Planting Lavender, Painting and Decorating, and a Blind Man

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Lavender, Painting and Decorating, and a Blind Man

1. The Cosmic Gardener came today.  "Let us," he cried, "plant Lavender."  We did so, we went to the Garden Centre and bought five little pots of lavender and he planted them.  Planting the lavender has changed the whole of the front of the house; the five little clumps of lavender have made it into a Homes and Gardens home and I think the Cosmic Gardner knows what he is talking about.
2. At 2pm a Painting and Decorating Man came to look at Furiously Independent Son's room.  Five years ago Furiously Independent Son chose to paint his bedroom yellow and green and his little en suite sitting room, purple and blue.  In order that serenity and uncluttered thoughts flow through his part of the house I am going to have it painted white and off-white.  So a nice man came to see it and  gave me a jolly sound price to make it wholesome and normal.  Job to be started in a few weeks, and I won't have to deal with it at all.  That is how I like things, someone else to do it and be nice into the bargain.
3. The Blind Man is late.  He should be here by now to give me a quote on making blinds for the TV room.  We need something to help cope with the full on glare of the sun during the summer, as the room not only becomes very hot, but more importantly no one can see the telly. 
4. The Blind Man has been and gone, a very nice and interesting fellow.  He has given me a quote that I have accepted to have my TV, or Dining Room if you are posh, which I am, made into the kind of room that would suit having five pretty lavender bushes at the front of the house. 
5. So there it all is.  A fancy front of the house, a fancy back of the house, and a fancy couple of rooms upstairs.  

 I am very tired today.  It is a sunny day, though windy.  The best place to be is in my sitting room (and under the window, outside, are planted five of the snazziest lavender bushes in West Sussex).  The best place then, is in this sitting room, on the sofa here, because the sun streams into the room through the red and orange gauzey Indian curtains, straight onto my gently reclining form, making me squint my eyes and think that I am starring in a French Film with very little dialogue and much sighing and gazing about.  My boys are upstairs doing deals with each other (you go and make me something to eat, and I will let you have my laptop.  You go and do all my homework and I will hide your beer.  You go and buy me cigarettes and I will not tell mum that you do pole dancing after school etc.)  I have had a busy day being here for fellows who are going to make my home look better, and now I am going to do nothing at all till it is bedtime.  And since I am boss here, bed time could be any moment now.  It is 17.24.  Could be done.

Tomorrow morning my dear Polish Worker, who lives with us at the moment, is going to have a full cooked English Breakfast.  I offered to cook one for him as he has never had one before, and he has requested it for tomorrow morning.  It is not often that the thought of a full cooked breakfast makes someone so excited.  Dear Polish Worker is going to take a picture to show his mother and family, so I had better make sure the breakfast is pretty professional.  Then, only then, will I be able to get into the studio and paint what I have been trying to paint for the last week or so.  It will be worth the wait though.  The Polish Worker will be full up and joyful all day, the blinds are ordered, the garden is wonderful, and the purple, blue, yellow and green of the Furiously Independent Son's rooms has only three weeks left to live.

Before I lay my head back onto the twinkling feather cushions on my sofa, the sun shining into my very soul through the sitting room windows, there is one more job that has been taken care of today.  My windows are dreadfully mucky, no one has thought about doing them for years.  The Cosmic Gardner is going to do them on Friday.  The tense and heated negotiations went like this.

(Scene - in the garden.  Sun shines, bees buzz around the five lavender bushes that have become quite heroic.  Cosmic Gardner stands next to me, both of us gazing into the middle distance as the odd car passes by in the road outside.  Birds sing and both of us lost in our thoughts.  He, about the best way to make gardens better, me, about what to have for lunch.)

Me:      I want my windows cleaned.  Wish I knew a window cleaner.
C.G:     I'll do them for you.
Me:      Can you clean windows?
C.G:     Dunno.
Me:      Have you got a ladder?
C.G:    Dunno.
Me:     Think I have one in the garage.
C.G:    Oh yes, so do I.  My ladder is in your garage too.  Ha ha ha.  Silly me.
Me:      Ha ha ha.  What do you charge?
C.G:    What's the going rate for window cleaning?
Me:      Dunno.
C.G:     I'll ask someone
Me:      How do you clean a window?
C.G:    Well, you just put some water on it and a bit of bubbles and wipe it off and that.
Me:     That's amazing.
C.G:    Friday do?
Me:     Yes.

Small pause.  Sun shines, lavender bushes nod, all is right with the world.

Me:     Can you do insides as well?
C.G:    Could try
Me:     Thanks.

Oh I live in a cut throat world.  I'm the only person Alan Sugar is scared of.