Today we have made satisfactory progress with our Improvements.
It has been a successful, but rather wearisome day. There was at least one point when I looked about me at the staggering mess that we had made, and felt quite despairing of ever living in a nice house again.
We did lots of things, all at once. This was what turned into a huge mess, because we emptied lots of cupboards and scattered tools everywhere, and every now and again we got distracted from doing one thing and made a new mess somewhere else before going back to the first.
I was glad that nobody comes to see us.
Mark started off by sticking the first of the mirrors up. Whilst he was busy I emptied the glass-fronted dresser, so that he could mend it.
This dresser is a very elderly piece of furniture, which used to belong to my grandmother. It is a bit battered, and a bit crumbly, and bears evidence of my grandfather’s creative repairs, but nevertheless it is still in daily use and holding up splendidly.
It always brings to mind the devastating insult that Alan Clarke once used to describe somebody, I have forgotten who: when he remarked that he was the sort of person who had had to buy all of his own furniture.
We have not had to buy all of our own furniture, which is a good thing when it comes to not being sneered at by Alan Clarke, if he wasn’t dead, but a bit troubling when it needs attention. Inherited furniture always reminds you that you are only a temporary custodian, and you have got to look after it properly so that it stays around for the next generation when you are dead as well.
We are not expecting to die at any time soon, but all the same, today Mark was fixing the dresser.
It has needed attention for ages. The back had flaked away from it completely, so things got stuck down the gap behind it, and it had become very creakily wobbly.
Mark had bought a new piece of board and this morning he cut it to size. He cleaned all the old nails out, and chipped the splinters away with a chisel. Then he carefully fitted the new board into the empty space on the back.
It looked ace. It was clean and sturdy and tidy again.
In the meantime I cleaned the dresser out and retrieved all of the things that had been stuck behind it. Whilst I was doing this I noticed that the fridge, which was next to it, was also looking a bit cobwebby at the back.
I climbed on the stool and took everything down that had been stacked on the top of it. There were a lot of things there. I found fifteen tins of dog food that I had forgotten we had got. We do not give it to the dogs because it encourages a rather smelly sort of indigestion, but I had saved it for an emergency. I thought perhaps I should throw it away, but you never know when you might have another emergency, so I didn’t.
We dragged the fridge away from the wall. It has been there for five years.
I have never seen anything so revolting.
The back of the fridge, and the wall behind it, was black with cobwebs and a horrible sooty fridge-effluent.
Long, furry black fingers trailed down the grille at the back of the fridge, and cobwebs, weeping black clouds of their own, were strung across every inch of the wall.
Given that we do not seem to have very many spiders, it was a remarkable effort of industry.
The carpet was actually invisible beneath a greasy layer of black dirt.
I hoovered and wiped and scrubbed. Then I unscrewed the back of the fridge and scrubbed that as well, which I hoped might make it all work a bit more efficiently. Motors do better when their vents are not muffled with several pounds of greasy black dust.
The carpet stayed resolutely black. I painted the wall behind it and scrubbed hopefully, but it is black for ever. This does not really matter, because it is underneath the fridge, but it made me think that probably I would not be doing any experiments in rearranging the furniture for a while.
Then Mark made an exciting suggestion.
Since the fridge was out anyway, he said, we could start sticking the gold to it.
We would not have time to completely cover it all in gold, because of going to work, but we could do the sides before we shunted it back on top of its black patch.
We did the sides. It took both of us. You have got to be very careful not to make bubbles in it. Then we stood back and stared at it in surprise.
It almost does not look tasteless at all.
We thought that it looked lovely, soft and warm and bright.
We looked and looked and felt very pleased indeed.
I have attached a picture.
1 Comment
Your kitchen cabinet is shrouded in mystery. I think, although I wasn’t even born at the time, that your Grandma and Grandad bought it when they were first married. They lived with my Grandma and so it went into her kitchen, and stayed there for the next 30 years. The details are hazy, it might even have been bought prior to that by my Grandma. However come what may it is at least 85 years old, and approaching antique status. I always loved it.
Your picture is somewhat confusing, the fridge looks black and it seems as if you have acquired another lookalike grandfather clock! Needs attention however, as the time is 6 hours behind the other one.