It’s been my day for breaking things or, at least, reducing them to a non-functioning state.
The first casualty was Dolly’s brush, where the handle suddenly collapsed into three separate pieces. I can’t see any way of fixing it, so I’ll have to buy another when I go shopping. Meantime, the mats mount up.
Second was my mouse, a Microsoft cordless optical thing, which decided it can’t make contact with the batteries any more. There’s a springy kind of gizmo inside that’s supposed to conduct the electricity but it’s gone into a sulk and hides itself deep down where one of the batteries go, reducing the whole to a miserable, useless hunk of expensive gadgetry. It did the same thing a while back and Graham fixed it by means of poking around with a screwdriver and swearing at it a lot. Blowed if I can do the same so I’ve put it to one side for him to tackle next week and, meantime, have borrowed the mouse from his home computer.
Third was a glazed picture he’d propped up against the side of his desk and which fell over, shattering the glass, when I was poking around on the floor looking for the end of the mouse cable. I can’t bring myself to feel bad about this one because it’s a bland IKEA print of the house-doctoring kind that I’ve never liked much and which I don’t think Graham values much either. The frame is good, though, and will take another print when he gets home. It was dark by then and I know better than to scrabble around picking up bits of glass when I can’t see them so shut the room off and left it overnight. I’ll do that job today, using a bit of duct tape to collect the splinters together. I’m pretty sure I have an old padded envelope to take the pieces and I’ll use more duct tape to wrap it up safely ready for the wheelie-bin.
Today I’m planning to go shopping, stocking up to see me through to the reunion (Monday or Tuesday, not certain yet). Top of my shopping list is a couple of bottles of Oyster Bay sauvignon blanc for us to sup when we get home–Graham’s absolute favourite. And I seem to have developed an irresistible need for a good, rich, gooey pizza. Haven’t had pizza since before Graham left so I’ll treat myself to a little feast tonight. Might even indulge myself in a half-bottle of chianti to go with it. I think I’ve earned a little treat and I’m sure that the other half will go down pretty well tomorrow if I don’t use it for tomato sauce. Oooh. A mind-b***ering tomato sauce with meatballs. That’s something I can enjoy tomorrow while I’m watching Merlin.
Other than that Dolly and I have had a nice, lazy day. I even picked up my current read–Caesar, by Allan Massie–which I’m determined to finish if it kills me. I don’t think I shall end up recommending this one. I enjoyed Augustus and Tiberius greatly but this strikes me as dull and plodding. I get the impression that Massie thought much the same when he was writing it.
