aboveboard
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Back to the old place
Dropped into work this morning, my ex place of work I should say, to hand in a cake and say farewell. As I was about to ring the buzzer at the theatre entrance to be let in, a member of staff, who used to be one of the trust's drivers but was now wearing theatre blues, approached the door. I asked him if he was going into the theatres because I didn't know the code. He promptly keyed in the code telling me what it was. I wondered if he recognised me, if he thought I was still a member of staff. He never asked, and I had no ID badge.
I stopped by the old office which was deserted and almost derelict last time I looked. Nothing had changed, not even the entry code; my pigeonhole was still there and overflowing with mail, mostly junk mail from pharmaceutical companies, but also internal mail. Word that I retired ten months ago has not reached all departments.
In the afternoon I retrieved the remaining boxes from the loft without injuring myself, the boxes or the ceiling. If the loft of my next house is not boarded and fitted with an electric light and ladder, I shall consider having that done. I will not remain nimble for ever.
Thought for today
Seldom any splendid story is wholly true.
Samuel Johnson, Works vol 7, 1787
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2.5.06 19:55
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Homeless
After fourteen months on the market my house has finally been sold and the money has reached my bank account. I am homeless and am staying temporarily with my parents. Finding somewhere to live is now my priority.
The removal men arrived yesterday to clear my house, and I cleared out this morning. The only casualty yesterday, to my knowledge, was the estate agent's board which was knocked over by the removal van.
I'll give more details when I'm feeling stronger. Tomorrow I intend to drive back to collect the stuff that I left with a neighbour because there wasn't room in my car to take it all with me.
Thought for today will resume once my books of quotations come out of store.
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5.5.06 20:47
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The story so far
I sold my house ten days ago, put my furniture into store, and moved in with my parents while I search for somewhere else to buy or rent.
Progress of a certain kind
My parents' house is a tip. Today I have cleared enough space in one of the bedrooms to be able to sit at the table in there, set up my laptop and type this in relative comfort; relative, that is, to sitting on the dirty clothes' basket on the landing and perching the laptop on a small filing cabinet next to it.
The mess in this house has to be seen to be believed. There must be twenty years' worth of neglect to the sorting, the tidying and the cleaning of the contents. And goodness knows when the place was last redecorated. It will be an estate agent's nightmare (and mine).
My father was keen on geology and one of his hobbies was collecting stones. The garage and garden shed are full of them. Every day when I go for a walk I take a bag of stones with me and dump them secretly. My mother refers to this action as my dealing with another BoS. She said today that if I got rid of one BoS a day for a year this would make little impact on his collection.
The garage is a mess too. When my parents had cars it beats me how they managed to fit both in there. There's scarcely room for one (mine) in there now. I don't know where all the junk comes from. It's like a volcanic eruption; larva, junk, is flowing out uncontrollably. As fast as I remove it, more appears. Soul destroying actually.
At least it's a pleasant area in which to live, and the weather is good. Being able to type this is progress and a way of venting my annoyance at the mess. I can't escape it. I'll have to clear it when they die, so I might as well start early; there's so much to do. Little and often, that's one of my mottoes.
Thought for today
Let it be observed, that slovenliness is no part of religion; that neither this, nor any text of Scripture, condemns neatness of apparel. Certainly this is a duty, not a sin. 'Cleanliness is, indeed, next to godliness.'
John Wesley (1703 - 1791) Sermons, No. xciii, On Dress
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14.5.06 20:00
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The way through the woods
Got rid of three BoSs today. Found a way through some nearby woods ideal for that; loads of nettles and brambles which hide the discarded stones. I walk along tossing them out of the bag. They came from the ground so they can return to the ground, albeit different ground.
A chap collecting stuff for Help the Aged came round this morning in a transit van. After he'd visited my parents's house his van was full. When I saw what he'd already put in his van I felt no guilt about the stuff I gave him. He almost seemed interested in my father's WW2 army parachute that I found in the garage. He suggested I try to sell it on ebay.
One of my mother's helpers arrived about 12 noon and went through the house like a mini tornado sucking up anything that was lying about including today's newspaper and a document from my mother's bank that was delivered in the post this morning. She went off with a large box of books to take to a local second-hand bookshop, which was useful, so I mustn't complain, but must remember to watch what she throws out in future.
Went into town to buy an Explorer map of the area to help me with my walks. And, guess what? The town is on the edge of one map so I need two to cover the area. Why is it that the areas you are interested in are always on the edges of maps? I baulked at buying two maps (£7.49 each) and shall make do with my smaller scale map.
Thought for today
What, after all, is a halo? It's only one more thing to keep clean.
Christopher Fry
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15.5.06 19:26
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Man's best friend
It's more pleasant to walk in leafy woods than on hard pavements. However, a new hazard, apart from the dog turds which are hard to spot being the same colour as the paths, are the dogs themselves. Many owners walk them unleashed although notices on gates and fences instruct otherwise. Some dogs pay me no attention, others jump up covering me with mud or slobber or both. I am tired of this as I told a man with two large boisterous dogs this morning after I'd waited for him to grab them before I opened a gate that separated them from me. At least unruly kids don't crap on pavements or jump up and slobber over people.
My mother saves her notes to the milkman. I counted nineteen in a pot in the kitchen.
I took a load of rubbish to the household waste site today, a journey accomplished without injury to myself or to the car. The old parachute never made it into a skip; one of the attendants went off with it. As I staggered up the steps to the skip with it, the chap, who looked older than I, said that I could leave it by him on the platform. It's an old parachute I said. I can see that he replied. I doubt many would have recognised the bundle wrapped in khaki strapping, and covered in dust, as a parachute.
Thought for today
The trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.
Dr Norman Vincent Peale (1898 - 1993) American clergyman
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16.5.06 19:25
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Stones by the ton
Well, so my father's collection seems to me. The grand clear out continues. I found some colourful shiny ones today which I saved for myself; something to have on display in my next home, whenever I manage to buy one. I also found ancient beans, biscuits, bags of sea shells, and bags of empty plastic containers, all now destined for a landfill site.
Dismal weather now. Poured yesterday and is raining hard again now. A nearby farm has acres of poly tunnels which, because of the warmer weather, have their lower parts rolled up so the crops don't overheat. The heavy rain yesterday ran off the tops of the tunnels and collected in the rolled up parts making them sag under the weight of the water. Workers (probably Eastern Europeans paid low wages) at the farm this morning had the laborious, and tedious, job of emptying the collected water. They'll have to repeat the process tomorrow. There must be miles of poly tunnels for them to check.
Thought for today
At fifty, everyone has the face he deserves.
George Orwell (1903 - 1950)
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17.5.06 20:17
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A woman's work is never done
Even with no household of my own to run I'm still busy. After a four-mile (I reckon) tramp through the woods between breakfasts, I lay in wait for the wheelie bin men because the WB was overflowing again and there was more rubbish I wanted them to take. There are times when it pays to look weak and getting WB men to take rubbish is one of them. They took my extra bag which fortunately didn't split as the man hurled it into the wagon.
My next task was to fill my car with as much wood as possible from the garage. There was loads of dust and dead leaves but mercifully no mice nests. A bumble bee buzzed around ostentatiously which made me wonder if it had taken up residence somewhere in the garage. I managed to fit most of the wood into my car and added some glass and a roll of lino for good measure. There's nothing like having sheets of glass perched on top of junk in one's car to concentrate the mind and encourage one to drive slowly, smoothly and carefully - how one should really all the time, I suppose.
At the entrance to the tip I was dismayed to see a notice proclaiming that rubbish generated from home improvements or alterations counted as construction waste, the disposal of which had to be paid for. I left the roll of lino in the car until the attendants' backs were turned, and then nipped smartly up the steps with it and hurled it as far into the skip as I could. Having emptied my car, I dusted myself down, shook out the sheets of plastic that I'd used to protect my car, and left, mission accomplished. It's a bit sad when a successful outing is to the local household waste site.
Thought for today
England is the paradise of women, the purgatory of men, and the hell of horses.
John Florio (1553? - 1625) Second Frutes, 1591
(Well, I never knew that.)
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18.5.06 20:11
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