a lick and a polish

well readers, it seems that selling a house does not just involve putting a sign up outside and waiting for someone to turn up with their cheque book. oh no. your have to make your house look smart. in our case this has involved herself turning into a tornado. yesterday she cleaned all the windows, cleaned the house, secreted the vast amount of camping gear in various corners, cleared a pile of junk on the drive and started spreading the ton of gravel that had been delivered by a large truck the day before.

by the evening she was exhausted and her hands wouldn't work. she has a thing called car pull tunnel. this is something you catch from towing cars with your bare hands. it means that she has to sleep with her hands in splints. himself kept saying "i can do some of it, let me help." herself refused point blank. he helped her dig up some plants a few days ago and went a very worrying shade of grey.

help was at hand in the form of mr rokit. he and rokit arranged to come along today and spread the rest of the gravel. in preparation for this herself got up early and spent a happy hour or two clearing the huge pile of junk off the drive. herself is in the habit of piling things up with a view to taking them to the dump and then getting distracted. so the pile grows. there was a very large heap of rotten wood which was no good for burning, a brazier with the bottom burnt out, some horribly slimey melted cardboard harbouring various wildlife, and all sorts of other joys. herself finally got the trailer loaded.

himself said he would come to the dump. this would have meant also taking my boy. at the moment, with all the stuff that has been going on, they are more troll-like than usual. herself therefore snuck out of the house on her own and headed for the dump. when she got there she remembered why another person was useful. she does not have very good trailer-reversing skills. not to be defeated, she collared a dump man to help wheel it into a space. she attracted some funny looks from fellow dumpists. in anticipation of getting covered in grime and slime she had not had a shower and therefore looked like medusa. added to this, the sort of person who does serious dumping of the type involved today is invariably a man. shifting rotten wood and slimy cardboard is not a ladylike occupation.

eventually, after a lot of huffing and puffing the job was done. but as she threw in the last fence post, her glove fell into the huge skip. in fact not her glove, but a glove belonging to our friends on the corner. these gloves have been in her car since she took a bunch of stuff to the dump for them. luckily, in fact extremely luckily, a dump man was standing next to her holding a fishing rod. maybe the dump people employ a special fishing gnome to make the place look nice. the dump man swiftly recovered the glove for herself, who thanked him profusely and told him it was the first good thing that had happened to her all day.

things improved further with the arrival of rokit and mr rokit. rokit had to be restrained from giving me the usual cuddle as he might have caught my shoulder pipe. but it was good to see the little chap. and mr rokit made short work of the gravel, putting the feeble efforts of herself rather in the shade. so the peeps settled down to a plate of chilli feeling much cheerier, leaving young rokit and i to chew each other's ears under the table...