The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Free dairy for ‘superwoman’
A freedairy farm has gifted a “real-life superwoman” a year’s worth of products after she was spotted pushing one of their milk lorries up an icy hill.
Charlene Leslie, 33, was videoed pushing the Graham’s milk HGV on a snow-covered street in Cowdenbeath.
Mum-of-three Charlene was heading to the local shops when she saw the lorry in trouble and asked a neighbour to watch her children as she went to help out.
Supermarket worker Charlene pushed the lorry to the top of the hill and said she can’t believe the attention she has received for her efforts.
Graham’s has now gifted Charlene a year of free dairy products to thank her.
Charlene, who was with daughter Rihanna, 10 and Hunter, two, at the time, said: “I would never just stand by when I see someone in trouble.
“I suppose what I did was really dangerous but thankfully the Graham’s lorry got safely up the hill.
“I wasn’t really thinking about me, I just wanted to help.
“A load of people were trying to push a car up the hill when I noticed the Graham’s lorry coming behind it.
“Its front wheels spinning and it was from all the snow.
“My neighbour appeared, so I asked her to watch the kids and the dog while I pushed it from the back.
“Eventually, it made safely to the top.
“I cannot believe all the attention I am getting for what I did. were stuck it
“I simply believe that it is your duty to help others if they are in trouble.
“It was lovely to meet Mr Graham, as I’m a huge fan of the family farming brand and their products.”
Dr Robert Graham Snr, chairman of Graham’s The Family Dairy, said: “When I saw the video of Charlene pushing one of our lorries up a steep hill singlehandedly, I couldn’t believe it. Charlene’s intentions were incredibly kind.
“She not only made our family, farmers and colleagues smile, but clearly captured the hearts of thousands of people across the world who also watched her help others, without a thought for her own safety.
“Although she is a reallife superwoman, for health and safety reasons we must advise others not to follow her actions.”
There are two kinds of people in the world. The ones who say they enjoy winter – embracing snow in the volumes we saw this week with unbridled, frostbitten, chappedlipped, wet-nosed glee – and normal people.
A colleague spent Tuesday night skiing down his street on Dundee’s Law with the neighbours and an incredulous golden retriever in hot pursuit. A Facebook friend was last seen doing yoga in her scanties in a snowdrift in an appeal to the “what doesn’t break you makes you stronger” brigade. The hills are alive with the sound of sledging and readers have been showing off their handiwork in the form of backyard ice rinks and snow dinosaurs.
Me? I’ve grudgingly accepted that no amount of refreshing the weather app on my phone will change the fact that it’s still 10 below zero in the middle of the day. I don’t even have the energy to go through the rigmarole of getting happed up for the fiveminute trudge to the park and since my terrier is 2cm shorter than last night’s snowfall that’s probably just as well.
Winter makes for hard going. Even if you subscribe to the “Oh but isn’t it pretty, though?” school of thought (we can’t be friends) there’s no denying that the conditions we’ve faced this week have made every little act that bit trickier and more time consuming and there are plenty of people who don’t have the luxury of being able to admire it from the comfort of indoors.
So to all the good souls who have dug out cars, kept roads and pavements cleared and public services moving – and particularly those who have staffed Covid vaccination clinics and waited in line in the cold for their jab for longer than is desirable or even acceptable, I salute you.
On Wednesday, as Scotland shivered in the lowest temperatures in a quarter of a century, another milestone was marked as the millionth jab was administered.
That day, 63,000 people stepped up to be vaccinated – a new record – meaning a quarter of the population, including some of the most vulnerable, have now been seen.
There were slip-ups along the way.
In Dundee, people who had been invited to the Caird Hall community vaccination centre endured long delays and uncomfortable queues as the schedule went awry and managers struggled to accommodate the ones arriving late because the snow had disrupted their journey and those turning up early because they’d set aside more time than they needed.
By Tuesday night, appointments were suspended as blizzards cloaked the city.
At the same time, schools were closed, roads were blocked, buses were off – there were even avalanche warnings in places. The fact that so many appointments went ahead as planned – and in some of the more remote and rural parts of our region – should be a cause for jubilation.
In Fife, the problems were more widespread – and more concerning. Monday brought chaotic scenes across the kingdom, with long queues outside centres in Kirkcaldy,
Buckhaven, Glenrothes and Anstruther. In Lochgelly, there were reports of an elderly lady collapsing with suspected hypothermia, prompting an apology from Nicola Sturgeon at the following day’s Covid briefing.
Here the weather was merely a compounding factor, exacerbating the misery for patients caught up in a booking blunder. NHS Fife revealed on Tuesday that the issue had been caused by significantly greater numbers of local people being allocated appointments through the National Scheduling Tool