UNDER OFFER

My brain has gone from lockdown to ballistic this morning at the thought that someone has finally made an offer on our house. And we’ve accepted it!

I want to swing from the chandeliers, run, shout, laugh, cry and tell the whole world all at the same time.   I’m so excited, I feel like rushing outside and kissing people!  Okay so perhaps that last bit will have to wait a few more weeks but maybe it’s alright to just pogo on the driveway like an exuberant puppy whilst wearing a facemask.  What will the neighbours think?  What do I care?   Today the world is a happy clappy place to be in.

Our buyers seem lovely, a nice young family with a couple of kids who were more interested in Shelby than in exploring their soon to be nice new home.  I’m so glad it’s not some rip-the-guts-out property developer who would have turned this beautiful house into a dozen cramped bedsits just to make a few quid but a family who might cherish the place as much as we have.

And so after a frantic flurry of phone calls, emails, preparing checklists and filling in web questionnaires, we are officially ‘under offer’ which means we can now begin to move things along with our own property purchase in Chichester. 

I’m keeping this brief partly because my head feels like it’s trying to contain a beehive and also because I don’t want to jinx it.  It’s so exciting!

Keep Calm?  But I'm Spanish

POOPY PROTOCOL

Morning has broken!  Who’s gonna fix it?

Got into work this morning to find a brightly coloured ‘Poopy Protocol’ sign had mysteriously appeared on the door to the Ladies loo.  Although there are only 6 key workers occupying our office building, it appears we all need re-educating on the correct procedure to follow if you suddenly feel the need for number ones or number twos. 

Going to the loo?  It's more complicated than you think

Here’s what the Poopy Protocol recommended to keep you safe in the ‘New Normal’:

1)  You must look both left and right to ensure the coast is clear before crossing the corridor to the toilet door.

2)  Once outside the main toilet door, peer furtively through the narrow glass partition window to check for signs of life, alien or otherwise.

3)  Without actually touching anything, push open the door.  I find a swift boot thrust works wonders on a swing door, just make sure you clear the return trajectory quickly if you don’t want to be forking out for a nose job later.

4)  Inside the lavatory, shout out to alert other humans to your germ infested presence.  ‘I need a shit’ bellowed loudly will not only be heard by the occupants of the flats over the road but should clear any occupied cubicles in seconds.

5)  Only 1 person is allowed in at any given time.  Phew, what a relief!  I’d hate to be sharing my cubicle with anyone else especially when I’m giving flight clearance to a monster turd at the Crapwick Airport. 

6)  Conduct your business quickly and with minimal touching of surroundings or anything else.  Yep that means no sneaky wanks, nose picking, bidding on Ebay, sexting on Tinder or reading the Guardian and that’s just for users of the ladies loo, the list of ‘Do Nots’ for the gents would fill this blog.

7)  Wash your hands and anything else if you can get it to reach the sink with the skin-drying, eczema flaring, disgustingly gloopy sanitising solution we’ve procured at great expense from some dubious third world country. 

8)  Don’t blow dry your Venus Fly-trap under the air dryers, dab it dry with a paper towel instead.

9)  Fold your sleeve over your fingers (but not the one you sneezed in earlier) to grab the door handle then exit swiftly taking care not to lick any walls or windows on the way back to your desk.

If you follow this Poopy Protocol to the letter not only will you receive a recognition email from the Top Knob himself as being the saviour of mankind but you’ll most certainly be certifiably dubbed the ‘Office Loon’ for the next decade. 

Whoops!  I think I need a pee ….  CLEAR THE DECKS ….

BEST BEFORE

There’s been a great deal of media speculation since the ‘sticky buns’ pandemic first kicked off about best before dates printed on food items as scarcity of some things has forced many of us to dig deep into our larders only to uncover the equivalent of Inca gold in those dark forgotten recesses.

Ah, here’s the strawberry jelly I bought for the Queen’s jubilee! Rummage, rummage.  Ooh look - there’s that jar of stem ginger pieces last used during the Renaissance period and this fabulous 6 year old sachet of satay mix is marinating tomorrow’s chicken skewers.  Who knows what else is awaiting discovery?

2014 - a jolly good year

Heh, heh!  We’re no strangers to eating food that’s well past its sell by or best before date and living proof that it’s OK to do so.  I hate food waste.  My thinking is pretty much along the same lines as the ‘5 second rule’ – if it’s in an airtight can, box or packet that’s never been opened then it’s fair game for the dinner table.  If I’m not online next week, you’ll know what’s happened - Colonel Mustard, satay sauce, kitchen.

For sale!

Meanwhile, property news flash!  We’re online!  Our house is now on Rightmove, Zoopla and all those other property porn sites everyone secretly accesses from their mobile phones whilst in the toilet.  I’m waiting for all those buyers chomping at the bit to bite my hand off with their spectacular offers.  Come on, where are you?  You know you couldn’t bear another 5 minutes in your own squalor-hole during lockdown so why aren’t you booking a viewing?  Say again – what do you mean they’re all down at Durdle Door?  Covidiots!!

Coastguard safety alert - no tombstoning!  Muppets!!

Well while the online viewing diary is filling up with ‘non appointments’, here’s an update on what’s happening behind the hedge at the bottom of the garden.

Fruit and veg are busting out all over. It’s going to be another bumper year for berries or anything else full of home-grown nutritional value by the look of things.

Tomato plants I've grown from seed

One's I bought earlier from Wilko

Unlike the Premiership, peas are already in the back of the net.

Mangetout peas climbing up the net teepee

Has beans?  Yes we are and lots!

Dwarf French runner beans - so tasty

A river of jam is soon to be flowing through Charminster judging by the amount of berries in eyeshot and figs, well they don’t give one but many.

First signs of redcurrants

Explosion of blackberries

Blackcurrant bushes looking bushy

Strawberries and cream - yes please!

I don't give a fig about Covid

If we’re unlucky, we’ll be reaping the bounteous harvest in a few months’ time but if we’re lucky, then the new owners will.

POTATOES

The other night I dreamt of Jeremy Clarkson.  Not in some perverted (phwoar! Get your kit off)  kind of way though I have to admit there’d be a certain allure about him after 10 pints of Rekorderlig and a large dose of ketamine but nope, this dream was strangely about potatoes.

“Jezza” I said as we strolled side by side along a leafy country lane near Crow-On-The-Bog Water, a fictitious town I’ve invented somewhere in the Cotswolds close to JC’s agricultural pile, “you’re a big fool, mate.  Fancy letting 38 tons of perfectly good spuds go to waste.”

“You could have used all those tatties to brew moonshine or employed a Tefal-headed nerd to invent LPF (liquid potato fuel).  Extinction Rebellion would have undoubtedly hailed you as the second Messiah and kissed your feet (ugh!) a million times over".  

Using my surplus crop to brew up some jam

Blackcurrant jam too sticky for fuel

"Or better still, you could have turned the spud mountain into a new brand of smoky diesel flavoured artisan crisps, perfect for that trackside snack and scoffed by petrol heads across the globe.  Walkers would have snapped up the recipe faster than a stegosaurus on a skateboard.  Think of the money that could have been made - such a wasted opportunity (head shake)”. 

And so the dream ended with me skipping off into the barley leaving a very confused Clarkson scratching his head and wondering what all that was about.  It’s amazing what gets lodged in the subconscious.

Back in world of reality, the next small tentative step in the process of property selling has been taken.  Our house has been photographed from top to bottom and a man in a mask turned up on the doorstep today to carry out an ‘EPC’ (energy performance certificate) inspection.  It appears every property for sale must have one of these certificates in the same way as most women at some point in their lives will have had to have had a red pair of stiletto shoes.  

Now that all our particulars have been taken, we just sit back and wait to be sent an electronic advert to approve then bam!  Show time!