Everything Log Stardate 64015.9

So… Let’s try again.

This is the post I meant to write before I got bogged down in the meaninglessness of existence. And just so that I can immediately get over the paralysing effect of having two weeks worth of stuff to catch up on, here is a quick list of things that have happened since my last (proper) post on 5 July:

Simon has got himself a mini-digger.
Simon has been up to London to visit the Queen. (Well actually to visit his pregnant daughter, but no one has written a nursery rhyme about that).
Simon has done digging.
Simon has done filling-back-in.
All drainage systems are go.
Simon’s back hurts.
Big Cat has gone.
The Bold Three are back (without Little Black).
Lonely Chicken has stopped being broody.
Lonely Chicken is moulting. Again.
It hasn’t hardly rained at all.
Max hasn’t died.
Oh, and did I mention… Simon has got himself a mini-digger.

It’s a funny thing. Now that I look at it, not as much has happened as I thought.

I guess the digging and related activities have taken quite a chunk of time. All those jobs that are prefaced with “I’m just going to….”, and are supposed to only take an hour or so, invariably end up filling most of the day. But the activities are so engaging, and the desire to get to the marvellous end-result so powerful, that, despite all rational intent to the contrary, we all too often find that we have somehow worked our sweaty and melanoma-inducing way through the hottest part of the day, and the shadows have grown long on the fruits of our labours.

Despite Simon’s recent assertion that he would blog no more, the degree of proud satisfaction he has accumulated as a result of his digger-related endeavours over the last week may, I think, prompt him to expound publicly on his new toy and the pleasures thereof, with accompanying pictures. Methinks he likes his digger very much. And oh, the plans he has for it! The bridges that will be built! The ponds that will be created! The endless diesel-powered joys of holing and piling and terracing and trenching that lie ahead! The earth will move indeed, and the world will be a better place, and everybody will be happy. Because SIMON HAS A DIGGER.

Meanwhile, back in the world of Nothing At All To Do With Digging, Life goes hotly and dryly on. Potatoes proliferate and courgettes escalate. Beans run and squash squashes. The cherry tree buzzes with guzzling bugs, and broom pods pop in the hedgerows. Armies of dragonflies helicopter in the green longness at the edges of the barely-a-stream, and guerilla frogs jump ship at the approach of cutting machinery.

Summer is here and the living isn’t particularly easy. There is too little water and too much heat. And, as Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said,

Do what we can, summer will have its flies.


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3 Responses to Everything Log Stardate 64015.9

  1. Linda says:

    Welcome to the world of digger widows! Ian has decided that he now needs a dumper truck. Everything is prefaced with “Well, if we have a dumper truck…” but don’t tell Simon or he will want one as well! Ian’s back also hurts a lot after he has been sitting in the digger. I say “how can you have bad back when you have been sitting still in a digger all day” and he says “You’ve no idea what it is like! It takes a lot of concentration”!

    • Val says:

      It does indeed take a lot of concentration. I had a little play when we first got it, and although it is undoubtedly an Entertaining Thing To Do, my concentration span is famously small, and 15 minutes was enough-for-one-year for me, thank you very much.

      Simon’s bad back may have been exacerbated by the tension of the concentration, but it was brought on (as I predicted, I might smart-arsingly add) by his insistence on loading 20 x 40kg bags of gravel into the trailer single-handedly during the 7 minutes remaining before Bricodépôt closed for lunch.

    • Simon says:

      Instead of a dumper truck, he should get a compact tractor – and add a tipping back box. Then he could also have various mowing attachments. And so on. Much better than getting a dumper and a ride-on lawn mower . . . . so much more versatile and so much scope for getting extra bits!

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