on to the accelerator instead of the brake. The car of course hurtled at the cliff top, and we were about one metre away form tumbling into a ravine by the time I found the brake and brought us to a halt.
Again, no harm done, just an entertaining tale to tell, and another reason for the family to tell people how irresponsible I am. Which with hindsight I can’t really deny, it was a stupid thing to do. But presumably everyone has these little events, don’t they?
I haven’t included the story of how last year when I was moving a light switch from one room to another, as part of my trying to work out why it didn’t work, I reached around the corner to turn a different light on. Unfortunately that was the one I had just removed, and I managed to grab the wires instead. By sheer luck I managed to grasp the earth wire before the live, realised what i was doing,and was spared a ‘shocking’ death.
Still, I hope my next ‘near-death experience’ can wait until I am 85 years old and fall out of my rocking chair, because they seem to be coming a bit too often at the moment.