Wise after the event

31st October 2021

After an action-packed couple of weeks this past one was much more domestic and generally of a calmer nature. This means, as far as you are concerned my dear reader, that much as I might want to, I won’t be able to make much of a meal of what did happen and thereby not making too many demands on your time, allowing you to go and get on with more important, though not necessarily more interesting, things.

Having said all that, Monday was actually a very busy day for Stephen, and I saw very little of him during daylight hours other than when he made it home for lunch. What was taking up all his time, I am not at liberty to say – mainly because I don’t know – but my day was profitably spent. I was busy with my usual Monday morning chores when our friendly gas man hove down the lane in his tanker. The good news was that as we were down to less than 30% in the tank, filling it up meant that we should have enough, in conjunction with the fire, to keep us toasty through to next spring; the bad news was that as we were down to less than 30%, with recent rises in fuel it cleared me out of both the readies that I had set aside to cover the bill as well as the contingency. Bread and water for the rest of the week, I don’t think.

In the afternoon, having finally given up on HSBC, I decided instead to investigate a company called Wise, that Alessandra, if you recall a recent returnee to MSP from Manchester, had suggested, saying that both she and her husband find it very good. The thing that held me back was that Wise is not actually a bank, but I don’t really need the facilities a bank offers. With Wise you get not only a UK sort code and account number but also a debit card, and these are the only two things I use.

Gritting my teeth and preparing, following recent experiences, the worst I set about applying for an account – and less than fifteen minutes later it was all sorted. So simple was it that I doubted it could really be all that good, but as during the week I changed all my details with other companies (i.e. Amazon and PayPal) with no trouble and not only ordered my debit card but had the details instantly available online, I am a convert. Thank you, Alessandra, and a big raspberry to those so-called banks, Tesco and HSBC. And if that wasn’t enough, to make the day complete it wasn’t all that long after that Luigi stopped by in his white van to drop off our olive oil. Result, as I believe they say.

Speaking of Luigi and his white van, we had to call upon him again to help us with the repaired washing line/maiden/dryer/whatever. Franco got in touch on Monday to say that it was ready and the plan Stephen concocted to get it back to the house was this: I would take Stephen to the factory after lunch on Tuesday then Mirco would take him to Franco’s in the factory van, load the repaired dryer and drive it to the top of the road where it would be unloaded, I would then walk up to meet Stephen and we would wheel it down to the house. What could go wrong?

Well, not the fact that by 5 on Tuesday afternoon it had started to rain as that was immaterial for when Stephen and Mirco turned up at Franco’s they found that the washing line was too tall to fit in the van, hence having to call upon Luigi. There was a slight delay in this as again he and Mario were conspicuous by their absence when Stephen called by on Wednesday – could they still be out and about picking olives? He had more luck on Thursday morning, and ever obliging, Luigi agreed to come to our rescue. Not that this was all plain sailing, either.

Even though the Mogliani brothers’ white van was larger than the factory’s, it was still a centimetre or two too low to accommodate the washing line – all the fault of the wheels, apparently. That is why they had to take the brunt of the solution, which was to leave that end of the construction hanging out of the back of the van and to lash the doors together with a piece of rope. Just as well the police they passed on the way home were too occupied with a minor scooter incident to notice this highly suspect arrangement, and at least Luigi was happy to make it all the way to the house so my services as apprentice wheeler were not needed. As for the line, it is looking even more chipper than before, with a fresh coat of paint, an additional strengthening bar and super solid welding, as evinced by the cheery load of washing Stephen hung out on Friday.

With nothing else demanding our time away from home, the weekend has been spent very pleasantly at LCDDB, with my focus, other than making the most of the sunshine yesterday morning to sweep the terrazzo, being on various sedentary tasks inside and Stephen focussing on the outside. He did a spot of tidying up yesterday, including having two bonfires in two separate locations. The first was in the garden whilst the second was on the banking in the lane where he got rid of the very last of the branches and leaves from the tree pruning all those months ago. Yes, this does seem to have run and run, but following advice from experienced fire starter Luigi that the best thing to do with what remained was to burn it, by late afternoon this was reduced to a slightly smouldering pile of ash.

With the practical side out of the way, he turned to more artistic matters today when he set about the oleander bush on the corner of the driveway. This, logically enough, is a bit bushy, so much so that it is nigh impossible to drive past it without it brushing against the side of the car. His solution: a spot of judicious pruning with view to encourage the centre to sprout up into more of a tree configuration, thereby avoiding contact with the car and giving the plant a more elegant and sculptured look. That’s the theory anyway, and who am I to doubt him?