THE THREE GNOMES

It was a wild morning. Rain smashed into the concrete and the wind threw handfuls of it angrily against the windows. Meanwhile the sky rolled overhead, cruel and battleship grey. I was grateful to be indoors.

I was watching all this from an upstairs window. I could see shimmering slates and wobbly television aerials, and a misty backdrop of sky and water-tower, almost hidden by the veil of rain. Garden fences were blowing back and forth in the wind, and empty washing lines were spinning in their gardens.

My eyes drifted to next door’s garden. They’re the kind of people who like collecting stuff, mostly for their children, and then completely forgetting about it. Like a sort of sculpture park of wild trampolines, old footballs, and broken bits of old toys, the exhibits poke up through the long grass.

There was something new though today. Something different. Standing upright near the back fence between the hosepipe and a pile of old pots, there were three oversized, quite terrifying, garden gnomes.

They’re big. I mean bigger than normal, hip-height. Two are the traditional bearded, big-eared goofs who look like they’d garrotte you with a ‘Hi Ho!’; the other, angled as though he’d just deliberately turned to face me, was a gnome dressed as a rabbit.

He had beady black eyes and a cutesy smile from ear-to-ear. He carried a little basket, and he grinned terribly. Two ears stuck out at angles from his round, shiny head. I almost wanted to call the pastor to ask whether it was theological to cast demons out of porcelain. I had a feeling though he’d have recommended I stop being so silly.

Ears static in the wind. The gnome rabbit stared into my room, through the howling wind and rain, smiling, unperturbed.

“Do you reckon they’re going to put them out the front for Easter?” asked Sammy, coolly. I could not think of anything less Easterish than three petrifying gnomes on the front lawn, an anti-trinity of china, striking fear into the local children. I said I hoped not. I might have to spend Easter in the car.

INCEPTION THE MUSICAL: THE SERIES

Sammy’s into a TV show called High School Musical, The Musical: The Series. It’s taken me months to get my head around it. Here’s what I think is going on.

It’s set in the school where Disney filmed the original High School Musical. The idea is that a new drama teacher wants to celebrate this fact by putting on a performance of, you guessed it, High School Musical in the school. Hence High School Musical, The Musical. Over the course of the series, the kids with all their turbulent relationship and home lives let their various plots intertwine until opening night.

So, we, living in Reality Universe A, are watching kids in Universe B put on a show about Universe C, the HSM universe. In Universe B, High School Musical (C) the movie is also fictional and they’re copying it, fully referencing “V Hudge” and presumably “Disney” as entities that are ‘real’ in Universe B, just like they are in our Universe, Reality Universe A.

And the race is on to land those parts.

There’s also a Universe D of course, the version of High School Musical the kids in Universe B put on at the end of the series. Let’s not worry too much about that one.

So basically we’re watching a fictional show made by a company who have invented a world in which that company also exists and made a movie that really is in our universe and theirs, and that’s being recreated by fictional characters.

This is honestly worse than that time Julia Roberts turned up in Ocean’s 12 and was told that she looked exactly like the character being played by the real Julia Roberts. No, Hollywood. Some storytelling rules are just not breakable!

I guess Zach Efron might turn up in Universe B playing a fictionalised version of himself in High School Musical, The Musical: The Series. I hope so. But if the kids refer to him as Troy, I promise you, I am switching off.

THE SHORT LIFE OF RATTUS

Georgio came by yesterday to collect his rat boxes. He opened them up.

Two hadn’t been touched. The other contained half eaten blocks of poisoned rat bait, looking for all the world like leftover candy floss. Rattus had filled his boots.

“This is great!” cried Georgio, excitedly. “It means you probably only had one, and he’s gone away and died somewhere, yes?”

I never know whether to agree, so I just said yes. Georgio was happy.

“And you didn’t have any bird feeders out no?”

“No. We even asked the neighbours.”

“Fine, fine.”

With that he took the boxes to his van and gave me his business card.

“10% off next time,” he said. I said thanks. I also hope there won’t be a next time.

So ended the short life of Rattus, sneaking away with poisoned candy floss in his belly. Poor Rattus. 

CROSS-COUNTRY TO OXFORD

There was blue sky over Oxford as I beetled along Northway. Just as well too; the journey to work had been grey and wet and kind of annoying. I felt I was owed some sunshine.

I was late, for one thing. I had had to pick up all the soggy recycling that had been blown around the garden overnight. It was unpleasant, picking up bits of soggy cardboard packaging and yoghurt pots half full of rainwater. All the while the cold rain had been pecking me as it spotted from the miserable sky.

I said goodbye to Sammy and flung myself into the car. The engine rattled, the radio piped up, and the car jolted backwards out of the drive while I grabbed the seatbelt. 

About five minutes later, as the cheery presenters interviewed a government minister (who I suddenly thought would make a decent apologist for Lord Voldemort), I realised with a shudder that I’d left my security pass behind. I swung round, raced home and swiped it from the corner of my desk, wondering why on Earth I don’t just keep it in my rucksack the whole time.

Life’s all about learning, isn’t it? The radio presenters barrelled onwards talking about inflation, the BAFTAs, and an athlete who’s gunning for her third Olympics. The trees dripped with rain. The windscreen wipers squeaked across the glass with indignation.

A few minutes later, I was in a queue of traffic on Whitchurch Bridge, scrabbling around for 60p for the toll. I found a pound coin, wound down the window and dropped it heavily into the cupped, manicured hands of the tollbooth operator. She gave me four shiny ten pence pieces in return. It’s ludicrous to think it, but I couldn’t remember the last time I actually saw a ten pence piece.

Then on the other side of the bridge, I was stuck in traffic. There was a lot of beeping behind me, but I just assumed it was frustration. The car ahead was going nowhere. After about ten minutes, a white van, several vehicles back, pulled out of the queue and zoomed angrily past me.

“Where are you off to?” I wondered out loud. He disappeared out of sight. More beeping in the traffic.

“Well there’s nothing I can do,” I said, with a note of resignation. I checked my rear view mirror. The lady behind was looking puzzled. I gave her a smile. She scowled back and then swung her steering wheel round, angled past me, and rushed on, up the road. A thought occurred to me.

I peered forwards at the car in front. There was nobody in the driving seat. I had been waiting behind a row of parked cars.

-

Fiddly roads, Google maps taking me down potholed short cuts in the rain. Oxford gleamed finally, the slate roofs just catching the sun. I turned into Summertown and headed down the familiar tree-lined avenue that leads to where I work.

Of the three ways to get here, the cross-country route is perhaps my least favourite. Pedro listened to me complaining about it as I fished my laptop out of my rucksack. He asked all the right questions. I said I preferred the train, or even the angry, impatient traffic on the A34. My guess is that I’ll go back that way, rather than let the sat nav take me on another tour of Oxfordshire potholes and villages.

For one thing, all I have is four ten penny pieces, and that isn’t enough for the toll bridge.

OPEN-SKY AROMA

I went for a walk this morning. I do this most days. Sammy goes to work; I leave at the same time to make it feel much more like a work day and not just some skyless pyjama day when I can lounge in front of my laptop.

I went round the block as usual.

It’s the first day of Spring today. Well, what I mean is that we’re past the vernal equinox, which means from now on things ought to start to warm up and dry out. Already a few flowers are poking up. The weather though, is only hinting at it. The sky is grey, there’s cold rain in the air and this morning the trees were dripping onto the wet concrete.

I don’t know if I can explain it, but every now and then I get a whiff of the fragrance of life. I mean it - it’s the smell of being ‘alive’, open to the huge wide sky, living big. It’s as though a window’s suddenly been opened on my boxed-in idea of what my life is, and the smell of the real thing rushes in - freshly cut grass, or hot bread, or sun-cream or lemonade, or even a thousand other summery fragrances. For the briefest of moments, I’m remembering something very real about being truly alive.

That happened this morning, just by the trees next to the horse-field. It only lasted a moment but it was all things hopeful and free, like a memory of being young and not having a phone or an email account or a job or a to-do list or social media. As though everything that happened prior to about 2006 was pure and wonderful, and every now and then the under-fabric shows beneath the modern blanket.

I suspect it’s a bit more complicated than that. I don’t think abstaining from the modern world would fix it entirely, though I’ve got the sneakiest of suspicions that it might help.

I gripped the inside of my pockets and walked on. Kids were on bikes heading for school, cars swooshed by through the collected puddles, and birds sang in the trees above. It might just be as simple as taking the time to actually be outside. But again, I think these things can only help, not necessarily solve the problem of not really feeling alive.

When spring picks up over the next few weeks, I do hope we’ll get more chance to do that. There’s so much life beneath the earth, waiting for sunnier days, for warmth, light and freedom.  

THE MASHED POTATO INCIDENT

We recently bought a really nice, three-tiered steamer. At the bottom, a pan for water, then two layers of colander (each with holes for the steam to pour through) and a handsome glass lid. It’s great for vegetables.

Tonight we used it for mashed potato. I love a mashed potato; oodles of lovely butter and soft, crumbling potato. We boiled the potato in the bottom pan and let the steam cook the courgettes and green beans in the top of the steamer. Everything was going really well.

It was my job to do the mashing. I was about to drain the potatoes by holding the base pan over the sink and tipping - that’s my usual method. Provided the boiled potatoes don’t tumble into the sink, it’s a fair technique I think, though tricky to get every last drop of boiling water out of the pan. What’s more, if you’re a glasses-wearer like me, you’ll know the rather obvious problem with holding a pan of near-boiling water in front of your face. Sometimes you just have to peer through the fog and hope for the best.

“Why don’t you use the colander bit?” asked Sammy.

This was, I concluded, a cleverer idea, so I did exactly that. Moments later I was happily shaking the potatoes over the sink, making sure I’d drained as much steaming water as possible. They looked great - just fluffy enough for the masher, so I let them rest on the hob for a moment and swung open the fridge to retrieve the butter. I think Sammy and I have different ideas about how much butter you should use for your mashed potato, so given that I’d been delegated the task tonight, I took matters into my own hands, sliced off two generous portions of lovely butter and dropped them onto the hot potatoes.

As ever, the butter began to melt immediately. I love this part, especially over the hob - it’s as though the butter is so cosy and happy on its bed, it has to curl up and smooth out, gently flowing and melting into the rough cut potatoes beneath. Sammy is allergic to black pepper, but of course at this point, I might have ground some seasoning in to give the mash a little more pep. Not for us though, these days. I yanked open the utensils draw and pulled out the masher.

Squish, press, scoop, tap. It’s a great feeling seeing the yellow butter mix steadily in with the mashed potatoes. A little elbow grease, a little angle of the wrist and it all just merges together in a smooth, delicious mess.

It was at that point a familiar thought occurred to me - one, I think that happens every time I get to make the mashed potato, but I always forget. I tapped the side of the pan with the masher to get the last bits of stuck potato off, and then casually said out loud…

“It’s funny how you always end up with less potato than you think when you’re making mash.”

Sammy peered over to inspect. I put the masher down on the side, then lifted the pan from the hob.

Two things happened at the same time.

One, my lovely wife spluttered into uncontrollable fits of laughter, and two, to my absolute dismay, I realised that the hob was covered in a small mountain of neatly squeezed, hole-shaped tubes… of hot mashed potato! I had accidentally used the colander, and without realising had squeezed half the mash through the holes in the bottom!

I made a whimpering noise and went away to hide myself in my jumper. My face was burning red. Through the muffled fabric I could hear Sammy filming the scene on her phone, still in hysterics. I felt absolutely stupid.

I think life’s like that, you know. Every now and then we do something that takes even us by surprise with its breathtaking silliness. Sometimes it’s absent-mindedness, sometimes it’s deliberate but not-thought-through. Sometimes it’s that central survival instinct that Freud called the Id - the chimp-brain that acts now asks questions later. Sometimes, I guess, it’s much harder to clear up than mashed potato.

To my relief, Sammy continued to find it funny and not infuriating. That helped, though I was upset with myself for making such a basic error. She sent the video to her sister who replied with four laughing-face-emojis - which I guess is the best kind of response. Nobody was hurt. It was just a mashed potato incident.

I hope God chuckles at our silliness. I like to think he does, though I don’t think he likes it when people are hurt for no reason. As if to to complete the object lesson, Sammy handed me the kitchen roll and suggested I cleaned up the mess I’d made over the hob. I thought that was fair enough. I certainly believe each of us should be responsible for each of our messes where we can. She laughed. She loved. She even helped in the end, when she’d got her hysterics under control. I really love that.

RODENT CONFERENCE BLUES

The Rodent Conference is getting me down a bit. I was thinking about it last night, while transfixed by the kitchen floor. Sammy was busy cleaning and washing up, and talking about how we can't leave anything on the sides.

I was just getting more and more depressed.

We now have traps set. A little peanut butter, a little chocolate - baited into a spring-loaded catch. And apart from that two-second dash the other night, the little blighter hasn't been seen. I reluctantly got in touch with Georgio.

"Just bring in one of the rat boxes," he said on the phone, "And leave it with a breadcrumb on top of it yes? To see if they take the bait."

I can't do that. My wife doesn't want me to touch the rat boxes. I was thankful though that we didn't have to call him out. I like Georgio from Ratbusters, but I don't want to see him any more than I absolutely have to.

In my kitchen-floor reflections, I was pondering the real problem. Two seconds of a tiny darting mouse was dominating everything in the house, and had upset all my reliance on systems. I like systems - you know where you are if you have a system: knives and forks go in the top drawer, you run the dishwasher when it's full, you close the fridge properly, you rinse things well and don't leave them on the side - it all makes sense. But then a whirlwind happens, or a topsy-turvy party, or a mus musculus shoots under your washing machine, and suddenly all your systems are interrupted.

That, I do not like. It's like trying to play a song without any idea of what key it's in - scales won't help you till you figure it out; the notes are all just a jumble of black and white levers. And that's frustrating when you know you're a pretty good piano player and you can definitely do better.

And that's what's happened, I think. I've temporarily lost track of the systems. At the moment, the bread's in a plastic tub, the butter's in the lounge; no cutlery or crockery can be left out for any reason, and the pots and pans and roasting dishes are living inside the oven. There are a dozen things to remember, and I can't rely on my old-way of thinking, and it's all the fault of a two-inch long, two-second-quick rodent, who might, or might not be here any more, and who might, or might not be part of a much larger gang of pesky mice, waiting to chew through the back of the washing machine and poo in the sink.

ST PAUL’S IN THE EVENING SUNLIGHT

A London day today. Amazingly, my office is right on the cross rail Elizabeth Line, meaning I can get there, all the way there, without Paddington, and even better, without the London Underground.

Don’t get me wrong; the tube has its nostalgic charm. I do like the warm wind that carries the sound of buskers along porcelain-tiled tunnels. I like the rush of air as trains pull out of the black hole and squeal to a noisy, rattling halt. It’s the sound of museums, tourist attractions, the great grey river, and of course the glimmering City.

What I don’t like though is the feeling of being forced underground along with a thousand grumpy people. That is stuffy and exhausting, and when you’re working, stuffy and exhausting is exactly the last thing you need at either end of your day.

It turns out I work about five minutes away from St Paul’s Cathedral, so, rucksack slung over both shoulders, I headed off there in the evening sunlight. They say Sir Christopher Wren designed it so that the light would be focused inside like a microscope. I didn’t go in though. The sunlight was magnificent enough on the outside tonight. Half in shade, half golden, the columns rose splendidly to its apex roof and famous dome.

It’s always a treat. For one thing, its size takes your breath away. You round the corner and bang - there it is! Imposing, elegant, historic, wonderful! I really like it. And it’s been having that effect since the 1670s, I’d wager.

Having wandered through the twilit streets then, it did occur to me that London, particularly the City of London is a trove of churches. None as grand as St Paul’s of course, but subtly surviving, speaking, and standing, hidden away in the tight network of office blocks and cafés.

It’s quite emotive to see stone spires reach barely the fourth floor of their monstrous glass neighbours. Stained glass, high in the belfry of those old churches must barely glimpse the sun. It’s a little sad really. But I reminded myself, those churches stand. And something tells me they’ll be there long after Metro Bank and Standard Chartered have gone.

There’s more to say about my day today, but nothing that can’t be repeated next time I go in. It was a very pleasant working day.

Faith, whether enormous and famous, like St Paul’s, is supposed to stand, even in shadow, and reach for the sun. But even if it’s dwarfed by the sky scraping towers of glass and metal, it does its best sometimes to stay right where it is, doing exactly what it’s supposed to do. Hold fast.

I’m on my way home. I’ll be glad to get in. I like London, but as ever, I reckon it’s best when you don’t have to be there too long.

MICKEY MUSCULUS JOINS THE RODENT CONVENTION

No sign of Rattus since we (Georgio) laid the  bait boxes in the garden. That’s the good news.

The not so good news is that while the rat’s away, well… put it this way… tonight’s episode of Ben Fogle in the Scottish Isles was interrupted by my wife suddenly leaping onto an unopened box in the kitchen and pointing at the floor with a cry of “That’s a mouse!”

And it was. I just had time to see it bolt under the washing machine. A common brown house mouse, tail disappearing into the underside of the Fancy Samsung.

It’s not quite the same as it is in the cartoons. Neither of us shrieked. In fact we were both really calm (even though one of us was perched on a cardboard box). I stood there, transfixed for quite a while, half-expecting Mr Musculus to pop his tiny head back out for a twitchy sniff to see if the coast was clear. My brain was processing. I had an idea of what was coming next.

Two seconds of scurrying mouse led to a much longer, more extensive debate. Where had it come from? Was there more than one? Had we left any food out? Were there droppings somewhere? Who do we call? What do we do? 

That debate in turn led to two hours of unpacking, repacking, tidying, cleaning, washing hands, washing heads where hands had been, then dumping contaminated clothes into the laundry basket as though they were radioactive. And, perhaps most interestingly of all, taping a large amount of aluminium foil to the edges of the washing machine.

I was sceptical about that one, but I understood it.

In the end we went to bed exhausted from all the mouse-defence work. Every skirting board, every under-cupboard gap and pipe-hole was a potential portal for mice, and in my mind, a whole army of them were pouring and squeaking up from the floorboards.

“I had a friend who woke up with a rat sitting on her duvet once,” said Sammy, settling into the darkness.

“Let’s nip that in the bud right there,” I interrupted, knowing that that kind of thought would do neither of us any good at all. We were both exhausted and needed some well-earned sleep. I silently reflected that if I’d said that I might have got a soft punch in the arm. 

So, Mr Mickey Musculus. Thanks a lot; that’s another conversation with Georgio I hadn’t budgeted for. He’s going to wonder whether we’re not holding some sort of rodent convention.

I closed my eyes. You know, I might never find out what Ben Fogle made of the Shetland Isles.

RATBUSTERS

Let’s call him Georgio. That’s not his name, but we’ll call him that. Georgio the Ratman. From Ratbusters.

No ectoplasm tank, no screeching Cadillac. No hose-burst of rat poison or splintered fences. Georgio wore a woolly hat, a company fleece-jacket, high-vis trousers and a pair of extremely sturdy boots. He carried with him a sort of open toolbox with lots of mysterious little plastic bags in the tray. 

“All external is it?” he asked. I said it was and led him round the side passage to the garden. Something was telling me it would be ‘unhelpful to marital harmony’ to take those sturdy rat-busting boots (not to mention a tray of actual poisons) through the house.

I explained where we’d seen rattus, and when. Georgio set up three traps along the back fence.

“It’s important to speak with your neighbours,” said he, “To tell them not to feed the wild birds for the next two weeks. Then, I come back. There is enough bait in there,” he gestured, “… to finish off a small army of rats, yes?”

The three boxes looked serious. At one end, a rodent-sized hole. Inside, the mystery plastic bags that had been in the tray. I don’t even want to think about it.

Georgio told me he’d be back in two weeks and then phoned Ratbusters HQ to confirm the appointment. Sleety rain sputtered from the sky. I shivered a little. Not, I imagined, as much as the rats would.

SOMETHING STRANGE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD?

I phoned the Intrepids. My Dad’s got rats in the garden too, plus quite a surprising belief that rats don’t like garlic.

“Any strong smells apparently,” said my Mum, casually, as though it were common knowledge.

“How’s it going then?” I asked on the other end of the phone.

“Hang on,” she said, and then relaying, “How’s it going?” into their living room. A faint voice in the background chimed, “Not too well.”

“Not too well,” she boomed back into the receiver.

Apparently the rats took no notice of the garlic on the compost heap and my Dad has moved onto Zoflora, a disinfectant, which we urged them not to try if they were still using the compost to fertilise any vegetables.

Ratbusters (not their real name) are coming out tomorrow then. I don’t much like the idea of paying them to bring death into our garden, but there might not be another way. Sammy, meanwhile, has no qualms about it - chillingly, not a flicker of a doubt. The very sight of old rattus rattus, sneaking across the fence sends her into primordial concern and steel-eyed resolution. Peace of mind, for her, is worth the cost. 

I hope the Ratbusters turn up like I imagine - in a long Cadillac with blue-flashing lights and ectoplasm cages strapped to their backs.

“Step aside, sir, we’ve got this,” says the tall one with glasses.

“Just don’t blow up the shed,” I reply, with about 12% of my brain really really wanting them to cross the streams and blow up the shed while I watch excitedly from an upstairs window.

Anyway. I don’t know what the Intrepids will do if the Zoflora doesn’t work out. My Dad won’t fork out for the Ratbusters. To be honest, I’m not sure I like the thought of it either, but hey, who you gonna call?

OH RATS

“That… is a big… fat… rat,” said Sammy matter-of-factly. She was staring at the garden. I followed her gaze.

Clinging to the bird feeder on the back fence, was an enormous, grey mound of rattus rattus, complete with a long black tail. It was nibbling and balancing there, like a hungry trapeze artist, delicately gripping the wood with its tiny feet.

I watched it twitch in the morning sunlight. Little snouty nose. Tiny beady eyes. Then it scrabbled up the feeder, darted along the top of the fence, down a branch, and disappeared into the corner of the garden, its tail snaking after it.

It will be back, I thought.

“Could we block the hole in the corner?” I wondered out loud. Sammy reminded me that this was futile; these little blighters are resourceful. And this particular fatso seemed cunning enough to shimmy his bulk up a vertical fence. She was of the opinion that rat traps were the thing, and all the sooner, before he brings along his friends and relations for a bit more of the bird-food banquet.

Execution then. I don’t like it. It hadn’t helped that I’d also been listening to a series about the Tudors.

The Internet gives a bit of a feeble nod towards peppermint, of all things, as a deterrent. Apparently, the scent of peppermint drives away old rattus, giving off a pheromone that’s as unpleasant to him as rotting eggs or a forgotten public loo. But the Internet would also like to remind me that (ahem) “poison, poison them all” is really the only surefire strategy.

I think we can start by moving the bird feeder before we call in Ratbusters.