Not a gnome, but a garden ornament, nonetheless
No, for me if it’s not the size of a dinosaur and purple … ack! Shades of Barney! That’s too scary, even for me, Barney being far too reminiscent of a bad acid trip that would put anyone off psychedelic drugs and children’s programming forever … I won’t provide display space.
Okay, regular readers know that there’s a reason I have a piece of earth-moving equipment festooning my acre of paradise, but I have to admit to loving the illusion that it’s just here because it looks good and adds to the ambiance of tropical island living.
Shit! If I could afford it, I’d now be ordering a John Deere … although customized beyond the boring green they always come in … to complement, and a 737 to adorn the bottom of the garden.
But I do have Magnar to thank for the festoonishment … and how do I do that?
I almost bloody kill him, that’s how.
We took him out to dinner at Antonio’s (actually, Maria’s Rock Café) last night in appreciation for the Sunday he sacrificed on behalf of my road, then had him up for a beer afterwards. Being Magnar, he was annoyed by the fact that the light on my stairs was nonfunctional due to a broken off bit of bulb that was stuck in the thing, so he grabbed tools and proceeded to do the necessary repair.
“Is the switch off?” he asked.
Being trained to ALWAYS do what he tells me to do, I checked carefully, and, yes, indeed, it was OFF.
“Can you please double check that it’s off?”
Yep, and yep.
In the kitchen prising the tops off two Seybrews, I suddenly heard a loud pop, a yell and a tumble, so ran out to find my Magnar shaking and stunned and in pain.
I’d completely forgotten, you see, that said fixture has another switch to it under the house, so he’d just stuck a metal tool into a live socket while standing on a chair at the top of a flight of stairs.
After hugging him with all I have to hug with and assuring myself that he was as alright as he could be under the circumstance, I ran upstairs and burst into tears … a turn of events that had him right amused. (I have my entertainment value, as well, you see.)
There are many people in this world who I would not be the least bothered by the lack of, but Magnar is so far from that category that the thought that I could have been the reason for an early check-out just about killed me.
He continues to comfort me by insisting that dying from such a stupid blunder is “95% impossible because you always fall, so let go”, for which I am thankful.
Less pleasant, however, is his determination to take the piss out of me until I can laugh about it.
That’s going to take a while …
A collection of my short stories:
I'm in this one, too ...
And I'm in here, as well ...
Paradise Preoccupied 