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He is a neighbour, a friend and we all call him Lucky Jim, because he isn't. Jim is a guy who really should have insurance policies stacked up to his ears, but he hasn't. Until recently Jim and his very long suffering wife Jane had never had breakdown insurance for their car: the reason they didn't have it was simply because they always ran relatively new cars which never seemed to break down, which is fairly good logic I suppose. But there's always a first time because even if your vehicle is in good condition, it's difficult to predict when or where the next breakdown will occur, and in Jim's case it wouldn't be long, but please bear with me while I relate what exactly happened.
We used to meet at the local pub with some other guys for a bevy once a week but this one time Jim was missing. I called his home number and got no reply, so I rang his mobile which was on "answer" which I though odd but I had to leave it at that and carried on drinking with my mates. It wasn't until the next day that I found out what had happened, and it went link this:-
Jim had been clipping his hedge, and like our own it was abot 8 feet high and 6 feet across, so quite naturally he was on a ladder, and you don't have to be a neuro surgeon to guess what happened next - the ground was uneven so he fell off. So far so good, because I've done exactly the same thing because both our gardens are on a hill and getting an even plane for a ladded is difficult.
The fall would have been bad enough without the shears dropping point down to stick in his left foot just above the shoe line. Of course Jane immediately rushed to help but could do little apart from help him up with difficulty (he is 15 stone and she is about 8) and hafl walk him, half hop into their conservatory where he could at least sit down in comfort. Jane took one look at the hole in his foot and knew that it was a hospital job for sure.
Now then, you may be forgiven for thinking that things just couldn't get any worse, but you'd be entirely wrong - this is a completely true story by the way. Jane brought his slippers because they would be the most comfortable to wear in the car and at hospital, though she hoped to be able to get a wheelchair there. She fitted his left slipper carefully and then put on his right one, and that's when the next little problem manifested itself as there was an extremely large and irate wasp nestled in the area of Jim's big toe, which it promptly stung more than once.
Of course you may think that none of the above is in the least bit relevant to the heading of the page, but it just goes to show that people like Jim are so unlucky in life that they need breakdown cover for whatever machinery they are operating at the time, car, van or whatever.
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