What a day this
has been … well, what a few days … what a fortnight …
In 18 days I fly
out of New Zealand, back to my Winter Palace, in Yamba NSW, where the sun shine
always (nearly) and the waves schlepp around my front doorstep …
This season’s
first buy was a new ride-on mower. From the Stihl shop. But it’s not a Stihl,
and it will be in on guarantee if it doesn’t start starting more efficiently.
The Drive. It has
been wrecked into potholes over the years by Mainpower and other Public companies
who have dug trenches through it for other folks’ water, electricity, phone
lines, and sogged by the water from the adjacent council land. It’s also partly
shared with the neighbours. But who pays for the maintenance? We do. Call the
irreplaceable Taggarts. $4,000 this week.
Then, the Trees.
In spite of the destruction of our forest in the storms of former years, we
still have a helluva lot of trees. Mostly shelter belts, which, when we had 30
plus horses were needed. Now we have 13. And just as many trees. We’ve had a
few different contractors in (cut only, cut and clean, double act, cut and
clean) and we’d sort of settled into a painful routine. The worst days of the
farmer’s year. But this year our ‘usual’ couldn’t fit us in … so we went
searching for HELP. What? They’ll come tomorrow?
Well, I am here to
say that if you want tree-trimming, hedge-cutting, immaculate clean up in North
Canterbury, call Steve at Tiger Trim (large hedges) and Mike at Grasshopper
(smaller hedges and clean up). They are by Royal Appointment here now!
By 5pm it was a
little splodge of white ash ..
And by 5pm the
season’s final extravagance had arrived. A horse manure vacuum. No more
shovelling! Brent and Kelley delivered it from Ashburton. Alas, we couldn’t do
a test run because the tow-ball didn’t fit …one more thing!
But by and large
that’s it. We’re pretty well in order. I just have to restock the bank account! And here comes the rain ...!
Baby, it's cold outside! |
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