The Dog on the Tuckerbox
The long drive up the Hume highway. I keep my eye on the temperature gauge but it doesn’t move. We stop in at North Gundagai for some dinner, but everything is shut — even the shop with the sign that proudly proclaims “YES, we ARE Open.” No, you are not! Can’t I sue them or something? The one redeeming feature is the sunset and the colours of the sky over the statue of the famous Dog on the Tuckerbox, and by half-kneeling at its feet I manage to take a photograph without the presence of the buildings.
Back in the car and sure enough, as soon as it starts with a hot engine the dashboard idiot light comes on — then stays on the entire hair-raising hour to Yass. The temperature goes up when we go up hill, drops as we go down, never quite getting above three quarters, never entering the red, but never getting down to the mark where it ought to sit… I guess this means that Garry and Warren Smiths “repairs” were sheer guess-work.
