Today, I learned that being a wonder with a hammer and a nail is not all it is cracked up to be.
Especially when it comes to flatpack.
Some people are good at flatpack and some.. well, maybe not.
Let me explain.
As many of you know, I have been laid up with a fractured bone in my back. The days have morphed into weeks and I am finally able to walk with the aid of my late Dad's walking stick.
Today, I ventured down to Redhead's place and it was the first time I had been out since my fall.
You have no idea the joy I felt at seeing the sky, feeling the breeze on my body and the delight that I could finally see the world.
It had not changed since I last ventured out. The birds were still chirping and the sun was still shining and the sky was still there.
All was good in the world of Shaydee.
I managed to walk, albeit with the aid of my Dad's walking stick, to the car. I opened the door. I got in. I drove. Carefully. Very carefully.
It was only about 10 minutes of a drive but I saw things that I had taken for granted: the vista of the ocean as I drove. The swirl of the waves as they crashed onto the white sand of the beach. The sheer beauty of the bush that lines my road to the destination of Redhead's home.
I wound down my window and inhaled the salty air and smiled as I took in the magnificence of what I had taken for granted a mere 3 weeks earlier.
OK. I got that out of the way. Back to reality.
My back was hurting by the time I arrived at my destination.
Stuff the birds chirping and the waves crashing and the air full of salt: I was IN PAIN.
Redhead came out to greet me. She said " you look terrible and your hair is a mess. "
I already knew that, but it was kind of her to remind me.
" Perhaps you need to put a ribbon around your hair? That would look pretty," she suggested.
I explained that I wasn't that concerned about how my hair looked and that putting a ribbon around my hair might make me look like a nearly 70 year old dickhead and she simply replied " it would still look pretty.. would you like a cup of tea? "
In our home, a cup of tea solves all problems.
On this occasion, it would not.
I had most definitely done more than I should have and a ribbon in my hair would not make the pain go away.
Sometime later, after staggering down the walkway into her home, I managed to do the online banking, download the photos of the Manx cats and admire the pruning in her garden, I was fortunate enough to pick up my bottled water and the new grocery cart that my brother had built for me.
You see, I have to take my groceries up from my car to my unit. I use a little trolley. My brother assembled a new trolley and laughed and said that I had a lifetime warranty.
Only, when he assembled it, there was a piece left over.... big mistake.
But, so it was, that I drove back home and took my bounty out of the back of my car, loaded it into my new " warranty approved " cart and started to walk up to my unit.
I cannot tell you exactly when the cart collapsed. One minute, it was cruising along and the next minute it just went bugger up. Fell to pieces and all of my " goodies " as my father used to say, fell onto the pathway.
Bugger.
As I stood there, walking stick in hand, back aching in agony and feeling marooned between my home port and my ship, I saw the mental picture of my brother, years ago, trying to put a number plate onto his new mini that Mum and Dad had purchased.
He wired it on, screwed it on and proudly declared that the job was done.
As soon as my Dad moved the car, the number plate fell off.
In his immortal words, my Dad said " He's a wonder with a hammer and a nail! "
And so it stuck.
Well, all I can say is that my brother might be a wonder with a hammer and a nail but he is bloody useless when it comes to flatpack.
I rang Redhead and told her what had happened.
She said " oh he did have a piece left over. It was a metal bar. "
Oh, goody.
Meanwhile, I am going to call him in on his warranty and get him to build my trolley again.
After all, he is a wonder with a hammer and a nail.
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