The Landlady is weary of a collapsing ceiling
The Boyfriend, who is still basking in the balmy climes of west Africa, sends me a text every morning to say that he’s been for a run (along beautiful, Atlantic palm-fringed beaches) followed by a swim in the sea. I, on the other hand, have been for a run along Hove seafront, which this morning at least, was plagued by force 9 gales and pelting hail. The English Channel did not look the most inviting under these weather conditions, so I decided not to risk going for a dip…
“My North African lodger now thinks it rains every single day in England”
All this rain is not doing me any favours. My opinionated North African lodger now thinks it rains every single day in England and continually grumbles about it as if it’s my fault. To keep him warm, he eats almost a whole loaf and an entire pot of Nutella at breakfast time and – in the likely event that someone else might want to eat it for breakfast tomorrow – packs in the rest of the loaf in the evening, even though he’s just eaten a large two-course meal. He is a bit of a dichotomy, because he’s very well-meaning and rather sweet (he calls me ‘Lady’ R) yet slightly irritating with his views and a total gannet. Since he’s been here, a familiar aroma has wafted around the house, which has not been in residence since the heady teenage years of The Big Son. Namely it is the rather unsavoury smell of a slightly unclean body, masked by a very potent aftershave. I am managing to rein-in my marginal displeasure, as he’s only here for three weeks and I am away with The Small daughter for one of them. Besides, I really need the money as Landlady Towers seems to have become a giant sieve.
“My North African lodger now thinks it rains every single day in England”
The water which was coming into the back of the house has stopped, as I had the offending bit of roof done – at huge cost – last year. I have started to measure things that I have to have done to the house in terms of how long I have to put up with tortuous lodgers for and the roof, under this bartering system, cost me a very large, hungry French lady and half an attention-seeking Spanish boy.
However, now I’ve fixed the front of the house, there has been a large increase in the water coming into my bedroom. This water, I view as my own personal water, as I am the only one who is aware of its creeping ingress up and down my walls. Due to strategically-placed furniture, no one would know that I’m living in a sieve, apart from me, who lives under the perpetual fear that the ceiling is about to fall in. The thing is, it would only host a third of a North African to fix, but I need dry weather in order to do it. Bah!
