How much can a koala bear?

"You know I'll never forgive myself if any of you got hurt" I said as I poured another drum of HCl into my makeshift boiler. It's not that I mind Princess Leah and Duke lying naked in their hammocks watching me work, but I was starting to get soooriously concerned about the O, H and S implications of my rather primitive jungle lab.

I was under so much pressure with dealing with the council over the Panzer tearing up roads, the banks, the bad vibes from the editors of the local rags and not to mention my conscience with producing an outdated and unregistered chemical. If the government knew what we were up to out here they wouldn't be happy. I was thinking my brain was on overload and I didn't want to make a mistake that hurt anyone- especially those I loved so much.

But we weren't about to get sucked into Monsanto's advertising and propaganda for only using more expensive and modern chemistries for insect control and becoming more reliant on them. I had to keep this jungle lab operational and safe.

I was working on gradually converting the villages over to softer Integrated Pest Management (IPM) strategies using only natural pyrethrins for mosquito control. Princess Leah had been teaching the villagers to grow Chrysanthemums that we could extract the natural pyrethrin from.

I was also worried about local bird populations as the DDT was affecting eggshell thickness according to the latest research to hit the "Labia". I wanted safety signage up saying "Laboratory- Stay Clear"- Duke painted me up a sign that just said "Labia- Come in Here". Funny if this wasn't so sooorious.

I requested that Princess Leah and Duke go inside and put some kit on and get the Post van ready. We had to load it up with this latest batch of chemical and drop it off over at the elders place for distribution.

After that we had to make it to Brisbane airport incognito to drop Lamb off. She was flying to tropical Darwin to use her engineering expertise helping with protein production for the natives up there. It seemed that we were becoming more of a consulting outfit everyday. The following day I was off to Adelaide to work on environmental issues for the tree croppers down there. Right now we had a job in getting through the Quarter safely to see Lamb off.

Knowing the trouble we were having getting around unnoticed after the Panzer incident at the Parallel Universe, I sent Princess Leah and Duke off to find transport that would get us anywhere relatively safely. Well knock me over with a feather if they didn't come up with the goods. Once again, the safest option is don't ask how they did it.

They turned up in an Australia Post van the next day.

So the girls got their "Postie" uniforms on and we packed the drums in the back. Lamb was ready with her suit bag and laptop and AK-47.

We travelled safely to the local elders and dropped the drums off. All the little kids came running as they knew who we were. Princess Leah and Duke had given them a ride in the van after they picked it up and were on their way back to the Tree House.

Then we headed off to the airport and travelled safely through the Quarter. Lamb had her AK-47 hidden under the back seat. With all the security in place at the airport we couldn't let her take it on the plane. We knew she'd be safe as Bella had organised Maverick and Goose to escort her QANTAS plane to Darwin. Not that we liked QANTAS as they had lost my beautiful TREK bicycle twice between Brisbane, Perth and Melbourne a few months ago. Sometimes in Australia we just have to deal with a lack of competition and bad service.

And so we headed back to the Tree House. We were all busted and I had to have a sleep before heading off to that desert called South Australia. At least my best mate, Fat Slag, would be down there in Adelaide to have a few Coopers Pale Ales with (the one with the green label). Slaggos has a PhD from London University specialising in agricultural and developmental economics and she always opens my mind up to new things on how to help the local villagers.

I knew that Lamb would be safe with Maverick and Goose. I'd be happy and safe in South Australia.

My only concern now was getting our assets and liabilities and cashflow to the banks in 48 hrs to extend our finance and even more worrying- Duke and Princess Leah would be left in the Tree House unsupervised for that time.

I decided to just sleep and for once in my life and just not pharkin worry.

Whatever will be, will be.