Now, just to show that Bushwhacked has a balanced approach I want to tell you about some events which in recent weeks have reminded me that there are some pretty nice people in our businesses.

Incident 1: Mrs Whacked has a beaut antique bedside lamp made of a cast iron base, a small hanging metal chain switch and a glass, beaded shade. In recent months the bulb has blown many times and a thought kept occurring: Gawd, is metal touching metal somewhere and perhaps Mrs Whacked might find this a shocking experience, after all, the gubbins of the thing are about 90 years old. We had thought of just junking it, even though she loves it.

Instead, we took it to Bendigo Lighthouse where a nice bloke took some time to look it over and pronounced the problem was – the light globes. Some new types are sensitive to movement and can blow without warning.

His charge for this welcome advice? The cost of a more stable light globe. We suspect many others would have junked the loved antique and sold some modern cra…err, alternative.

Incident 2: Again, it involved Mrs Whacked, whom I am beginning to think gets out and about more than I do.

Music has been a theme in her life and she decided that if I was too bloody lazy to use the guitar lessons she had bought for me a year ago, she’d take them up.

She took her late Mum’s much loved and much used old Yamaha guitar to Josh at J’s Music City to see if the old instrument could hold a tune. They spent some time assessing the instrument, tuning it and showing what a rich sound it could produce.

The cost of this service? Nothing. Just the joy of dealing with someone who liked music.

Incident 3: Old Henry the Hippyvan was being prepared for another adventure on the road, but the bed, made up by re-positioning the seating, was a tad firm. Well, a big tad – you could use the seat squabs as snare drums.

So, around we went to Clark Rubber in Marong Road for an “egg-carton” foam mattress topper. It came in a neat zippered plastic carry bag which would have fitted nicely into the space-restricted campervan.

“Tell us the truth, now,” we asked. “Once we get the foam topper out of the bag, will it ever fit back in again?”

“Not a snowball’s chance in hell!” was the answer. “You’ll have to roll it up.”

Such honesty. It saved many hours of sweat and swearing.

Incident 4: a “special deal” we didn’t remember doing with our gas and electricity supplier, Origin, warned us our plan was about to run out and if we didn’t ring by a certain day, we’d go back to paying full whack.

You know what usually follows then: call centres in unspecified countries and jerky conversations with heavily accented people who pretend to be local and who spew technical and nonsensical terms and specifications and – after an hour or so – leave you with a vague feeling you’ve been had again.

This time, a bloke answered: “Hello, Bruce here, what’s the issue?” And we chatted for a while about various matters and strange coincidences, laughed a bit and then he … now get this … not only renewed the discounts, but piled a couple of new ones on top.

Mr Grumpy-Pants will be back next week.​

WAYNE GREGSON