First Impressions

First impressions count. Did you know that? Opinions are formed and there’s nothing you can do afterwards that will change them.


Marianna’s colleague, Bill, his wife, Hazel and their children Katy, Becky and Josh visited us on 7th June 2009. At that time this house was a time capsule of deep pile carpets which covered walls, floors and ceilings. It was also a Fairground Hall of Mirrors since they were on walls and ceilings. The children loved it and ran, dived, sled and treated the whole place as an adventure playground. That was just fine by us since we were about to start demolishing it and we loved that they had such a good time. Today, the five of them returned to see us but most probably to see the house and the children were keen to explore the Wendy House again. The problem was that despite the absence of deep carpets and mirrors they still saw the place as a playground. Their parents repeatedly pointed out to them that the house looked very different from last time, it was almost finished and they must treat it more respectfully. But they didn’t, couldn’t. Our house brought about a Pavlovian response and they couldn’t not go wild. As the four adults sat and talked downstairs we heard screams and doors opening and closing and slamming and feet stampeding. I’m a great fan of Bill and Hazel’s parenting style which doesn’t involve X-Box’s, Wii’s or television but their children were beyond their control today and eventually they admitted defeat and loaded them back into the car and departed. Marianna and I then wandered around the house and closed the wardrobe doors which had clearly been used for ‘Hide and Seek’, noted the multitude of handprints on the walls and the footprints in the bath and that a large number of Marianna’s shoes had been removed from their boxes and worn.



Still, Hazel brought an exceptionally good carrot cake she’d made which, in my world, makes up for pretty much anything.

The Idiot Advice Service

It seems that like a moth to a bulb our front door has begun to attract idiots. Or I’m increasingly intolerant.


During the afternoon on Tuesday when I was boring myself senseless by writing an assessment of someone’s risk of reoffending the doorbell rang.


On opening it I found a man/idiot.


IDIOT: “Simon Green wants you to call him”


ME: “Does he? Are you sure? I’ve no idea who he is”.


IDIOT: “He wants you to call him about the door”


ME: “What door? Are you sure you’ve got the right address”


IDIOT: “The door in your house”.


ME: “This house is full of doors, you’re really going to need to narrow it down a bit. Are you sure you don’t want 129 Rugby Road, they’re having building work done”.
 

IDIOT: “The doors we fitted”


ME: “Our builders fitted all of our doors”


IDIOT: “The folding doors at the back”


ME: (in the most patronising tone any human is yet to achieve) “Oh, so you’re from the company that fitted the bi-fold doors”.


IDIOT; (Bristling slightly) “Yes. We’re working across the road and he said I should pop over”


I should explain that Marianna dealt with every aspect of buying those doors and is now dealing with negotiating a settlement given the dozens of flaws they had. To her someone beginning with “Simon Green wants you to call him” rather than “Hello” might have been the beginning of a conversation rather than a riddle.


On Thursday a courier called with some legal papers for me but he didn’t immediately declare that this was his role in life. It was only just after eight and I had recently returned from the gym. The doorbell rang and when I answered it I found a man poking a finger into the passenger tyre of our car.


IDIOT: “That tyres not legal” he called over.


ME: “What?” (I genuinely couldn’t fully hear him but what I really wanted to say was ‘Who are you?’)


IDIOT: “It’s not legal. You’d be in trouble if the police saw it” said the fat, bald man now walking back towards me. I noticed the parcel in his hand and the white van behind him.


ME: “You’re very fat. You’d be in trouble if a cardiologist saw you” is not what I said but it was remarkable how quickly this man had annoyed me. What I said was “Oh”, pulled a face which said “And your point is??” and took the parcel from him.


IDIOT: “None of my business mate, just sayin”. And he walked off (backwards), hands raised, palms up in surrender.

Advice like this must be a service he offers, perhaps around town.


IDIOT: “Your ears are too big for that hairstyle, mate” he tells the man taking his order in McDonalds.


IDIOT: “Your arse is too big for that skirt, love” he tells the teller at the bank.


IDIOT: “You’ll never make it as a professional artist. If someone with any taste saw that you'd be in trouble” he tells his five year old, handing back their collage; “None of my business son, just sayin”

Ice, Ice, Baby

Rejoice! Rejoice! for we now have a fridge. We have been without refrigeration since we moved back into the house in December and our diet has been dictated by what the local Tesco Express had in stock that was on its ‘Best Before’ date and had been discounted. Those days are over and dietary decisions will no longer based on eating something purely because it’ll be mouldy tomorrow if we don’t eat it today.


It was delivered at 9am but we had been told that it would arrive some time between 7am and midday. This meant that we had to get up at six so that we could clear space in the garage for access to the kitchen and remove the chipboard panels that still cover the hole where a garage door should be. This felt a little early since we had been in Manchester the previous evening worshipping at the temple of Mr Barlow and the Take That brotherhood and had arrived home after 2am. We quickly cleared a space and removed the doors and so rather than nap until the doorbell rang we constructed a set of shelves which Marianna bought in the bargain basement section of Ikea when we lived in Coventry. Since it measures about six foot square we thought they would make for useful storage in the garage and so set about rebuilding them. Only forty five minutes later our work was done. For ease we had constructed it on its side so all we had to was tip it onto its base and push it into place. We began to move it with one of us lifting and pushing and the other pulling. “It’s tipping!!!” cried Marianna. Indeed, for a millisecond I noticed how those 90 degree angles were decreasing and then the shelves had gone and were replaced by several dozen small sections of MDF on the floor and a confetti explosion of dust, pegs and screws. “Well, there’s confirmation that my life has become utterly pointless” I said.

When the fridge (and feezer) arrived and was unwrapped in the kitchen our joy overflowed like unexercised flesh over skinny jeans. I’m not sure if the delivery men are always greeted with hugs and tear filled eyes. Normal diet here we come!!!!



(and maybe some ice-cream too)

Are You Basil Bailey?

Making money can be very difficult. Being dead should be a setback but it isn’t for everyone; take John Lennon, Elvis Presley and Eva Cassidy. Dear Eva has not only found a level of success post-mortem which evaded her previously but appears to have recorded many hours of new material since heading into the light.

This week a letter arrived for the former owner of this property/spiritual leader/raconteur/swinger; Basil Bailey. In the two years since we moved here a number of pieces of mail have arrived for Basil but we’ve marked them ‘Return to sender’ and put them in a post box. Some have even come addressed to ‘Basil Bailey Deceased’ as if he didn’t die but opted for a more sophisticated double barrelled name. A letter for Basil was accidentally opened today amongst post that was actually for us. It was from his mortgage providers and delivered to him ‘Important news about your closed mortgage’. The news was that ‘We have enclosed a cheque representing a goodwill payment....because our original mortgage offer may not have explained things as clearly as it could have’. The cheque is for £100.

So, only four years after he died he’s started making money again. This cheque represents a 400% improvement on his earnings for the last three tax years when being dead was proving to be a significant impediment to his earning power. Now, like Lennon and Presley, it’s proving to be a positive boon. Who knows what he might earn next year now that he’s into his stride?



The problem is that this cheque is of no use to us. Nor Basil, given his deadness. I have a number of options. Firstly, writing to the bank, as Basil, returning the cheque and declaring myself to be currently without a bank account and asking if they could return the £100 in cash. They may spot this deceit since the real Basil would want the sum in carpets, mirrors or cravats and smoking jackets. Alternatively, I could find someone who is both alive and called Basil Bailey. Then, I drive over to their property wherever they might be, hand them their cheque and ask them to exchange this for cash.




Are you Basil Bailey?

The Frog Prince (Phillip)

Sorry for not writing for a while. A Superinjunction taken out by Ryan Giggs has prevented me from doing so.

There have been a few developments house-wise. It was with the invaluable help of my parents on 13th April that the rest of our furniture was transported from the storage unit to our house. I was pleased to find that I still liked much of our furniture which is surprising given the length of time which has passed since I last saw it. However, I’m not sure that much of it suits the house and the items we’ve bought in recent years may not sit easily alongside some things we previously owned. It’s like appreciating the taste of both carrot cake and gravy but not necessarily liking them together. On the days that followed having everything we own in the same building several processes took place. One was arranging furniture in different rooms. There are some things which have spent some time in every room in the house as we try to make up our minds. The other process is this; Go into kitchen, find something which belongs in the bathroom, deliver that item to the bathroom and once in there find something which belongs in a bedroom, take it there and happen upon something which belongs in a bathroom. Take it there and.........I think you get the point. Chaos. I hate chaos.

On the 27th of April the gas hob and sink became operational. The oven was fitted a few days previously and so, for the first time since we bought the house (May 2009), we have the capability to conjure up any sort of hot food a stomach might require. We haven’t really gone wild with this though. We’ve been used to uncooked food for so long we’re a bit out of the habit. So, over the weekend of the Royal Wedding we were able to open boxes and put our crockery and utensils into the kitchen cupboards and drawers. One thing I do like about the kitchen cupboards and drawers is that they are self-closing. Try as you might to slam them shut they apply their own brakes and close themselves oh so gently. I think they should come with a sound effect of someone sighing “Aaaaggh” as they close. The opening of many boxes revealed that we have enough kitchen equipment to open some sort of catering business. Name something and we probably have one, name something you have one of and we probably have five of them. I’m not sure quite how this happened but I think it’s that we began packing to leave Hull in June 2008 and since then have clearly spent a lot of time in shops saying “Do we own one of those?”. “Don’t think so” and buying it, packing it and putting it in storage almost instantly and because we didn’t see it again forgot about it and so found ourselves in a shop saying “Do we own one of those?”. “Don’t think so”. I prefer to be more minimalist; in possessions, in speech. We are still without a fridge but we’re currently on a Pay-As-You-Go budget so each next step only goes ahead when we have the funds to do it. Consequently, the project is now moving as quickly as an obese corpse across a linoleum floor.

Also, on April 27th we gained a blind in the front bathroom. We can now use the room with the lights on without fear of indecently exposing ourselves to innocent pedestrians.



Even though everything we own is now in the house we remain surrounded by chaos. There is a particularly huge amount of clothing chaos since much of it remains in boxes and suitcases. We had planned for the carpenter to make wardrobes for the top floor but the Pay-As-You-Go system meant that we ended up buying some from the dreaded Ikea. Because we’re highly intelligent people we measured the space in the room and the wardrobes before buying them. We then constructed them on the top floor. Marianna then realised that we had quite correctly measured that the units themselves would fit in the room but because of the pitch of the roof we wouldn’t be able to open the doors once fitted. My response, as it is often is lately, was that we should sell the house (and then a lengthy period of ranting follows). I have come to view it, as I do many things in life, as a prison; I am trapped. My patience has now worn so thin it casts no shadow at all. The wardrobe was dismantled just a few days after we had mantled it and was remantled in the front bedroom. I’ve been experiencing House rage very regularly of late. I can lose my temper quicker than the members of Blue can lower their standards. Actually, House despair might be a more accurate description. This is just because of general stress and tiredness and that I have largely lost interest in the project. It seems to have comes as a shock to me that I’m not living next to a Scottish Loch or Canadian lake or in a camper van parked by a US highway. I feel that we’ve lost sight of the point of all of this. If the journey is the destination the focus has been so much on the journey we no longer know what or where the destination was. Weren’t we supposed to making a home and not a Showhome? I feel that every penny we’ve spent and now spend would be better spent putting me on a beach somewhere with a novel in my hands.



Martin, the intellectually challenged midget next door is often the focus of my annoyance. He knows as much about any subject as a bluebottle knows about escape routes. He is....The strongest argument for birth control there is. He is.... Like an insect repellent. He is.....not so much a joke as an eternal punchline. On occasions when I notice that Martin has spent six hours cutting his lawn his presence on the planet can infuriate me and I hate living here. We are missing a five foot long area of fencing on the side we share with him. It was removed during our building work but, apart from Marianna telling him he couldn’t affix it to our house during an argument, I’ve no idea why he’s left the gap there. I feel horribly exposed by it. A few weeks ago Marianna overheard him complaining about us and the missing panel to a friend. We are also without sections of fencing on the side we share with Becky but that is our responsibility and we’ll address that during the summer. Why Martin annoys me so much I don’t know since the architects and party wall specialists and builders told us we were in the right over the famous guttering issue and he was completely in the wrong. His failure to acknowledge this exasperates me. I don’t know why. The reality is that there is no reality, there is only perception. But his is erroneous. Here’s an example of my normal reasoning. When I was twenty two I was engaged in a discussion with someone about music and they mentioned that the Paul Simon song ‘The Obvious Child’ was on the ‘Graceland’ album. I said it was actually on ‘The Rhythm of The Saints’ album but he insisted that he was right and so I said no more. A few weeks later he sought me out at a social event to tell me I was right about which album the song was on. I told him that I was well aware of this and he was completely bemused that I hadn’t endeavoured to convince him. Because I KNEW I was right was the only answer I could give. I didn’t need to convince him because I KNEW I was right and he was wrong. Currently, I know we are in the right and Martin is in the wrong and yet I feel a need for him to acknowledge this. It’s exhausting and I feel a sense of unfairness about this. The game of life is the only unfair one, the one where you can play by the rules and lose. I’ve been intentionally driving through the traffic calmed roads on the local estate just to experience the human contact and love of the little wave people give when you can give them ‘Priority over Oncoming traffic’.



I have also found time to be annoyed by the neighbours on the other side. Not so much Becky as her boyfriend, Gary. He is a tosser. The problem is that over the past year or so they have separated and reconciled a dozen times and during one of these separations when invited by Becky to express an opinion I did just that and gave a full psychological formulation of why he’s tosser. And then they got back together again. I feel slightly awkward now about his almost constant presence next door. The excessive consumption of alcohol plays an important part in their relationship and, when drunk after midnight, they love singing along to their favourite songs. It’s like local commercial radio gone bad; Mariah Carey, Phil Collins, Lionel Bloody Richie and Bryan Adams. Not even Mrs Adams wants to be woken by Bryan at 3am.

Bunting For Sale

It seems that I have misread the mood of the public. I haven’t received a single RSVP to the 257 invites I sent out for my ‘Will and Kate’s Royal Wedding street party’. It wasn’t like this in 1981 or for the jubilee in ’77. Where’s the patriotism and sense of community spirit? I’ve hired two hundred trestle tables, Morris Dancers, a Boy George lookalike (was too slow off the mark to get a Prince William-a-like, although could have had the real Viscount Linley for less than Boy George), a Town Crier, face painters, paper plates and cups, 1800 metres of bunting and a massive tv screen to watch the ceremony on. The council said I needed 100 confirmed guests to close the road so I’ve fallen a few short there. 99 to be precise. I’m sitting on the pavement at my trestle table with a portable tv looking more desperate than a fat girl at the end of a disco and watching the coverage on the BBC which began about 8 weeks ago. I’m not alone though. Boy George is here. And Sami Khiyami who was a last minute booking. Come and join me. I have jelly.

My Kind of Town

We made a trip into The Fens on Sunday for a Bodger gathering. Here are the briefest of reflections on my hometown of Wisbech as I found it on 24th April 2011.



1.You know you’re entering Wisbech these days when you pass the Kiss Kiss Adult Superstore. They say first impressions are important.

2.We ate at Mendi’s. I haven’t been there since 1988. Neither has a decorator or chef to create a new menu.

3.We saw a rat in Tesco’s car park.

4.You know you’re leaving Wisbech when you see a young woman pushing a pram on the A47......not on the pavement but the actual carriage way.......in the dark.