#18

Ug. Didn't enjoy Saturday... I should have gone to the park or something, because the music from Tyrone's party (next door) was so loud I could not stand being in the back garden at all. It's worse when you have a set time in your mind for how long a disturbance will go on for and it goes-on for much much longer. Because I had kind-of assumed that the party might be over by... oo.. let's say 6pm...but no, it went on 'til 11pm, rather unexpected when you consider that Tyrone is only three. Tyrone and his fellow three year old friends (but unfortunately not the neighbours) must have been shipped-off to a quieter location after his birthday party before adult rowdiness took-over. Sunday was a relief, did the usual lawn mowing. My organic lawn looks the worst it has ever been after the two months of solid rain. There was a gathering at Russ's on Sunday night as is somewhat customary, and many many laughs were had. You might want to look at Barkfoot's latest blog entry to err, see, err.... And today (Monday) was really nice -- a relaxing lie on the grass with the Sun on my face in between Cortina renovation work, my idea of paradise. The six foot high daisies in my Mother's garden practically shone with warming summer yellow against the blue sky and fluffy white clouds.

A few days ago I discovered an animal burrow in the lawn. I pondered what animal the hole belonged to, and whether it would fall into the 'wild animal' or the 'vermin' category. And of course if it was vermin I would have to decide what to do about it and would be faced with options ranging from 'live and let live' to 'total annihilation'... but not relishing the possibility of having to execute some sort of rodent I came up with the brilliantly cowardly solution of delegating all responsibility to Sumpy the Cat.


To my surprise all I had to do was point to the hole and Sumpy seemed to immediately get the message that this was an issue that needed his expert attention. There was not a rodent in sight but it didn't stop Sumpy ramming his paw down the hole, sticking his nose in, and generally standing guard and peering-in.

Oh and before I forget (further to #15), here is some more advice on interfacing with the love'em'n'hate'em supermarkets:- when you come home from a super market wash your hands extremely well (and don't get your hands anywhere near you mouth before that). If you're a person who is unfortunate enough to suffer a lot of stomach aches, ask yourself if most of them occur within about 32 hours of doing your weekly shopping, I think you'll find they probably do. That's what I found was happening to me, but not anymore since I sussed it. I'm not talking about the actual food you buy posing a heath hazard (although the usually manky out-of-date produce from the delicatessen counters handled by hygiene shy assistants, are to be avoided at all costs). I am pretty sure that the source of infection is the handle bar of the super market trolley. Don't believe me? Well consider the life of the handle bar of the typical supermarket trolley during just one shop. It is a continuous cycle of people picking-up items off shelves and putting them in the basket and grabbing the handle to push the trolley to the next location. This probably happens 20 to 50 times. There's that source bottle you pick up that is all sticky because an adjacent bottle had broken during transit, then there are the packs of raw meat you pick-up and look over (a bit of blood may be leaking out of one pack), then there's the customer with the jippy tummy who has to visit the in store toilet due to being caught short, and add to this any dodgy micro-organisms that are already on customers hands when they arrive at the store.... it all builds-up on that handle bar, an ideal sticky pathological bacteria growing medium, like a petri dish spread with agar jelly and seeded with a huge variety of germs... and one of'em's out to get you!