Gees I love progress - In the name of Thiago - Day 162

 

This has been a really good weekend. I often find that I get one good and one not so good day over a weekend but this time both days were right on the money. I’m not going to reflect on yesterday’s happy events – you can read yesterday’s blog for that, do you like what I did there? – so instead let’s get into the meat of today.

 

After loading the car with more firewood for Dad, putting the washing out and dragging Elisa out of bed at the ungodly, (according to her), hour of 10am it was off to the old man’s place to drop Elisa off and make my way to Draycott for a spot of tennis.

 

Once again I’ve failed miserably to get a picture so you’ll have to accept my word that I spent a good hour and a half improving my game ready for another match with Kudzy tomorrow evening. Bill is an excellent player and has terrific sporting knowledge with regard to self-improvement. I really enjoyed the time on court with him even though there was a miserable bastard on the court next to us that came perilously close to losing his shit on a couple of occasions.

 

 

Dad and I chopped up the rest of the wood at his place for when he gets his woodburner. I really hope he’s not going to start using it right away, though he has been threatening to. Perhaps a slightly warmer day today may have just put that idea to bed for a little while longer.

When I got back to Dad’s place I was greeted by a wonderful sight. You’d normally be waiting for a punchline here, but I have nothing to add, other than refer to the previous sentence.

 

Just look at these two. Yes, I asked them to sit back down before we left, and I did set up the picture, but the reason that they look so natural is that they had been enjoying each other’s company for a good couple of hours, while I was on the tennis court. It’s so comforting to see – as regular readers will know, managing my Dad’s short-tempered days has been a great challenge in the last few months.

 

They really bonded over Elisa’s fascination for the old man’s model-building. Dad was telling Elisa about how he used to pick fruit to get the money to buy parts to build his models, so that he could go to London with his mum to visit a shop called Henry J Nicholls. Elisa has an absolutely phenomenal memory, she has just shouted that name down the stairs to me. She really was listening to every word earlier.

 

 

I have a cat called Jack. Like most cats he’s a bit of a shit. This comfortably proportioned cat is from next door though and his name is Kev. Poor Kev cops some stick from Jack but clearly likes to wind him up too. He was having a brave moment obviously this morning perched comfortably on my garden waste bin and at the same time sticking two paws up at his fierce rival. I like that, it made me laugh.

Part of the reason I’m telling you this is that it segues nicely into a conversation I had with my friend and next door neighbour Super Steve.

 

This huge beast - clearly you can't get the full picture from this image but showing where it is matters for this part of the blog - is causing a fair bit of bother. Angélica and I need to decide whether to take it down, as part of it fell into Steve’s garden recently. Thankfully, none of his children were close by when that happened. We reached what seemed like a very fair compromise when he said he was happy to source someone to do the work.

 

I agreed that I should pay – the base of the tree is completely on my property. Steve even offered to pay for half of the work, but I’m not having that. That man already does more than enough for Angélica and I. I know that I'm extremely lucky to have a neighbour like him. His good lady Louise is a Spurs fan as well – it’s like a match made in heaven!

 

Right that’s it, I’ve already stolen enough of your time for one day. All that remains for me to do is to point you towards the place to donate and wish you a very pleasant evening.