THIS ISLAND LIFE
IT all began when my dear wife decided the time had arrived to invest in a new kitchen. It ended seven days later with both of us going to bed dressed like Arctic explorers after the central heating packed in and frost began to form on the inside of the windows.
Before this full, sorry tale unfolds, it’s time for cards to be placed firmly on the table. I could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as 'a new man’. Indeed, I am a barely reconstituted old one.
I’m always prepared to help out with the dusting and vacuuming, washing-up is something of a speciality and I’ve even been known to wield a nifty iron in moments of extreme emergency.
But the kitchen is not my natural habitat. I can’t be doing with all that faffing around and every meal I ever prepare tends to end with a 'ding’.
Indeed, when Mrs N is away for any length of time and the microwave is used as an implement of first resort, the pitch and frequency of the dings emanating from our kitchen is positively symphonic.
That’s why the condition of the kitchen is a matter of immense indifference to me.
If it comes to the crunch, I can ding away in any room in the house.
My wife has other ideas, however, and during the course of the latest refurbishment, it was decided that having a radiator in the kitchen was a waste of time.
Apparently, something called a stove warms the place up perfectly well.
So the radiator was removed and the pipes capped — at which point the central heating ceased to function.
It was at this point memories of Michael Flanders and Donald Swann were evoked — as the gas man cometh.
He took one look at the boiler, blanched and said the split in the front was infusing the house with 'products of combustion’ — among them carbon monoxide.
The entire apparatus was shut down immediately and as we sat in our front room huddled in duvets and slurping microwaved soup (ding!) we began to realise the extent of the insulated and cocooned existence most of us take for granted nowadays.
The boudoir scenes that evening were a joy to behold, as we both got dressed (not undressed, you note) to go to bed.
Mrs N was at her most alluring in (among many other insulated garments) hiking socks, thermal vest, gloves and a fleece with the hood held in place by a thick scarf.
I cut a rakish figure in my long-johns, tracksuit bottoms, two pairs of socks, three T-shirts, a jumper and a woolly hat (complete with bobble).
The overall effect was that of Captain Oates bedding down for the night with Eskimo Nell.
Eventually Robbie Tillbrook and the lads from Heatmaster came to our rescue and fitted a new boiler with the maximum of efficiency and the minimum of inconvenience.
As I write, the kitchen looks like a bombsite, the new sink is leaking and the microwave concerto is still echoing through the house.
But at least the hot-water bottles have been stowed away for another year.
Farewell to gentle man Les
 |
| Les Fleming. |
ANOTHER of the Island’s great cricketing characters has left the crease for the final time.
Les Fleming was one of the gentlemen (and gentle men) of the game; someone who umpired with a friendly twinkle in his eye and a smile never far from his lips.
The first time he stood at The Hump at Havenstreet almost 40 years ago, he saw a promising young bowler whose action resembled a broken windmill.
"You’re bowling off the wrong foot son," he told him and spent a long time that season reconstructing his run-up and delivery stride.
Many years (and hundreds of wickets) later, Ray Winter never forgot the debt he owed the kindly Les.
Be my friend? I thought most of them were already
A FEW months ago I was suddenly inundated with e-mail requests from people asking to be my friend.
It was all very touching but rather puzzling, since I was under the impression most of them already were.
It transpired someone — aware of how much I despise everything about social networking sites — decided to have a bit of fun by logging me on to Facebook (or whatever the technical jargon is).
My daughter smiled knowingly when confronted with my suspicions and a few hours later the Facebook door at this particular address was slammed shut.
But I now find myself guilt-ridden by the thought that some of my friends are under the impression I do not wish to be publicly associated with them.
I’m told some people — who would keep therapists gainfully employed for years — have hundreds (sometimes thousands) of names listed as 'friends’ on Facebook.
I suspect nobody is really safe from their flimsy embrace. Join the same bus queue as them, or inadvertently nudge them with your trolley in Tesco, and you could well find yourself on their dubious roll of honour.
Why do folk feel the need to parade their neuroses in front of millions?