How to cut your fuel bill with a hearing aid

I’m getting a hearing aid.

Furthermore, when I get a hearing aid, I’m going to wear it.

This in stark contrast to my mother, who will not.

Not that I’m getting my hearing aid this week, or this month. Probably not even this year. But I am getting one. I won’t be able to afford not to.

Last night Mum and I took Miss9 for an MRI and then picked up Tracey’s new computer and had our eyes tested. It was a big afternoon and evening – we arrived home at 10.30pm. Between the MRI and the eye specialist we had to drive along a baffling stretch of road from Noosa to Maroochydore which demanded we navigate some eleven roundabouts.

Of those eleven roundabouts we managed to take the correct exit not once. But not for want of trying.

“Next turn! Take the next turn!” I’d call out, pointing out the front window with both hands.

“Not the next turn?” my mother would repeat.

“The. Next. Turn,” I’d shout succinctly as it passed the passenger window.

“Oh, alright,” my mum would say in an unconvinced tone, taking the turn after it instead. “Where now?”

“Now we do a U-turn.”

“Oh,” she’d say, spinning the car around at a spot the town planners hadn’t even considered as being suitable.

I gave mum instructions to merge with the next lane so we could make a turn. A shadow loomed over our car and I realized Mum was about to mate her white Camry to a black Prado.

“Steady on, Mum. There’s a car there,” was what I went to say. What came out was, “CarcarcarcarcacaCaCACAR!”

It was no wonder we were on our way to have her eyes tested.

And then, when we were again on the roundabout she’d look confused. “Haven’t we just been here?”

“Yes. The next turn. Take the next turn. You want to… JUST KEEP DRIVING ALL THE WAY AROUND!”

I guestimate it took us 50km to travel the 34km stretch of road. When my ears get that bad (and they will) I’m getting a hearing aid, otherwise a trip to the doctors will bankrupt us.