Tinkering with tools of the trade
22nd January, 2007
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Not possessing anything worth stealing, I have never been overly concerned about thieves. No one has shown the slightest interest in nicking the grease-encrusted barbecue that sits outside or the timber table complete with chairs that, as recorded here previously, regularly collapse beneath guests.
Since Christmas however, this has changed and we are now the proud owners of a brand new outdoor setting. There is some history to this - approximately two years and three months ago, when I moved into my apartment, I went to a hardware store and bought a large quantity of sandpaper and an electric sander. These I would use to sand back the second-hand buttercup yellow wooden table, complete with significant alcohol stains and six chairs, which had been given to me by friends. Sanding complete, I would paint them and then, beer in hand, stand back to admire their gleaming new livery and practise smiling modestly for when visitors remarked on what an adornment they were to my otherwise simply furbished abode. The sandpaper is still sitting in a kitchen cupboard and the sander has never been out of its box. Somehow I have always been able to find something better to do than sanding back and painting furniture.
"It's never going to happen is it?" my wife would taunt, her lip curling in distaste as she regarded the tins and blistered, peeling paint.
I was not consciously trying to wear the poor woman down, for I honestly intended to paint it, but after 27 months of my procrastination, her patience snapped and she bought me an outdoor setting for Christmas. It's so clean, I barely dare to eat off it. It has a glass top that shines like a mirror. You can look down on it and watch yourself eat, not a particularly uplifting experience in my case. So impressive is it that I now live in mortal fear of someone climbing over the fence, scaling the side of the building, and making off with our new chairs. I come home and rush to open the blinds to check if the chairs are still there. Some days, when I am feeling particularly paranoid, I bring them indoors and stack them up in the living room. I also have been forced to concede that I will have to buy a new barbecue as the tawdry state of the present one has been highlighted by the shiny new table. I have explained to my wife that I am loath to do this because it had belonged to a friend who bought it, used it once and dropped dead. His sudden and unexpected demise had nothing to do with his cooking which, while being nothing special, never actually killed anyone. It was, rather, a heart attack that did it for him. When I was gathering his possessions and cleaning out his effects I decided to help myself to his barbecue, bringing it back to Australia at enormous expense as a memento.
"Anything to declare, sir?"
My mate was in no position to object and it seemed like a very Australian thing to do. My wife thinks I have concocted this entire story as part of an elaborate scheme to avoid buying a new barbecue and that having squeezed a new table setting out of her, I am now working on wearing her down until she buys a new barbie. This is not true, although I am flattered that she thinks I am capable of being so creative in my storytelling and conniving in my machinations. The new chairs are wonderfully sturdy, although now that guests do not suddenly disappear as their seats splinter beneath them, our social gatherings have lost some of their spontaneity. |
