28 September 2009 (Monday) - Painting and Prison

Last night I worked out that if I got up promptly this morning I’d have time to paint the house. So I woke about 2am raring to go. I tried to get back to sleep, but couldn’t. And so I was outside painting before 5.30am. Over an hour before dawn. But the street lighting is good, and I was using white paint anyway. I left the coloured stuff until after dawn.

It’s amazing how many people walk up and down my road at silly o’clock. I was harangued by a mad old biddy who wanted me to join neighbourhood watch, and another old trout took offence when I told her I didn’t build walls. I can only think that she saw me up the ladder and assumed I was some sort of itinerant jobbing handyman. Would I build her a wall? She got quite uppity when I told her I wouldn’t know where to start. Eventually she stormed off muttering that I wouldn’t get far if I didn’t build walls.

I had a go at getting the ground anchor up, but I had to give up. When I installed the thing all those years ago, I would seem to have made a good job of it. If any of my loyal readers could lend me a crowbar and/or a pneumatic drill I might shift it, but I think the thing might be in place permanently. The next job is to get shot of all the moss on the concrete. I’ll see if B&Q sell dangerous chemicals in the morning. I also need to paint up the box around the gas meter. I’ll do that later.

And then to the tip to get rid of the wreckage that once was garden fences. Whilst chucking it away I noticed what looked like a brake cable hanging out from underneath my car. Panic set in, and so round to the Renault dealer where I found it was the battery overflow which had come loose. Which was a relief…

And then I met up with Chris and Stevey and we drove to the chokey. Usually I take the train, and I will again next time. I don’t really know the area round HMP Slade that well, and the parking was a nightmare. Eventually we found somewhere to park three counties away from the prison, and we trekked our way there. Via McDonalds where a foxy young lady was showing very ample bum cleavage. However despite my best efforts I failed to capture anything which would be good enough to appear on “CrackWatch”.

We got to the prison where the entry procedure was again totally different to any we’d had before. And the tea shop has closed down. One of the highlights of visiting the nick is to feed “Norman Stanley” to the point where he is nearly sick. We couldn’t do that this time. However, joking aside, some of the other visitors had travelled hours to get to the prison. For them, having no refreshments at all must have been really bad.

We soon met up with our mate, who was looking well. He’d been able to speak with his littlun on the phone at the weekend, and was really pleased about it. We sat and chatted, and bemoaned the demise of the tea stall. And, as ever, two and a half hours flew by, and all too soon it was time to come home. I slept most of the way back. I was rather tired for some reason…