18 April 2021 (Sunday) - Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep

I didn’t sleep at all well. Yesterday I probably went no more than ten minutes at any one time without getting all choked up about Fudge, and last night felt as though it was much the same. I gave up trying to sleep, made myself some toast and scoffed it whist trying to watch an episode of “Superstore” whilst the washing machine attacked assorted laundry.

I did another COVID test (negative), peered into a rather dull Internet, and on seeing pretty much nothing of note I got dressed. The plan for today had originally been a rather good walk, but I wasn’t up for a long walk today (mentally, rather than physically). Pogo and Treacle need long walks, and they will get them soon. But not today.

 

I went into the front garden. I say “garden”; it is really a rather scratty yard. I spent a few minutes pulling weeds out of the cracks in the concrete. As I took the skin off of my knuckles for seemingly the millionth time so my brother arrived. With the bathroom roof having been fixed last weekend he had been charged with painting the back of the house. He’d made a very good start yesterday in getting all the preparation done and was looking to get the soffits and facias painted today. Whatever they are.

I left him to it, and carried on in the front yard. I got the weeds out, swept it all down, and gave it a once-over with the pressure washer. That only took two hours. As I pootled, someone had been visiting the shop over the road and had left their car parked outside with the windows open, and “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” playing on a continuous loop  (for the entire two hours that I was in the front yard). Oh, that made my day… I actually cheered when they finally shoved off.

 

er indoors ^TM” made us all a cuppa, then once I’d cleared away my mess we left my brother to the soffits and facias and went shopping.

First of all to the vets to settle up for the costs of Friday. Putting my little one to sleep, having him cremated individually (and not chucked in with a load of other animals) and getting him a good casket cost the thick end of two hundred and fifty quid. This last week’s vet bill has set me back over one thousand two hundred quid, and I’ve still got a claim for nine hundred quid waiting to be paid by the insurance people. I shall phone the insurance people tomorrow and find out *exactly* how they want me to make the claim for these final expenses.

 

We then went to B&Q for exterior expanding filler (No – I have no idea either) and a length of drain pipe. Whilst I was in the queue to pay, my phone buzzed. I had an email for which I had been waiting. An outstanding debt had been settled. I have a website - http://www.mankybadger.co.uk/ for which I pay so much every three months. Last month I changed the way in which I pay, and set up a direct debit. Late last week the nice people who provide the web space sent me a message saying that the payment was overdue. After a little mucking about it turned out that the money left my bank account on April 8^th and arrived where it was supposed to be this morning. So where has that money been for the last ten days?

 

With shopping shopped I came home. Soffits and facias hadn’t taken long, and my brother was well into getting a coat of paint onto the back of the house. It was at this point that I noticed that Treacle was the odd dog out; Sid and Pogo both had substantial amounts of blue paint on them. She didn’t.

I made my brother and me a cuppa (er indoors ^TM” had gone to Asda), and then got on with mowing the lawn. As I mowed, not-so-nice-next-door came out and had a rant. When they put up the fence between their garden and ours (over fifteen years ago) the thing didn’t follow the boundary line. It is about four inches to their side. My brother had painted up to the boundary between the houses down as far as the fence, then painted up to the fence. That way he made sure that the part of her wall that she couldn’t possibly reach was protected and maintained. I told her we thought we were doing her a favour. She wasn’t happy, but she rarely seems to be anyway.

 

With the first coat of paint done, my brother set off homewards. We had a spot of lunch sitting in the garden, and I watched Sid sitting with us. Usually he sleeps on his own for much of the day, but today he was making a point of being with us. Am I being overly sentimental in wondering if he too was missing Fudge?

We took the dogs up to the co-op field, saw some girls having a picnic and came straight back home again. Dogs and picnics don’t mix.

Once home we sat in the garden for a little more until it got too cold, then I sat on the sofa and dozed until er indoors ^TM” sorted some dinner. As we scoffed it we watched an episode of “Guessable”, and like pretty much all TV quiz shows it features the same contestants that all TV quiz shows have on them. Mind you it is quite an entertaining show. 

I’m not feeling on top form this evening; did I catch the sun whilst cleaning the front yard earlier? Possibly. I’m thinking early night… I wonder if I actually will…