Vultures, adders and adrenalin

So this has been a week full of danger and taking risks for my family.

The first perilous event happened on Sunday when Mum, Billy dog and I went for a walk around a local reservoir. It was a lovely day, the sun was shining and there was barely a breath of wind. We had walked about 3 quaters of the way around the lake and had filled our tub with blackberries, ready to make a crumble, when we met a group of people also walking a dog. They told us that they had seen a couple of adders out sunbathing and to be careful.

Adders are a type of viper that are native to Great Britain. They are venomous but only mildly so and do not present a threat to a healthy adult. However to a small Billy sized dog they can be fatal. Therefore for the final mile of the walk Billy had to be kept on a short lead and was not allowed to sniff around in the long grass which he likes to do. Mum and I spent the walk talking really loudly and stamping our feet to try and scare the snakes away. In fact we were stamping so much I think that we both gave ourselves shin flints, we created such a rumpous that we were probably in danger of attracting the snakes to us, as I imagine they thought a herd of elephants was on its way by.

Luckily we survived this threat but our family wasn't out of danger yet.

On Monday, my day off, I was having a coffee at home and decided to check Facebook. My niece and her husband are on holiday in France and to my horror my niece had posted a picture of herself and her husband, dressed in hard hats and overalls, standing next to a colourful paraglider. The comment she'd posted said,

"Just jumped off a mountain".

That was it! No mention of whether they had landed, why she'd decided that jumping off a mountain holding onto what is basically a kite was a good idea, or if they'd had lessons or anything.

I know that technically speaking her and her husband are adults, the fact that they are married kind of implies this, but how did we get to the point where she can make that sort of decision without consulting her parents, much less her Aunt. Yes she's an adult but it only seems 5 minutes ago since I pushed her on a swing; 10 minutes since she was a toddler and needed help to wipe her bottom when potty training, and it only seems 15 minutes since we were changing her nappy and exposing the multi coloured horrors within. Incidentally I'm sure her husbands nappies were just as bad, it's just I didn't know him then.

Now suddenly she's throwing that same arse over the edge of a mountain, without a thought to the care and attention that has gone into keeping her safe over the years. I can't imagine how both sets of parents felt as they pictured the bodies they protected from nappy rash bouncing down canyons, to be trodden on by mountain goats and pecked at by vultures. I'm not even exageratting, that could happen.

What really worries me is that paragliding might be another step along the slippery slope to becoming an adrenalin junkie. Kids start out on swings, urging parents and carers to push them higher and higher, so the addiction starts. Before you know it they are experimenting at funfairs, they ride their bikes too fast, but assure us they didn't inhale. Next they learn to ski and inform us they can handle it. They try a climbing wall, then climb a mountain, stating it's not a problem, they are just social adrenalin users. Then they jump off a mountain and tell us they can stop any time they want to. What's next, skydiving without a parachute into shark infested waters, whilst smeared in blood?

So I request that you stop this dangerous habit now. I suggest that you go cold turkey and cut all risk taking behaviours out of your lives. Maybe it would be sensible to never travel faster than 40 miles an hour, to never have your feet off the ground for longer than 11 seconds and to avoid activities that could involve injuries that require more medical treatment than a sticking plaster can provide. Yes this won't make you popular on motorways and will rule out flying, but there are still loads of fun things to do. There's walking, skipping or even bowling.

This week my niece jumps off a mountain and I walk along a snake infested path. She loves it and posts a picture on Facebook, I hate my adventure and can't wait to get to safety. I am not an adrenalin addict, she's becoming one. So this post is by way of being an intervention, let's stop this young couple ending up as vulture food all because they couldn't resist the allure of adrenalin.