Little by Little

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. 

Well, in my case this was very literally true. It all started when I purchased a new lawnmower. You know that you have truly arrived as a fully fledged adult man when you purchase your second lawnmower. Our first one was the cheapest model that I could find in the Argos catalog and I think had markedly less power than my wife's hair dryer. It was fine for the postage stamp sized area of lawn in our first house but the massive garden we now have caused it to choke and die within a matter of weeks. 

The new mower was more powerful and even had a throttle & variable cut height (I know!). As it turned out; this was the cause of my undoing. 

You see, I am a somewhat lazy & procrastinating person where garden maintenance is concerned. I know that many of you are keen horticulturalists who like nothing more than to be knee deep in Begonias but I really cannot be bothered with it all. On arriving at our current house, I pretty much pulled out any plant which required any degree of care and just went with 'plain lawn'. But it still requires cutting in the warmer months & so I came up with a brilliant strategy to prevent my needing to cut it too often. 

By adjusting the cut height to the lowest possible setting ( maybe 2cm), I could 'buzz cut' the whole lawn & it would then take weeks for it to grow back to the point that any further manicuring was required. Perfect! I congratulated myself for 'winning at life' & went back to more interesting pursuits. Secure in the knowledge that nothing could ever mess up the perfect system that I had created. 

And then it got hot. I mean, really really hot for weeks & weeks. The best summer that I can remember for a long time. Fantastic. & this was pre COVID so we could all go out & enjoy ourselves. There was only one minor drawback. My lawn was cut so short that the hard sunlight completely blasted anything green to death in a matter of weeks. No matter how I tried to water it, the suns relentless hammer pounded it dry. Rather than being a green & verdant carpet, my lawn began to resemble a barren and featureless wasteland broken up only by the occasional cat turd.

I could write a whole other blog concerning the enormous cat population in our neighborhood. In the event of terrible brexit meaning that foodstuffs cannot be delivered to supermarkets; I could probably feed my family for some weeks just by hunting the local feline population & they all seem to use our garden as their litter box of choice.

In any case, the shame of my 'Fallout 76' styled lawn prevented me from inviting visitors for barbecues that summer and to add insult to injury, my neighbors lawn was a verdant and lush paradise. This due to the fact that he had paid greenthumb to come and execute a campaign of chemical warfare against his weeds. The worms in my neighbors garden were hench and roided up and the local cats clearly felt afraid of them & were more comfortable crapping in my arid dust bowl of a garden.  About the only thing that was growing apart from weeds was brambles. Enormous, alien like tentacles were probing out from every brambly corner of the garden. The children's bikes had long ago been snared and assimilated into the  impenetrable 'borg' of the blackberry bushes as they pursued their remorseless agenda of total domination over the garden. 

I felt completely at a loss as to how to turn this situation around. I couldn't afford green thumb and I had neither the time nor the energy to spend days and days meticulously re turfing the lawn and hiring a vicious dog to guard the perimeter against cats. In the end, I was praying about it (having failed to have the faith required to command the desert to bring forth plants and bud...believe me I tried).

Holy Spirit encouraged me to stop being discouraged by what I was unable to do & to just do what little  I could. So I made a start. A pathetically small start. Pulling out two or three weeds a week and planting new grass seed in their place. The new seed would eventually sprout and grow, like patchy follicle replacement on a man having a midlife crisis. I also started to cut three tiny bits of bramble off of the borg every morning and sacrifice them in the flames of my burner. HA! 'I'm coming for you next bramble' I would say as I tore my pajamas & dressing gown free of it's thorny clutches.

The results were underwhelming. Particularly because; when I looked out at my neighbors garden it looked amazing. But over the weeks & months there was a gradual but perceptible improvement. The bramble borg eventually relinquished control of the children's' bikes and the local cats responded to my loudly hurled insults and placed my address firmly on their 'avoid' list. 

Finally the lawn began to come back to green life and I could tentatively begin to mow it once more. This time with the cut adjustment set as high as it would possibly go so as not to terrify the new grass too much. I trained my son to mow the lawn and (once he had severed the power cable by mowing over it a couple of times), he became quite proficient & was able to earn some money into the bargain.

It took a long time. A lot of very small steps but one day my wife was looking out of the window and commented that our garden now looks as good as my neighbors( & I haven't had to spend a lot of money for the privilege). 

Holy Spirit started to use this to speak to me about my life & my walk with him. 

Sometimes the idea of what God wants us to achieve or accomplish appears completely overwhelming. ''You want me to invade what impossible land?'', '' You want me to engage THOSE giants over there''? But God never intended us to do everything all at once. He even said to Israel that he would give the land to them a little at a time so that they did not get overwhelmed by wild animals in the process (Exodus 23:29). He gives is a few talents to invest (proportional to our faith) & lets us get on with it. Not expecting us to work a ten talent gift with five talent faith.

Sometimes our journey with God is not about those big decisions,those big 'alter call' moments or the blinding flash of light on the road that causes us to fall off our donkey and turn our life in a completely new direction. 

More often (& less excitingly), our walk with Jesus is about  lots & lots of very small decisions. Hundreds of  tiny 'yes's to Gods whispered question that no one apart from you and God really notice. If this carries on for long enough; this  lifestyle of saying yes over and over again becomes habit forming until the word 'no' drops out of our vocabulary altogether.  For small things anyway.

This is how you end up in deep water with Jesus. One tiny yes at a time consistently over years & years. You may not feel that you can go up the huge mountain but God never asks you to do that all at once. Eventually you will 'tiny yes' your way quite a long way up without even realizing it.

And when you look out over the landscape of your life, you will see that it has become lush and verdant. The cat poo has gone and the bramble borg has been cut back to fruitfulness.  

God works on the 'little by little' principle. 

So choose to give him your tiny 'yes' today in whatever he prompts you. If you can't think of anything then go back to the last thing He asked and do that. He's not going to give you  faith for tomorrow until you have used what's in your hand for today.

Plant seed, dig out the weeds, cut back the things that entangle you, water & feed the things that are good in your life. 

Oh, & don't set the variable height too low on your spiritual mower!

DADDY PIG: Arise and Save your Bacon!

Poor daddy pig, he goes out every day and works his trotters off to provide for his family. He is clearly highly intelligent & cares about those around him a great deal. And yet; when daddy pig returns to the warm bosom of his family they seem to  treat him with barely masked contempt and regularly refer to him as ‘silly daddy pig’. This is tantamount to emotional abuse in my book & I think that it is high time that Daddy pig manned up and ‘took charge’ of his household.

I think that we all know where the rot started in the pig household. Yes, I am of course talking about Peppa Pig, The most entitled and narcissistic little porker since the emperor Nero was a first turned up at ‘baby gladiators’ Roman toddler group. Peppa basically does whatever she wants all the time with no real consequences. In almost every episode she is told not to do things that she then almost immediately does.

Mummy Pig: you mustn’t touch the computer whilst I am working Peppa and George.

Peppa [touches computer, immediately crashing the programme that mummy pig is working on] Yes, don’t touch the computer like this George!

Mummy Pig: Oh Dear, Daddy pig.. come and help please!

This episode then has daddy pig fixing the computer and letting Peppa and George play on the  game that they wanted (rather than passing it back to poor mummy pig so that she could finish her quarterly sales projections or whatever it was she was working on). What on earth is going on here?

I thought when mummy pig called daddy in (from preparing lunch for everyone by the way…’silly daddy pig’), it was so that he could administer swift and merciless justice on the naughty piglets. But no. There must never be any consequences for Peppa pig. She will just dance through life, jumping in everyone’s muddy puddles and never having to do the laundry. Taking the piss out of her dad if he ever has difficulty navigating in the car or struggles with DIY eats too much.

So, daddy pig has a comfort eating problem. Well big woop Peppa! I am surprised that your awful behaviour has not driven him to rampant alcoholism or glue sniffing by now. This madness must end. I recommend a new episode called ‘Lets Talk about Peppa’ where daddy and mummy pig have a long talk about how they are going to manage Peppa’s out of control behaviour. Then the next episode will be entitled ‘Peppa Pig is sent away to Military boarding school until she learns the error of her ways’ or something like that.

Also the shows creators should introduce predation to the Peppa pig world. I suggest an episode titled ‘ Peppa pig loses a friend’. One day Rebecca Rabbit does not turn up for the class field trip and it turns out that she has been killed and eaten by Danny dog.

Madame Gazelle: What’s all zat muck around your mouth Danny? You really should make sure you are nice and clean before coming into ze class you know.

Danny Dog: Sorry Madame Gazelle, it’s Rebecca Rabbit, I was a bit hungry this morning after playtime so I scoffed her down. I’ve still got a bit of her leg in my school bag if you want me to share it with the class?

Madame Gazelle: Oh Mon Dieu! This is orrible, ow could you do such a thing Danny!?

Danny Dog: ‘Circle of life’ miss. [belches loudly]

 

POSTMAN PAT: Creating unrealistic expectations of the workplace

Hi Pat, welcome to your annual appraisal interview. Do come in and have a seat. Now, I’m sure that it will come as no surprise to you that the post office is seriously concerned about your conduct. Come come Pat, don’t look so shocked. Please sit back down. Don’t worry we can clear up that smashed cup of tea in a moment.
Now, let’s have a look at some of your behaviour over the past year shall we. First of all, there’s the matter of your cat Jess. …Yes she is delightful. What’s that you say, Jess is actually a boy? Hmmm, well I apologise for the misunderstanding. But you have to admit that she…I mean..he does sound like a lady cat. And with a name like Jess…well, there was a lot of room for misunderstanding.
But yes, adorable as Jess is; you really cannot be bringing your pet cat into work with you every day. No it’s not essential to your duties for you to have a cat Pat. This is not the nineteen thirties. Rats and mice are not running rampant amongst the mail room parcels, necessitating the role of the ‘post office cat’ to control the local vermin. Or are you claiming that Jess is some manner of disability companion animal?
No?...are you sure Pat. We were wondering whether Jess might be your ‘thinking brain cat’ after looking at some of your recent deliveries.
What do I mean by that? Well, lets take the delivery to Alf last week just as an example. Alf was building a rocket for some sort of race around Greendale and you delivered some of the parts that he would require. No problems there. But then you proceeded to chat with Alf for almost an hour. This would have been bad enough but then; whilst his attention was elsewhere, you entered the rocket, became locked inside and ended up flying it around Greendale for most of the afternoon. Pat, this is not what you are employed by the post office to do. You are a parcel delivery operative. No, it doesn’t matter that you won the race. It was a complete waste of post office time and resources, not to mention the fact that you aren’t insured to pilot such a contraption. What if there had been an accident?
Which brings me to our next concern. What do you think the running costs of an average rural postal service are Pat? Not sure? Well allow me to help you out. They are certainly not in the ‘hundreds of millions of pounds’ bracket. A first class stamp still retails for under a pound and one can send a parcel across the country for less than the cost of a packet of fags. How therefore do you possibly imagine we could countenance the use of your own ‘post office helicopter’ to deliver occasional items of mail?
What do you mean ‘special delivery service’. It certainly is special Pat. It breaks every known rule of consumer economics. You cannot use a helicopter costing thousands of pounds an hour to deliver a parcel that we were paid under twenty pounds to deliver. What do you mean ‘HS2 would do it’? Your department of the post office on its own is responsible for 43 percent of the total UK spend Pat. At the last count you were running two ‘bright red’ vans, a motorcycle with sidecar, a helicopter and a further ‘bigger van’ for special delivery jobs. It wouldn’t be so bad but you take three or four times as long as any other known postman to deliver even simple letters. What do you mean Mrs Goggins lost them one time? Mrs Goggins is about 1000 years old man! You are constantly opening other people’s parcels, or loosing them in fields or walking off of your postal route in order to support local school plays or to help out the local ‘one man’ police service!
I’m afraid that you no longer fit with the modern twenty first century postal service and we will have to let you go. What do you mean ‘the people of Greendale won’t stand for this’? Don’t you realise that we are trying to compete with Amazon and Ebay Pat. There is no room in the lean future for a postman who’se idea of a great summer party is to drop five hundred and thirty eight cubic tonnes of sand in the city centre and proclaim that it is a beach party without the beach. Also you are spending far too much post office time helping out with your friend’s railway project.
Enough is enough. Go and join Fireman Sam at the Employment Office and hand in your keys to the chopper on the way out. We are going to sell it to fund a post office staff party celebrating your departure.

Bing Bunny: The Reason Britain Has Lost It's Way

For any of you who are not held hostage by your children and forced to become over familiar with children’s television; the gruesome twosome pictured above are Bing Bunny and his carer Flop.

I say carer. To be honest, the exact nature of Flops relationship to the dark rabbit is a little uncertain. Is he Bings father? his childminder? some sort of teacher? A beanbag that Bing has imagined as having a gentle voice and happy personality ?

 

Actually the last suggestion might make perfect sense given the observable fact that Flop is (not to put too fine a point on it), one of the most ineffective and useless parents ever to have been given custody of a child.

The little terrorist Bing is pretty much allowed to get away with any bad behaviour with no comeuppance at all. This despite having always been warned by Flop that it is an inadvisable course of action.

 

On any given episode the formula is generally the same. Bing and flop are happily doing something. Bing proposes an utterly stupid or reckless course of action. Flop gently cautions Bing against this madness. Bing then does it anyway and then comes to flop in tears when something bad happens as a result. Flop then gently comforts Bing and makes it all better.

I am going to write to Cbeebies (or whoever the stupid company is) with the following (in my opinion much better) script for an episode.

 

[camera in…establishing shot…the zoo exterior daytime]

Narration: ‘it’s Saturday afternoon and Bing & Flop are visiting the zoo’

Flop: ‘Look Bing, the wolves enclosure’

Bing: ‘Oh wow Flop, wolves are so furry, look…that one is having a wee’

Flop: ‘[chuckles] yes, so he is. Do you need a wee Bing’

Bing: ‘No. I want to go & pet the wolves flop, please can I?’

Flop: ‘No Bing, wolves can be quite dangerous you know. They aren’t like dogs’

[we see Flop being distracted for a moment as he helps a passing old lady to pick up her dropped bag. Bing uses this distraction to clamber over the barrier and into the wolf enclosure]

 

Flop: ‘Oh Bing no….Come back!’

[Bing ignores Flop, he runs recklessly after one of the wolves in an attempt to stroke it. The wolf turns around and bites Bing’s hand]

Bing: [Bursting Into tears as he rushes back to Flop] ‘Oh Flop…Flop, the wolf was nasty and it bit me on the hand…look, there’s blood coming out Flop’

Flop: [giving Bing a smack around the ears] ‘I told you not to go in there you stupid bastard. You could very well have been killed. Let’s hope you haven’t contracted rabies from that bite. Now stop blubbing and let me have a look’

[the rest of the episode concerns Flop taking Bing to the emergency room whilst lecturing him on the importance of respecting and obeying your betters].

 

If Bing is not stopped, his sense of narcissistic entitlement will doom any future lady bunnies to a miserable relationship with him.

 I imagine him in his thirties, frittering away payday loans on yet more online casino spins from a dirty two seater sofa surrounded by empty plastic microwavable curry packaging. His signature adorable dungarees are shabby and stained . Straining in a vain attempt to cover the massive expanse of his beer belly. The stench of skunk lies heavy across the fetid bedsit.

 

Bing: [on phone] ‘Hi is that Flop? Hi buddy …. Sorry to be a pain but could you lend me some more money mate?’

Viking Funeral For My Pants

As has previously been discussed here; I find it hard to let go of things. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the area of my wardrobe. Some of the clothing items there have been with me for over a decade. This is not because of any environmentally conscious mind-set  on my part. But rather due to the fact that, at some unconscious level, I expect  all of my clothing to last forever and cannot really appreciate that some vestments need to be consigned to the dustbin. I often refer to certain shirts as ‘my new shirt’ despite the fact that I actually purchased it three of four years hence.

As a psychotically organised individual; I have a strict method to clothing storage. Trousers on one side, then shirts then warm clothing. As I am the only one in the household who every puts laundry away, this system has been rigidly observed for some years. I have two rails of clothing (one atop the other). The top rail for smart work wear and the bottom for the shambolic crap that I dress in at home.

When a new item of clothing arrives it heralds the  beginning of an arduous, decade long process of being digested by the Salak of my wardrobe system. For two or three years it will remain  on the ‘best work wear’ rack. But then the inevitable happens and I must sadly admit that it is looking frayed and old. At which point it is demoted to the lower ‘casual wear’ rack.

From this point on it is a slow decline for another four years or so until it has too many holes or stains in to be safe to wear outside the house.  The last three years are a shameful time for it as I refuse to throw it out but wear it when relaxing at home . Then finally I have to get rid of it.

My last pair of jeans reached this Nadir a few months back and I just couldn’t bring myself to chuck them out. They had holes in which I had repeatedly repaired but even I had to admit that jeans with a massive rip across the groinal area were a fashion ‘faux pa’s even for me. It had gotten to the point that I couldn’t sit across from anyone without the risk of seriously indecent exposure.

In the end I have landed upon the perfect solution. Like the Vikings of old, I now send the ‘honoured dead’ to their fabric afterlife upon a flame filled chariot (which is to say that I chuck my old clothing in the stolid fuel burner in the winter mornings in order to keep warm).

Watching  as my clothing gradually surrenders to the fierce glory of the flames  feels epic and allows me some form of primal closure. I feel as if I am some ancient warrior  shooting a fiery shaft  into a longboat  and standing in solemn silence to watch it burn  as it drifts away.

‘ A pair of great trousers comes to meet their fellows in Valhalla this day. Trousers that have rode out many storms in this life. Though vicious stains were visited upon them and farts beyond number ravaged the brave fabric of their gusset they stood true. But now they come home. To the great Levi 501’s store of the skies. There they will be born aloft on the legs of worthy hero’s and never again kicked under my bed and forgotten about for weeks on end’

And then I set a match to them and watch them burn. But only after cutting off some of the material to make Barbie doll dresses for my daughter. I mean for goodness sakes, I have to have SOMETHING to remember them by!

 

New and better blogsite coming later this year!

Belly Ache

Well it has come to that time of year where one has to spend several minutes upon arrival anywhere, divesting oneself of gloves, coats scarves and hats only to have the whole process repeated in reverse before exiting the building again.

Working as I do across quite a number of different sites I find myself having to repeat this little performance multiple times a day in front of various staff teams.

Many of our NHS offices are massively in need of modern heating and the ancient boilers and pipes that we are stuck with heat the offices  up to near blast furnace levels of warmth. This necessitates my having to also remove my jumper more often than not which leads me to a quandary .

Very often my shirt will ‘ride up’ as I remove said jumper, revealing a few inches of pale untoned midriff to all and sundry. I am afterwards forced to swiftly tuck my shirt back into my trousers in what I mentally refer to as ‘the Gasson manoeuvre’.  Sometimes it is possible to untuck the shirt and sit hard upon it prior to removal of the jumper but this is still very uncomfortable.

Now I am quite embarrassed about showing my tummy to work colleagues & so I have taken to a new practice of always changing out of my jumper in the gentleman’s toilet where I can take the precaution of locking the door before I wrestle myself away from the clutches of my jumper. This also affords me the opportunity to quickly check (what remains of) my hair to ensure that the static generated by the removal of the garment has not caused the hair to balloon out like some crazy Einstein.

Although the toilet visit does minimise the embarrassment from crazy hair and belly flashing, it brings with it another problem which is that I become paranoid that people will wonder why I am going to the bathroom and returning with no jumper on. Do people understand my concerns or do that draw the conclusion that I am locking myself in there in order to experiment with different clothing choices like some kind of cut price Mr Benn. Do they visualise me parading up and down in front of the washbasin mirror in different variations of dress and undress. Trousers on my head, shirt fully unbuttoned or whatever outlandish style takes my fancy.

Probably not, but it does mean that I usually try and time my divestment toilet visits to coincide with my frequency of urination in order to allay suspicion.

Roll on the spring.

Frying Pan Funeral

I need to procure a new frying pan. The non stick has finally given up the ghost on our most current one and now begin weeks of sniffing around the kitchenware sections of various shops in an attempt to find a new one which promises to neither stick nor warp with use.


So many years, so many broken promises. I always start the relationship with a new Frying pan in the giddy excitement of a new romance. After many days or weeks of searching I have finally discovered a pan which promises to last for ages & which will not warp or prove unworthy of my commitment.
I marvel at how awesome the non stick is as I return to cooking all the meals that I hitherto was forced to avoid in the old pan.


But then, over the weeks and months that follow, my affection slowly cools and the excitement of a new relationship is replaced by the mundane grind of normal life. The pan; rather than being the focus of exciting new recipes, becomes taken for granted and has to churn out endless omelettes, fry-ups and scotch pancakes.


After the twelve to eighteen month mark I start to notice visible signs of aging and deterioration which I immediately go into denial about. 'no no, it's a great pan. I took ages choosing it. It will surely go on and on'. But in my heart of hearts I know that this is the beginning of the end and I am already starting to cast furtive glances at other frying pans when we are out in town. Embarrassingly having to slam my laptop shut when my wife comes into the room for fear that she will see my internet history and realise that I have once again been looking at pictures of younger frying pans.


Eventually the pan is incapable of managing even the most rudimentary meals shredding & destroying rashers of bacon entrusted to it's care. After the second or third meal is transformed into a shoddy, shapeless mess; I come to my senses and declare that the relationship isn't working and that I need to start looking around for another frying pan that can meet my needs. And the adventure begins again.


This would all be well and good were it not for the fact that I appear to have great difficulty in actually throwing the old frying pans away. Perhaps it is due to all of the emotional investment that I have put into finding it. Or to the memory of all those great meals that it faithfully produced over the years. But when push comes to shove, and I am left holding it over the dark open depths of the wheelie bin; I find that (like Frodo Baggins) I just cannot bring myself to let go.


So it goes into the shed with my other dead frying pans and I tell myself that I will be able to find some use for it in the future (perhaps on a camping trip where I will be cooking over an open fire or as part of  a hastily constructed suit of armour in the event of zombie apocalypse).
This cycle has been repeating every 12 to 20 months so that I now have a not inconsiderable, stack of frying pans. All of which I feel some level of emotional attachment to. This must be how hoarders feel about all of their crap. Perhaps this is how it starts? Too much of an emotional relationship with cold unfeeling objects. Just not feeling able to let go. I have previously written of my tendency to hang onto dreadlocks, teeth and even beard clippings. This is a personality bent that I need to stamp out hard before I become a full time hoarder of bent screws or something!


On the other hand, I do quite like my pile of frying pans. My wife discovered it the other day (on an unauthorised trip into my shed. How dare she!). She demanded that I throw some away which I duely did. She does not have any difficulty in parting with old crap. There is clearly no emotional component there for her, whether it is getting rid of an old and faithful car or a previously loved sweater, she turns her back and moves on without ever giving it a second thought.


What I would really like to do if I am honest, is to continue to collect frying pans (I have given up on ever finding one that lives up to it's claims of a lifetime of stick free cooking). I would like to collect a big pile of them which could then be disseminated to the mourners at my funeral.
'Hello sir. Attending the Gasson ceremony today are we? Please take this Sainsbury's finest range 20 inch deep pan non warp model. Hello madam. You too? Please take this Tefal 18 inch red spot non stick deluxe'.
 Then people could throw them onto my coffin whilst they bid me farewell at the graveside. It would be a bit like the ancient pharaohs who got buried with all of their old crap. Maybe pyramids were just the afterlife equivalent of 'the big yellow storage box company' when all is said and done. Imagine the clatter and clang at the grave side as the accumulated lifetimes worth of frying pans are reverentially chucked on top of the coffin together before being covered in earth. Or maybe I could get them all melted together 'game of thrones' style into a custom made, non stick coffin. A Teflon coated Bier in which to travel to the afterlife.


In any case, the hunt is on for an exciting new frying pan and there is a place in my kitchenware mausoleum for the current incumbent. Hopefully my wife will stay out of the shed in from now on following my dire warnings about using the 'wrong sort of paint'.