| Subject: Keep it Simple, Stupid... |
Author:
Willie
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Date Posted: 04:47:19 09/13/03 Sat
It's not that I mind the work of painting and redecorating the room that the lodger has moved out of, it's the hassle of "improvements" my father wants to make that gives me the pip.
When he and his friend, Peter, get together, all sorts of crazy ideas start to develop. It's usually Peter who puts them into his head. He's like that brat on the road lately who gets the smaller kids to knock on doors or break plants and then hangs them for it to the irate neighbours.
We learned from the experience of having Kathleen sharing our space that any new lodger should have their own fridge. It wasn't that she kept anything particularly odd in ours (though being a vegetarian is odd enough in our house, where the residents are particularly carniverous), it was just that having to store stuff on two fridge shelves when we really needed all three was awkward.
So Tom arrived with a new fridge (slightly shop-damaged, but otherwise grand) and it's sitting in that great storage area for all things new and probably unnecessary -- the middle of the living room -- waiting for me to finish up the painting in the vacated space upstairs.
He figured the new lodger should have their own kettle as well. I asked him if he expected them to walk downstairs to the kitchen to fill this kettle and bring it back upstairs to boil it. Or would they be filling it from the bathroom taps? (Not drinking water, and not very hygienic anyway).
So Tom went off with Peter and what Peter says is what he generally brings home to plague me.
"Peter says..." I'm already gritting my teeth at this intro... "Peter says we could plumb a washbasin into THAT corner and run the waste pipes into the gutter."
"Did he now?" I say from the level of the skirting board. I KNOW I'm going to drip paint on the carpet any time now. How do you argue with logic that thinks foul water running down the tiles of the FRONT of the house into the OPEN gutter won't be messy, smelly, and... make a list....?
"What do you think?"
I brush out a few more strokes, thinking of an answer that won't cater to his wish to start a fight.
"I think I want to concentrate on this a bit and maybe we'll talk about it later."
So I get off the hook on that one. Eventually the sinks and pedestals in the brochure that Peter probably gave him turn out to be too expensive when the maths are done.
So he has to do something with the fridge.
"It's very low," he says. "I have a square table in the garage... We could put it standing on that."
My teeth are feeling the strain.
The table is someone's junked coffee table acquired in the usual "Oh Tom will take it" manner that has this place the nightmare it is for junk and heaps of useless stuff. It emerges from the garage covered in dust, cobwebs, heating oil, scratches, and grime.
"What do you think?" he says, measuring it up...
He's gone out now. With Peter. God knows what we'll be installing in my nice clean room when he gets back. Maybe the wardrobe needs a jacuzzi on top. Or the lodger might like their own rope ladder.
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