It’s all very well living in ‘countryside’ but if you want to get from the front door to the car in the morning, you have to beat down a path. Before you’re buried knee-deep in nettles and swamped by nameless green growing things.
We felt pretty nervous before we even entered the Power Tools shop. The salesmen were all toothless and grizzly. We’ve realised, sooner or later, we’re going to have to buy a chainsaw (our main heating is a wood burner. YOU try using an axe to cut enough firewood to last all winter).
Keith’s natural urban caution kicks in. ‘But what about safety goggles and ear defenders?’. He can’t quite get over the fact that you don’t need a licence or a safety certificate to own one.
Textbook strimming. Safety visor, ear defenders...... Taken shortly before the petrol incident.
So we came away with a cordless hedge cutter and a petrol strimmer instead.
Keith was momentarily thrown by the brilliantly translated assembly manual, which stated very clearly that the strimmer was not to be operated by alcoholics or women with the menses.
But once he’d got round those technical difficulties, he soon discovered the sheer pleasure of destroying swathes of nettles……the ‘Strimminator” we’re calling him now.
That was after he set fire to the patio by leaving the petrol cap off.
...you remember DiCaprio in "The Beach"...?
