Admittedly I probably don't need half a litre of fake blood, a navy blue, polyester, woman's jumpsuit from Debenhams and one and a half rolls of wallpaper with a brick pattern on them. Nor do I need right now the unused easel which is about four years old and has never left its box, the cheap costume jewellery, and the broken, hammered metal, table lamp from Habitat which I've kept because it matches the not-broken, hammered metal, table lamp from Habitat which I don't use anyway.
In my defence, and with the exception of the lamps, each of these things were bought to be used in the production of a play. The twelve feet of thick, white, yacht rope for example was a prop in Marina and the Clone and was last seen tying up the reporter in Marina Oliveto's Primrose Hill cellar.
Chris is as happy as Larry out in the garden, pottering around all day, moving planters, hiding gnomes and pruning things to within an inch of their lives. He's very much like Dr Doolittle with the animals and has regular visitors in the shape of the neighbours' cats. At the moment there are three everyday guests who turn up unannounced a couple of times a day, usually in rotation, sometimes together.
Naturally we've given them names, nothing too personal because, well because they're not our cats. There's Blackie, who is silky and jet black from head to tail, White Face a sturdy beast who is black and white with, unsurprisingly, a smattering of white fur across his face, and Black Face who is also black and white and who I'm considering renaming because it sounds slightly racist to my sensitive ears. My auntie Elaine used to have a black and white cat who looked just like Black Face, he was called Minstrel which I think, as names go, is probably no better.
Since we lost our elderly and much loved cat Gilbert, in January, we haven't got round to getting rid of his remaining food, and now with Blackie, White Face and Black Face brave enough to knock about in what was his territory, Chris has been feeding them. The wet food and tuna ran out ages ago and now the biscuits are beginning to run low. Chris wants to start buying cat food for them but I have to remind him that they're not our responsibility and they a perfectly good home and owners who feed them just a few doors down the road. They are clearly taking advantage of his good nature, he knows this very well but allows it all the same.
As part of the growing menagerie we're also visited by an array of birds. Some of these visitors, like the robins and tits, are more welcome than the likes of the pair of shitting magpies who have spent the last fortnight gathering goodies with which to build a nest, and the massive pigeon that barges its way onto the bird table and flings whatever bits of seeds or bread are on there, all over the lawn.
As I sloshed back the last of my Pinot Grigio I noticed the ladybirds were back, buzzing around in the warm air and smashing themselves into windows willy nilly. I later went inside and found two more of them under the dining room table, dead and cluttering up the place. I fear the warm weather has brought them out early this year.
I was born in 1975 so I don't remember the fabled summer of 76 with its never ending heatwave, villages reappearing after a hundred years from the bottom of reservoirs, and the ladybird plague that came with the heat. Until recently, as far as I was concerned, these little red visitors were cute. They were flying jewels which ate greenflies and made the garden look summery.
That was until a couple of years ago when they started invading the house. I'm not sure how they get in but I find tonnes of them in the bathroom, the bedroom and now in the dining room. These once charming creatures are now revealed for what they really are - devil worshiping beetles to be hoovered up at the earliest opportunity. I must get round to sucking up the two in the dining room.
I finally got round to dying Chris's hair the other day. He struggles with bleach because his hair has a tendency to go ginger rather than blonde, so he leaves it on for way too long. I'm no hairdresser but I'll give pretty much anything a go so I used the tiny little brush that came with his kit to slap a load of this blue, stinking gunk on his head. 'There you go,' I said, 'now pop the little shower cap thing on and give it fifteen minutes.'
Chris decided against the see through polythene hat and it wasn't until one whole hour later he disappeared upstairs to shower off the bleach - eyes stinging and scalp burning. He reappeared after rinsing it through and blow drying his hair and asked 'What do you think?',
'It looks great!' I said, 'Really, very blonde.'
'It's a bit yellow,' he said, 'put the rest of it on would you?'
So dutifully I slapped the remainder on and left him to potter about for another half an hour. Eventually the burn was too much to take and he rinsed the last of the bleach off his hair and scalp. I asked if he'd used the special conditioner after washing away the chemicals, so his hair didn't become too brittle. 'No need,' he revealed, 'I mixed it in with the two bottles at the beginning so it's been conditioning as it was going!'
I didn't have the heart to tell him that I'd missed a bit and there was a faint but noticeable brown line across the back of his head. Like a little cranial skid mark that only I was privy to. I've since taken the clippers to his head as he felt like he needed a quick trim and the skid mark has all but gone.
I suspect that he's waiting for that 'roots' look to come through so give it another couple of days and I'll be there giving him a short back and sides again. As I already mentioned, I'm no hairdresser, but I've been cutting my own hair for at least ten years and as long as he doesn't want anything fancy, I'm happy to give it a bash. I only really know two styles - short back and sides and skinhead - but thankfully that covers the pair of us.
I've been toying with the idea of writing to an author I've been reading recently but I'm not sure how that would be taken. I'm not a stalker and I don't want to profess undying love to them or anything, I just want to talk about how they write and learn a bit. I also like the idea of being an anecdote they recount in a future publication when they write about this person they had to call the police about. You never know, even though they are an acclaimed author with an international reputation, and millions of pounds in the bank, they might still want a new friend and I could be the perfect stranger they've been waiting for.
He lives in West Sussex apparently but I'm not sure where so I don't know how I'd get my letter to him. I remember as a kid my mum wanted to write to the Queen fan club. Queen the band not Queen Elizabeth. She too didn't have an address and this being pre-internet she took a punt and addressed the letter to The Queen Fan Club, London. Not even an attempt at a postcode.
I might try this tack myself, after all I have a name and there can't be that many people in West Sussex called that. Someone is surely going to be able to direct a letter to the right place.
Disappointingly it didn't work for my mum and a couple of months after posting it her little white envelope was returned to our house on the hill in Oldham.
Address not known.
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