It is Sunday so I will definitely see no one and can spend most of the morning in bed watching the London nohtaraM. Always especially enjoyable when it is pouring with rain, both here and there. Not so good this year as there seems to be nobody English in the top group, unlike last time when we Won.... but still it is an uplifting occasion. They all look so fragile - how can they possibly run so far?

But lo ... what is that noise? It is 10.00 am on SUNDAY. How can there be a loud, rude car horn blaring outside? And I am wearing a strange Arab robe-thing and have mad hair. But as it is obviously a serious emergency I will run downstairs, regardless. On the doorstep is a huge butch woman in a navy boiler suit, (do they still make these - or is it amusingly retro?). 'Look, can YOU tell me exactly where your husband is? We have been hanging about for half an hour now, you know'. 'But ... he's in London?'. 'WHAT! We made this arrangement to inspect the cow weeks ago. This is simply not good enough'. Light dawns ... 'Ah ... no, no. You are looking for the FARMER. He is usually lurking, I mean working, by the far barn'. 'Well, there's no sign of anyone. Can you give me his phone number?'. As I riffle through some stained notebook on the kitchen table I find that she is standing behind me, her face screwed into an odd shape.

After she drives away I take stock of my surroundings, as a stranger might. With limited time and strength and interest at my disposal I have been concentrating on the garden for a few days. As it was meant to rain today I had sensibly put off house stuff until now. Especially as NO ONE was going to enter the building until at least Monday. It's so unfair ... even my exceptionally low standards usually include keeping the kitchen unembarrassing. I have fresh flowers on the table for f@ck's sake. Not today ....... I think that the first thing a stranger would notice is a cat litter tray in the middle of the floor, (moved there to remind me to empty it first thing), so heavily used that the contents have been kicked contemptuously into a circle round it. Then possibly the THREE large Easter flower arrangements in the room, now not only totally dead but giving off that pungently horrible scent of fleshy decay. The rubbish bin, so full that the lid is propped open. Several plates of half-eaten cat food, abandoned as I had forgotten that they hate the chicken flavour. Various chairs with drying jerseys hanging over their backs. All the children's muddy outdoor shoes in a heap ready to be moved. A sink full of washing up. And a huge casserole dish full of off meat remains from the fridge which I was about to throw to the 'wild' cats. Plus myself - possibly as near to the opposite in looks to someone with neat short hair, subtle make-up and a pressed boiler suit as one could imagine.

I repeat ..... It's not fair.... If she had come at this time tomorrow, when I am expecting various deliveries; a 'fencing conference' (wooden ..); and coffee with the tree-planting man, it and I would have appeared not only unexceptional but even maybe charming. Now she will tell everyone she knows round here God knows what - except I can imagine only too well .... F@ck..

So I have pointlessly redressed and rushed around de-crapping the kitchen, at least roughly, and missed the rest of the marathon and my morning is totally ruined. And naturally no one will be here again today so I needn't have bothered but I had the fear. Grrrrr.
- posted by Iris @ 4/18/2004 12:53:00 PM comment