Around the House Part 1

It’s marvellous having help around home and garden. My cleaning lady is a delight. She is young, well half my age, half-Italian, very attractive, jolly personality, and extremely helpful in many ways. I would be lost without her. Particularly when the castors fall off my bed, two to be exact. Two castors, I mean, not two beds... although it is a double-bedded room. One for him and one for me, except he has no trouble with his castors. Hmm perhaps I sleep funny!

The casters aren't the normal push-in variety, they have to be screwed - which is a problem when the threads break. Family members tried to fix it, but couldn’t. Apparently I either needed new castors or a new bed. I wouldn’t mind but the old one is only about three years old. I have such rotten luck with castors.

So the bed was left in an unfixable state and that night I slept in a lopsided position and vowed to replace the bed with a new one ... or at least new castors.

Next day I asked my wonder-woman not to move the bed, explaining that if she did we’d never get it back in position. At that, I left her to get on with cleaning that room. However, she did seem to be taking rather a long time. It’s only a small room, you see. I went to investigate and found her kneeling by the side of an upturned single bed, all the linen and mattress on the other bed (the one with good castors) and the bedstead on its side. There’s no messing with my cleaning lady, when she does a job she does it well.

‘The thread’s broken,’ she announced, ‘I’ll have to pack it.’

See, I told you she was good.

On hearing this I got down on my knees to help. Of course, I couldn’t do much, so I spent the next fifteen minutes or so playing the part of errand girl. She wanted cardboard, she said. I must have looked dumbstruck because she went on to explain that she needed it to pack the hole before screwing in the castor. I fetched the cardboard. Next she wanted super glue, which I happened to have. I fetched that.  Then I had to supply her with a screwdriver with which to pack the cardboard in the hole, and scissors to cut the card. Kitchen paper was also required to catch the drips of super glue (there weren’t any, as it happened) and then she thanked me for my help. SHE thanked ME? And there was me forever in the girl’s debt.

The family menfolk couldn’t get over it ... beaten by a woman was one remark. Well yes, and had I been forty years younger that woman would have been me.

Well, that was a couple of weeks ago and the castors are still holding, but I won’t shout too loud – just in case.

Next post will be about the Gardener!