A frolic of her own

Eddie and Ceddie were up at the crack of dawn this morning; as was Gill. Me, I lay stinking in my pit until the day was properly aired. All three of them had the cellar cleaned up, plants watered, and the dogs sorted before the sun pushed its impertinent little face up over the valley's eastern ridge heralding another beautiful day ahead (or so I'm told). By the time I surfaced all the chores were done and the Farm Twins were suitably attired in their signature Sanfor overalls in that familiar fetching shade of pillar box red. I had to pick my way carefully past them for they were painting the edges of the staircase with a white 100% acrylic (no asvesti here). Gill was sitting outside in the sunshine stripping the lavender that she had harvested just before dusk yesterday evening. I sat with her and started my day in the usual fashion - roughly equal measures of caffeine and nicotine partaken as I watched the sun lighting up previously invisible spiders webs rendered gossamer and sparkling like wet silk by the remnants of the early morning dew. They are draped languidly between the olives in the expectation of snaring unsuspecting insects and, judging by this morning's crop, very successful they are too. Further down we could even make out webs amongst the lavender plants.

Gill was the one who had risen first (before 7): the people who live next door are being a royal pain in the arse and doing their best to make everybody's life, like their own sad little empty lives, miserable. Small people - small lives. Well - no dice here. We just refuse to play that game any more. We get angry but we do not get downhearted or miserable. Her next door hanging over her balcony last evening shouting "It'd be nice if you only tried to set light to your own house!", while I'm lighting a nice controlled garden waste burn in the incinerator is but a minor instance of the paranoia that pulses through the otherwise empty space that is her head.

Gill's anger; the very thing that had stopped her sleeping in was soon given vent when she disappeared down into the fields to do some "serious weeding and cleaning up" - her own words. She took her mattock and the curved Opinel knife and the secateurs and gave those weeds and underbrush a good seeing to. Today was going to be a day for implanting new lavender where old plants had tired but first there was energy and spleen to dissipate! By the time she came up for new plants, ready to begin implanting the Farm Twins were painting the front of the house around the front window having finished the stairs and the lip of the garage roof and when a break for frappes at Bellissimo was called the front of the house was finished, the paint was all used up and all of the implants in lav2 were bedded in. Me? I love work - I could watch people doing it all day. Today I did.

This afternoon was another blur of activity as the twins tackled the establishment of a wood pile pit and the removal of the existing pile into the newly lined pit by the front door. The bottom of the pit is lined with the remnants of last year's greenhouse cover and atop that sits a raft of mulberry branches that raise the logs out of any damp. Gill plugged on with implants in lav1 and began tidying and weeding there too. Eddie's services were required to saw up and root out a massive dead lavender but apart from that the boys worked in tandem all day long. By close of play all of the implants were done and lav1 was looking well on its way - now we just need Babbis and co. to turn up and harvest the bloody French. Finally, they took the rakes and, as they have been doing all this week, they took to spreading what used to be lavender hill thinner and thinner on the ground until it is now no more than a few raised inches of fine brown soil.

STOP PRESS: Lindz has got a job - an architect's practice in the Kings Road no less! I'm impressed: 1 interview, 1 job offer, what a great average! Now all it needs to make our week is for OTE to get off of their fat backsides and get our ADSL working again (out since Sunday and strange tales of "maintenance in Iraklion" is the best we can get from their help desk).

AND, we got a letter from Kell (I only vaguely recalled that she could write - that any of them could - but as they've all got degrees (the 3 degrees) I suppose they must be able to) with a DVD enclosed of Little Britain! Will these pleasures never end?