Feet of Clay

It's a good thing I'm not a war correspondent - the hostilities would be well and truly over before I'd filed the first report.
The trouble with writing to deadlines for 25 years is that when it stops, so do you (at least, I did).
For those who are still around besides my Mum and Boothy and Halfpint this is what's been happening for the past couple of months: house stuff.
To be honest, it's been bliss. It's almost two years since we bought this house and for some reason - the moon being in the seventh house, Jupiter aligning with Mars or whatever - shit, as they say, has finally started to happen.
It started with Garry Butler, the landscaping Eric Close look-alike, who along with Luke the Magic Concreter got the paths sorted out and turned the top garden from a miniature version of the Somme into somewhere you actually wanted to be.
We've got two types of clay in this garden: clay that looks like little turds when you dig into it (brown clay) and clay that looks and SMELLS like little turds when you dig into it (yellow clay).
The gumboots were useless in the face of it, mainly because I couldn't find a pair small enough to fit my feet and every time I took a step the boot would get stuck and my whole leg would pop out.
Crocs and socks were much better so I've spent much of Spring wandering around the garden looking like a menopausal Minnie Mouse with filthy shoes.

Anyway, to give you an idea of all the work involved, here's a pic of me in the top garden when we first looked at the house in September 2007:

Here's one when we had the ground terraced in July 2008 (that's my husband taking a picture of me taking a picture of him). The entire fence fell over in a storm shortly afterwards - what a barrel of laughs that was.

And here's what it looks like now. All that's left to do is put a grey wash on the pine terracing and add some more plants.

Since we last spoke, I also got a new clothesline. This was a really big deal because I'd been without one for 9 months. I celebrated with a new pinny - not tailor-made but it could've been.

We've also got stuck into the "lower 40": Removed some crappy old colorbond fencing and this concrete block wall (that stylish orange stuff is to keep the dog in - only 20 bucks a roll at Bunnings)...

...and built a picket fence to match the existing one up the top.

OK, that's a pic of the pickets being delivered. The fence was actually finished yesterday but still needs to be painted, which I can't do until next week, and I'm waiting until then to take another photo.
The bloke to the left of the pic is Saint Laurie, builder and carpenter extraordinaire, if I could bottle him I'd make a fortune. He's brilliant.
We've also had a driveway removed (we had three) so that the three lower levels of the block will be linked by gardens (one of them for veggies - yay!).
Unsurprisingly, we're knackered and a lot poorer, but over the moon about what has been achieved in just a couple of months.

Up the garden path (2)

Back in May we asked a bloke to come over and quote a price for laying the garden paths around the house.
This man, who I'll call Mr Can-Do, was very friendly. All over us like a rash, truth be told. Nothing was too much trouble, he could do everything from go to whoa.
The price he quoted for the job was amazing, almost too good to be true. We accepted straight away and, yes, he could start some time in June and, yes, he'd put the quote in writing and leave it in our mailbox the next time he drove past.
He never did give us that written quotation, even though we asked him twice, but this didn't bother us too much because, for some reason, a lot of tradesmen down here won't.
Besides, Mr Can-Do was a nice bloke, wasn't he? Friendly. Trustworthy.
As it turned out, Mr Can-Do didn't start in June. We were also having the house rendered and he agreed with our renderer that it would be better to lay the paths after the rendering was finished. Just ring when you're ready for me to start, he said. What a guy.
So, once the rendering was done - brilliantly, I might add, by a lovely bloke called David Cook - I rang Mr Can-Do and left a message on his phone.
When he didn't ring back after a few days, my husband called again.
And what my husband got this time was a very different bloke. A bloke who was rude and surly and whose conversation consisted of words like "nah" and "dunno" and "maybe".
Now, we're not idiots. After that phone conversation, even Blind Freddy could see that Mr Can-Do had lots of other work and didn't want to lay our garden paths any more. But we decided not to worry about it until after the weekend because, well, sometimes you just get sick of this shit and need to stick your head in the sand for a while.
Then, lo and behold, on Saturday, in the middle of the footy, there was a knock on the door and there he was, in the flesh. He thought he'd better have a look round, he said, before he started the job.
He was friendly again, talking in words of more than two syllables but, unfortunately, he'd morphed into Mr Can't-Do.
There was a lot more work than he'd originally thought when he gave the quote, he said. Before he could start we'd have to do all sorts of things: dig up and redistribute the clay and have compacting sand delivered and put it on the paths and compact it and remove a section of fence and dig up heaps of plants so the barrow could get through because he wasn't having his blokes pushing barrows uphill.
Now, my husband works five days a week, so on Monday he rang Mr Can't-Do and asked if we could pay extra to have some of his labourers do this unforeseen prep work.
"Nah, can't help ya, too busy."
Did he know of anyone else we could pay, then?
"Nah."
It was like dealing with Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Then, lo and behold, we got a call Monday afternoon saying his two labourers would be coming over the next morning - as in, yesterday morning.
So I arranged for the sand to be dumped in the driveway by 9am and dug up the plants and put them in pots and got money out of the bank to pay these two blokes direct.
My husband got up at six yesterday morning to finish things off and the two labourers turned up at quarter past eight.
My husband showed them what we wanted done, then headed off to work, and the two labourers drove off to pick up their tools.
And they never came back.
I waited and waited and waited. The sand was delivered. I waited some more.
In the end, because I had to go out, I rang Mr Can't-Do at 10am to see what was going on. This was the conversation.
Me: Hi, it's Michele. Your two blokes left to pick up their tools at 8.30 and haven't come back. I have to go out and I was wondering what was happening.
Him: Dunno.
Me: Do you know if they picked up their stuff.
Him: Yeah, they got it.
Me: Well, they haven't come back here. Do you have a mobile number for them?
Him: Yeah, hang on. (Pause 10 seconds). Look, I'll have to ring you back.
Me: OK. My number's...
Him (interrupting): Listen, I'm on the road. I don't need this. I'm too busy for this.
Me: Yeah, well, we're all busy. It's not just you.
Him (shouting): Don't you get uppity with me.
Me: I'm not, I'm upset they haven't come back. You'd be upset too if you were treated like this.
Him (shouting louder): Shut up. Just shut up and listen.
Me (shouting back): What? Don't you...
Him (screaming over the top of me): I don't have to put up with this. You can shove the job. I don't need your money.
And then he hung up.
When my husband found out, he phoned this prick and said things to him that could never be printed here.
And that's what Mr Can't-Do wanted all along because now he'll be able to tell whoever's interested what nasty, difficult people we are. He'll be able to justify not doing the job for us.
But only to himself. Everyone I've told about this (everyone I can think of, basically) thinks he's an arsehole who didn't have the balls to say, "Look, I agreed to do this job when I had no other work but now I've got lots and I'm pulling out."
Which is why this post is headed "Up the garden path (2)". If you look at the post below you might see some similarities.
Footnote: we now know that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And if you've got this far, congratulations and a big thank you for bearing with me. I really needed to get it off my chest.

Things I won't hear in my lifetime

"Hi, this is your dedicated garden path person.
"I just wanted to let you know that the price I quoted for the job is firm and inclusive of absolutely everything to do with garden paths.
"There'll be no nasty surprises.
"Yes, honestly. Absolutely. Swear on a road accident. No need to worry about a thing.
"Have a lovely day."

Muffy the Wonder Dog

Pic: Craig Barrow

If it's as cold in your neck of the woods as it is in mine, you can at least warm the cockles of your heart by checking out the story of Muffy the dog.
My son sent me the link yesterday and it's a ripper. You'll find it here.
Sorry I haven't been around much lately but the weather's been brilliant, if freezing, and I've been outside every day digging, weeding, planting and painting (walls not pictures, unfortunately).
While I was down the bottom of the garden planting quince trees yesterday, I spotted what I thought was a really big pelican out of the corner of my eye.
Turned out it was a lunatic (and I say that with the greatest admiration) paraglider doing aerial "wheelies" over Mt Clarence, so I raced inside and grabbed my camera.

To put this pic (and his/her altitude) in perspective, here's another one taken without the zoom. The paraglider is the tiny little dot you can see to the right of the crest of the hill if you've got really good eyesight and a better camera than mine (as in, now I've made the pic smaller I can't see a bloody thing but if you click on it you'll get a bigger and better image).

Today I have to finish up some painting but I'll be back next week with bells on.
See you then.

Sale of the Century

Well, not quite but a Booktopia book sale is always good and the one they've got on at the moment (their end of financial year sale) is a ripper.
You'll have to wade through 41 pages to check out all the specials but it's worth it if you want to get your hands on things like Peter Robinson's Inspector Banks novels for around $5.
There's all sorts up for grabs but I know from past experience that you have to be quick - they sell out fairly quickly.
Postage is $6.50 for up to 100 books, their service is great and the books are usually delivered within a week (they're based in Sydney).
And I know I sound like a walking advert so I should probably point out that I have no connection with Booktopia other than being a customer.
We're a family of mega readers - we have books coming out of our earholes - and I've been meaning to blog about good internet bookshops for ages.
A really fabulous one is Book Depository, which is based in the UK and not only has a list and prices that rival Amazon but also has free delivery worldwide.
Again, the books are usually on your doorstep within a week and the service is excellent.
You can get bucketloads of hardback titles at Book Depository for about half the price you pay in Australia (it will vary according to the exchange rate) and you don't have to worry about the weight because the postage is free.
I managed to get Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes for about $30; it was selling for more than $60 in bookshops here (they have a massive range of cookbooks as well as house and garden, craft, photography, art - you name it).
There are links to both websites just to the right of this post (under Places I Like To Visit).
If you're a booklover, believe me, you'll be like a pig in the proverbial.

Rust as a lifestyle statement

One of these days I'm going to learn how to scan magazine pages but until then you'll have to bear with me and put up with the dodgy photos.
This pic (along with the other pictures in this post) is from the May-June edition of Inside Out magazine. It's one of dozens of house/garden-type mags I've bought in the last 16 months, because when you're faced with an overwhelming house reno it's far easier to sit down with a drink and a glossy magazine rather than actually do any renovating.
As a result of all this magazine browsing I'm now quite well-versed in the art of design wank. And if you ask me, this pic is right up there with the best.
As in, it's fine if you don't mind grass seeds burrowing into the crotch of your undies while you sip your lemon barley water and nibble on a chunk of baguette (which I sincerely hope is made from organic, hand-milled flour or I want the cover price back).
And it's definitely not a problem if you don't mind being at one with the less cuddly of nature's offerings (snakes, bull ants, centipedes, ticks, feral pigs, escaped serial killers etc).
But otherwise it's bullshit, isn't it? I mean, when was the last time you said, "Darl, how about we have a picnic in the middle of a field of really long grass? Go on, dare ya!"
Worse: Those rusty old French cafe chairs, which are a fiver a pop in their homeland, cost $160 each. The folding metal table is $1000. The skinny little cushions tied to the top of the chairs are $40 (yes, each).
Now for pic number 2, which provided a much-needed laugh-out-loud moment after a morning of digging holes with a pick axe:

It may look like a giant toilet-brush holder but it's actually a bathroom sink. It doesn't say in the ad if council-approved sink fencing is required, but considering the way little kids like to stick their heads in things, it's probably a good idea.
In the meantime you could always use it for your home brew or to bathe your pet rabbits.

Finally there's this picture, which is attached to a story about Patti Southern (the lady wearing the table cloth), who owns a retro furniture store in Sydney (as in, it's all original vintage stuff).
I know I've said it before but what is it with this retro thing? Why does only the really ugly stuff seem to survive?
I lived through the 60s and 70s and I know for a fact that if anyone had bought my Mum that hideous red and blue lamp, she would have beaten them to pulp with it.
Or dumped it in a field of really long grass. Now there's a thought.

How the President will harvest his home-grown spinach

OK, maybe not. You'll find out what it's really all about here.

Whatever happened to used tyres...

...as stand-alone garden features? Why don't we see them around much any more, especially in these difficult economic times when we all should be getting back to basics and being extra mindful of the benefits of re-using and recycling?
We walk past this particular tyre every morning, my husband, the dog and I. It's one of three, all in a row, but it's by far the most picturesque because it's the only one that's actually got a plant in it.
Just up the road from this tyre, on the seafront, is something else we walk past every morning: Albany's bete noir, the huge, empty Esplanade Hotel site. It's empty because the Esplanade was demolished in 2007 to make way for a new multi-million-dollar luxury hotel, which has since been put on hold indefinitely.
So, what we've got on the beachfront at the moment is an enormous, multi-million-dollar sandpit surrounded by a high, wire fence and known among local cats as the best en-suite dunny in town, you can see their little paw prints all over the joint ("Hey, Fluffy, let's pee in the north-east corner today! Cooool.")
Apparently the town council doesn't have the power to force the hotel developers to get on with construction, something I'd always put down to the councillors' average age being 97 and three-quarters and all of them maybe too knackered to raise the necessary very big fuss. But I was wrong.
And it's a worry, because it's estimated the town is losing about $10 million in tourism spending for every year that the site stands empty.
My husband has an interesting solution to this. Being a Desert Storm kinda guy, he thinks councillors should storm the chicken wire, exert squatters' rights and build a casino. As in, they could get the tourist dollars flowing again simply by becoming the Apaches of the Great Southern.
Failing that, maybe they could do something creative with used tyres, something I should imagine certain other persons of power, albeit in a faraway land, are mulling over as I write.
I say this because I heard on the news that Barack and Michelle Obama are getting back to basics and planting a vegetable garden at the White House.
Which means that Americans will not only have their First Lady, First Children and First Dog, they'll also soon be blessed with their First Carrot.
And presumably, if the Obamas are ridgy-didge about setting a recycling, recession-busting, grow-your-own example, they'll also see the First of many Used Tyres.
As edging, maybe. Or encircling the spinach and collard greens.
It could change the face of garden design as we know it. And I, for one, will be watching developments with bated breath.