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An unusual object in the road
Busy again yesterday (when am I not?) so by the time I stopped, from exhaustion aided by the heat, I hadn't the strength to write this. I dismantled one of my father's stone-cutting machines so I can now take most of the pieces to the household tip. One bit is too heavy for me to manage. If I can lift it into the boot, I am unlikely to be able to remove it without help. It needs two strong men, not one weak woman.
Yesterday afternoon, while I was out walking, a friend of my mother's dropped round for a chat before she took a taxi home in time to watch ‘the match' as she called it. My mother, not a football fan, thought she referred to a match at Wimbledon. I arrived back as the taxi was leaving and my mother was waving goodbye. She had a small object in her hand which she said the taxi driver had handed to her saying that he didn't want it stuck in his tyres. It was a bullet.
Why couldn't he have thrown it across the road into the bed of nettles like I did? What good is a bullet? Perhaps he thought it belonged to us. It probably was one of the bullets that I found in my father's desk drawer and put in the wheelie bin last week together with a few screws and nails. When I put them in the wb it was full so I flicked them, when I put out the bin, so they fell to the bottom. I was suspicious that the wb man might scruitinise the contents of the bin before he attached it to the wagon, and I didn't want to risk any nails or screws falling out into the road in the process. (When I visit the tip I always look out for sharp objects on the ground; don't want a puncture.)
The wb was emptied on Friday and my suspicions were confirmed; the man lifted the lid, threw out a dead oak leaf (garden waste) and rummaged around. The contents must have passed his inspection so he dumped the lot into the wagon. What have we come to when we have to clean rubbish before putting it into our wheelie bins? There are no oak trees in the garden. The leaf must have blown into the garage from across the road.
Thought for today
I'm not denyin' the women are foolish: God Almighty made 'em to match the men.
George Eliot, (1819 - 1880) Adam Bede (1895) ch. 53
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2.7.06 09:10
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While the cat's away
I have transformed my father's workshop; it has become the 'garden room'. The stone cutting and polishing machines are now in pieces, most of which I took to the local tip and dumped in the scrap metal skip. Two heavy bits remain for me to decide how to recycle.
This blog contains a lot of tales about my trips to the tip. That's what my life has been like during the past two months, countless trips to the tip. I am trying to clear out junk from my parents' house before the local council weighs cars on entry and exit and charges for the weight of rubbish dumped. This week there will be no general rubbish collection, it's now two-weekly, a so-called improvement, so I await with interest to see how full wheelie bins are next week.
The garden room has a table and chairs, and vase of honeysuckle. I feel slight regret at having thrown away the roll of lino a few weeks ago. The current lino, now visible, has seen better days. The radio that could receive only LW and I chucked out would also come in useful now. Why is it that you suddenly find a use for something three weeks after you throw it away?
My mother has more saucepan lids than saucepans. Dare I throw the surplus ones away or will that make the missing saucepans appear?
Thought for today
A lot of fellows nowadays have a B.A., M.D., or Ph.D. Unfortunately, they don't have a J.O B.
Fats Domino (1928 - ) Rhythm & blues singer
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3.7.06 22:00
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The battle of the bees; part 2
I thought I'd won but discovered this morning, on my return from the tip, that the beasts had regrouped and were busy making another nest in the garage. Arrgh. I moved a plank of wood that was lying horizontally propped up against the left-hand wall to make space for another one and, in so doing, exposed about thirty of the blighters making cells for eggs. I stunned them with the fly spray and shovelled the foundations into a box and tipped it onto the nettles opposite. I shall have to inspect the site in the garage every day.
My mother visited my father in the care home today. He seemed comfortable, she said, but he said that he didn't want to stay there forever. 'There are some dotty people in here,' he told her. When I went to collect her later in the day, my father, ignoring my mother, had taken pole position by the telly and was watching the tennis.
There were two letters in the local paper complaining about the changes to the waste collection. Both correspondents had found maggots in their rubbish so collections every two weeks were not enough. They must have thrown away food and not wrapped it to keep flies out. Their families can't have learnt to judge how much they can eat.
Thought for today
If I am doing nothing, I like to be doing nothing to some purpose. That is what leisure means.
Alan Bennett (1934 - ) A Question of Attribution, 1989
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4.7.06 20:21
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Out of sight, out of mind
Went into the loft today. At least I can be glad that I am still agile enough to be able to do that. Going up the step ladders is easy; it's getting from them, perching on the hole edge and climbing into the loft that's tricky.
I found an amazing assortment of stuff. My parents couldn't have looked let alone been into their loft for years. Everything was covered with dust. If there is a lung disease caused by exposure to large amounts of house dust then I am likely to be affected.
There were ancient suitcases battered beyond use. Inside one was a silver cigarette holder which still contained cigarettes. There was a metal box which contained The Daily Telegraph dated Monday 4 September 1939. Another metal box housed a wooden box containing a document announcing the awarding of a knighthood to one of my great-grandfathers.
There were rolls of carpet, plastic bags of curtains, small bookcases, two ancient wooden shoe-trees, and a guitar. There was a table top with four legs, and four legs but no table top. There was the first rowing machine that my father bought; the second he gave to my brother last year. There were three rucksacks which must have been more than forty years old.
There was also a bomb. I think it's an incendiary bomb. It is harmless (unless dropped on one's foot) as it's empty, it contains no explosive; the top comes off. Haven't thought what to do with it yet.
Tomorrow I shall have to go to the tip again, and must remember to take the bottles of nitric and sulphuric acid that I found in the garage.
Thought for today
I never think of the future. It comes soon enough.
Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955)
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5.7.06 22:07
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SUVs: the new Volvos?
There are many SUVs round here and many do go off-roading -- on-pavementing to be precise. Residential and rural roads are narrow so people drive over kerbs onto pavements and grass verges to pass other vehicles. However, if they drove smaller cars in the first place then they could pass without doing this. Is the popularity of SUVs linked to the width of the roads, or to the wish to tow caravans (few have tow bars), or could it be that they are perceived as safe? In the event of a crash those inside will fair better than those outside.
It never rains ...
The downstairs lavatory leaks where the cistern pipe joins it, the shower leaks again so water comes into the living room, the main stopcock is too stiff to close, and a panel of tiles by the bath is coming off the wall. In spite of this I can report some progress; today I persuaded my father to sign a standing order for his monthly fees for the care home. His future, at least, is secure. He did ask, several times, whan was he coming home. We need to get the house sorted first, said my mother, and he seemed to accept that. He then went on about my being tone deaf, which was news to me.
I tried to locate the site of the leak in the shower cubicle, though am not convinced that I found it. I did find, on the ledge by the window, in a thick layer of dust, one empty container of shower gel, one almost empty container of shower gel, a red rubber band (probably one from the Post Office) used by my mother to tie back her hair, and seven small pieces of soap, the remnants of larger bars which must have been used before my parents discovered shower gel.
Thought for today
Parents should conduct their arguments in quiet, respectful tones, but in a foreign language. You'd be surprised what an inducement that is to the education of children.
Judith Martin, Advice from Miss Manners, column in Washington Post 1979 - 1982
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7.7.06 20:53
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What goes up must come down
Cleared out the loft. The box of 78s that I found and thought might be valuable turned out to be worthless; the records were so warped that they were like frisbees.
In another box, a small rusty metal chest, I found old coins, probably worthless too, and the remains of a WW2 parachute flare. That might be of interest to a museum.
Removed stuff from the top of a wardrobe yesterday and dumped most of it in my brother's house today. It was all covered in a thick layer of dust. (Why is dust grey?) There were documents, photos, cake tins, a suitcase and a long thin item wrapped in a sheet of plastic that could have been a hockey stick but which turned out to be a sword. It was the dress sword belonging to my father's brother when he was a midshipman in the Royal Navy. He became a submariner and died with all the crew when his boat was depth-charged off the coast of Tunisia in 1943. What a waste of life. Mind you, when families can't live in harmony, and communities can't, it's hardly surprising that countries cannot either.
Thought for today
I have never understood the liking for war. It panders to instincts already catered for within the scope of any respectable domestic establishment.
Alan Bennett (1934 - ) Forty Years On, 1969
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9.7.06 21:19
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Room with a view
The corkscrew hazel tree in the back garden has been removed. My father planted it thirty years ago and it had grown so tall it obscured the view from the bedroom windows. Now the rooms and garden are lighter. We no longer see leaves from the upstairs windows but the neighbours' washing.
Thought for today
An advertisement for a car manufacturer shows the windscreen displaying the speed of approach to a left-hand bend. The caption says: 'With this system, you don't have to choose between looking at the bend ahead and down at the speedometer telling you how fast you're approaching it.' Why is it necessary to know the speed at which you approach a bend?
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10.7.06 21:42
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