There is life beyond the garden. I am three talks in to an eight talks in eight days marathon. Why did this seem like a good idea at the time?
Then, last weekend, we braved drizzle and bracing winds to take part in a harvest mouse survey in the nearby country park. Given that I had barely moved further than from chair to bedroom since New Year (thanks Covid), we decided to drive to the car park rather than walk, as we normally would have done. We had studied the risk assessment – we were therefore aware that we night get hit by a golf ball (it is near the golf course), or get sand in our eyes, or get kicked by a horse, or get spiked by spiky grass. Spoiler alert, none of these calamities befell us. A couple of dozen intrepid volunteers set out to ferret around in clumps of grass, on muddy terrain, looking for last year’s abandoned nests. As you can see from the photograph, these are pretty jolly tricksy to spot, yet within about thirty seconds one was found. As usual our luck with wildlife, or even evidence of wildlife, was out so, although we didn’t find any, in all the team located ten, a significant increase from last year, which bodes well for the population of our second smallest native mammal. Having wandered a couple of miles across the country park in our quest, we were very glad we’d decided to take the car, especially as, by the time we’d finished, the drizzle was seriously persisting and the wind was positively howling.
What’s this with the grass? You might well ask. Well, deep breath and bear with. In the new house the former garage has been converted into two rooms. What has become known as the ‘posh’ half has double glazed patio doors leading on to the garden and a smart light fitting. The un-posh aspect was the flooring, which was very bumpy, painted concrete and I clearly needed a floor covering. I wasn’t up for spending a fortune on a room that isn’t really part of the house, so I investigated the options. What might be described as a glorified shed really wasn’t suited to cream, deep-pile carpet, so I was looking for something rather more hard-wearing and dirt resistant. I headed off to the local carpet shop, thinking I might get some form of coir or jute matting. The first problem was that carpet tends to come in four metre widths. The room was 2.6 metres square, so I’d be paying for a lot that I wouldn’t be needing. They could order me the sort of thing I was thinking of but it would, at nearly £400, be a tad over budget. I looked at the remnants but again may of these were larger than I needed. Then my eye alerted upon a fake grass offcut. Hard wearing, cheap, fitting for what may become a garden room when it is no longer required for toy storage for visiting grandchildren.
I headed to the check out. Firstly my partner in crime asks if he qualifies for a staff discount. The assistant asks how long ago he worked for that establishment. He truthfully admits that it was fifty eight years, to be told his qualification for a staff discount must have expired the previous day! She tactfully describes my choice as ‘unusual’. I didn’t tell her that she was speaking to a woman who once papered a room with rolls of brown wrapping paper. A couple of days later the carpet was duly fitted and that’s another space almost sorted. The shelves still need to be arranged but I am pleased with the result. I’ll draw a veil over the condition of the adjoining half a garage, which currently contains everything that won’t fit in the roof or anywhere else.
The History Interpreter - Janet Few 