FURLOUGH FINISHED

It’s week 5 of furlough.  I’ve been on high alert since Sunday.  What for is anyone’s guess but either we’re about to be hit by a world shortage of sardines or a top secret satellite that nobody knew about is going to drop into the back garden (again?).  Boris says ‘Stay Alert’ so I’m ordering a high powered telescope and CCTV to keep a close eye on things.

I’ve finally been recalled back to active duty so my ‘sticky buns’ staycation is over.  No more afternoons of lazy sunbathing or sauntering round the house half naked as from tomorrow its back to the grind. 

Our garden is blooming

Fatty looking for butterflies to chase

Kitties enjoy their daily exercise

Our organisation claims to have drawn up a Recovery Plan although the contents of said plan are as unknown as the final resting place of Margaret Thatcher’s infamous handbag.  (Yeah, what did happen to it?)  It follows that staff will be the last to find out what safety measures are being put in place.  Not sure what is of more concern to me right now, whether I’ll find my desk surrounded in plastic screening to prevent breathing in co-worker germs or whether we’ll all end up on the dole due to lack of funds.

‘R’ comes after ‘P’ in the alphabet and it’ll be no surprise that following this economic turmoil the tabloids are sure to be full of redundancy headlines in the coming months.  It may be easy to switch off the sausage machine but turning it back on to pre-pandemic levels isn’t going to be quite so simple for some companies. 

In Dorset, pandemic fallout has already begun with Sunseeker, provider of luxury yachts, waving goodbye to over 450 employees.  Since our office is only up the road from their premises, I wonder if the lay-off liner will be cruising our way too at some point in time? 

Still, I have managed to put the finishing touches to the lounge makeover just in the nick of time thus restoring our beautiful Deco themed room to its former glory.  

Fresh white ceiling and scrubbed up walls

'P' IS FOR PANDEMIC

‘Can I have a ‘P’ please, Bob?’  I’m sure everyone that hasn’t got their eyes glued to a smartphone will be smirking in remembrance of that immortal line as contestants battled to make their way across a lettered Blockbusters quiz screen. These days, P is for pandemic or party. 

Although we’re in a lockdown situation, social distancing restrictions clearly apply only to UK citizens and not Serbians.  When Boris said ‘Stay at home, save the NHS’ he forgot to repeat that in a Balkan dialect as whilst everyone else has understood they’ve got to stay in their own homes, our Serbian neighbours have taken this to mean that you must invite all your relatives round for a big party.   At least a dozen guests turned up last Wednesday, not a shred of PPE in sight!   P is also for peasant. 

Social distancing - kitty style

Week 4 of furlough has slipped by unnoticed like the piece of popcorn I found yesterday buried in fluff under the sofa.  Carbon dating showed it to have been there since 2008 along with the theatre listings from Poole Lighthouse of the same year.  (I wondered where that had got to).

DIY efforts are now being concentrated on the lounge, a room that was last decorated almost 20 years ago.  In its heyday, this room paid homage to all things Art Deco.  The beautiful Deco motifs that I painstakingly stencilled into each corner of the room have withstood the rigours of daily life well but not so the Egyptian sand coloured paint which is now dirtier than a pair of wellies after milking time.  Scrubbing the walls down with sugar soap has done little to reduce the pockmarks and splatters of the last two decades.

Our lovely Art Deco lounge needs a spruce up

Stencilled corner motifs

The decorative scheme in this room is unlikely to be to everyone’s taste but it kills me to think someone is going to come along and paint over the lovely stencilled motifs to turn the lounge into some bland, gruel-coloured, porridge palace.  I guess I’ll leave that to the new owners because I don’t have the heart to cover them.

In the meantime, I've freshened up the ceiling with a couple of coats of brilliant white emulsion and painted over the dark yellow plaster coving/picture rail to give the room a partial makeover.

White emulsion to cover picture rail and coving

Plainer look to appeal to prospective buyers

Fan design wallpaper now painted in white

TAPAS TUESDAY

The tills are alive with the sound of Ebay!  ‘Stay at home and save the nation’ said Boris.  And that’s exactly what I’m doing, saving the economy by selling all my surplus clutter.  Hermes couriers are still in jobs thanks to me as my little online business venture is keeping me off the streets (literally).  Don’t forget to clap for me later on.

Clutter for sale

It’s week 3 of furlough but it’s not all sell, sell, sell.  The spare room is now pretty much finished and looking a lot brighter although personally, I’m not sure if I prefer the previous blue colour scheme if I’m honest.  What do you think?

Spare room finished

Sunny yellow with white paintwork

Just need to get rid of all the clutter

With no painting left to finish or auctions to attend to, I’ve turned my thoughts to hairy bikers.  (Well what else is a girl to do in a lockdown?)  We’ve been following the larger than life Geordie pair travel through Valencia, salivating on the sofa each episode over their mouth-watering Spanish culinary creations so I thought I’d put a bit of the Viva España into our Tuesday night meal.

Save the Nation and cook!

It’s Tapas Tuesday!  (I know it’s Thursday but Tapas Thursday doesn’t have quite the same zing does it?)  On Tuesday’s menu we had:

• Albondigas (mini meatballs)
• Patatas Bravas with a spicy tomato salsa
• Pollo al Ajillo (chicken in garlic)
• Paella
• Halloumi fries (meh! I know it’s not Spanish)
• Cheese chunks
• Jamon slices (Spanish ham)

Home made tapas - they were yummy!

Serve with a glass of nice Tempranillo wine, Spanish flag and bullfighter music playing softy in the background. 

Table for two at Casa Corona

If you close your eyes and gently breathe in the garlicky smell, you could almost imagine yourself on a sunny terrace in Andalucia.

She's added way too much vino to that salsa

Coronavirus kitty update

PROPERTY POKER - PART II

Another week of furlough, another room to paint.  Most people that get up at 7.00 am reach for the caffeine, I reach for the paint roller.  This week I’m freshening up my son’s old bedroom with a few coats of leftover Dulux Sunny Day paint.  It’ll be a mini-me replica of our bedroom, sunshiny and cheerful.

Sprucing up the spare room

Currently painted blue but soon to be re-painted yellow

In my daily micro-schedule (Silicon Valley’s trendy term for ‘To Do List’) decorating takes up all morning slots leaving the afternoons for lazy sunbathing or knitting.  These activities are often supplemented by a spot of baking if I’m truly bored. 

Sunny day outside and inside

Painting over the feature wall in Mellow Yellow

Dusty cat inspecting my paintwork

The Fat Devil often finds works for idle hands thus baking scrummy cookies or other fabulous sugary treats helps to keep your mind off pandemic misery.  Yesterday I rustled up some delicious farmyard favourites which I’ve called ‘Bovine Oaties’ complete with chocolate dipped bottoms so they look like real cows.  I bet Mcvities are ‘well jell’ or whatever the phrase is in street speak.  (I can get down with the kids too, you know!).

Bovine Oaties - delicious with a nice cup of tea

I see I’ve digressed once again from the real point of this article which is to give you an update on our game of Property Poker.  Keeping our cards close to our chest, we submitted a revised offer for the ‘biddy bungalow’ a few weeks ago and fortune has favoured the brave, it has been accepted by the seller.  

All we have to do now is get on with the business of selling our own house – the game is on!