By now, you might have gleaned from the blog that we’re really into recycling. We are either a miserable bunch of tight-wads who don’t enjoy spending money, or we just have a really healthy repair-and-reuse ethic. In my case, I would hope that it’s the latter. I think my wife might disagree…

Anyway, to my delight, I found a couple of lengths of timber whist foraging about in a small wood. They had been there for ages because they were wet, mossy and supporting a whole colony of rather slimy slugs, snails, and god knows what else.

After a quick wipe-down, I took them home and fashioned them into a couple of benches, as you do when you have way too much time on your hands. The first bench went back into the small wood where I found the timber, and the second bench has sat in my garden for ages just waiting for a new home.

I wanted to paint the bench in the rainbow colours or red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, but the cost of the seven pots of paint was utterly ridiculous, and then they would have sat in my garden shed for 20 years, never to be used again, so I have had to leave it our usual dull brown. The reason that I wanted to paint it in rainbow colours is because someone suggested that we are a group that is set up to attract just men. Bizarre!! We are a group that welcomes anybody and everybody, as long as you bring biscuits. I was actually accused of being a misogynist. Utter bovine excrement of the worst kind.

So we got the bench in, or rather, Marcus, David and Reece did, because I am pretty useless at doing the physical stuff. The one that I did ages ago was not parallel to the path, so we then had to bend the path to make it fit, so all I’m allowed to do nowadays is just hang around taking photos and drinking coffee… It’s a bit narrow on the top so slightly uncomfortable on the old buttocks. It’s designed for a quick perch rather than the luxurious comfort that your living-room settee might afford you. If I ever come across a wider bit of abandoned wood, maybe I will nail it to the top.

Let’s hope the mob of angry squirrels don’t have one of their hedonistic parties, or the angry person who thinks I’m a misogynist doesn’t call in the misogyny police, and our bench remains intact for all to enjoy. The views are rather nice (even better when the farmer cuts the hedge) so I think it’s a bit of a keeper.

We had our little helpers again today, due to the never-ending school summer holidays. I really don’t know how a lot of people cope with tying to balance childcare, relationships, full-time jobs, and just eeking out a bit of time for themselves. Little wonder that mental wellbeing is under the cosh all the time.

Lastly, we enjoyed coffee and macaroons in our World Famous, or should that be Universe Famous, all-terrain-mugs. I really should order some more, but they are pretty useless to use anywhere but outside. The heat of the coffee transfers through the metal instantly so you end up with burnt palms or ruined furniture. But we love them, regardless.

In other news, our quest for World Domination has taken a rather bizarre twist.

These are the stats for a day, that day being Saturday 5th August. You can see the blog traffic visitor numbers and country locations, for the day so far, which is pretty normal. We have a new county tuning in, Namibia in Southern Africa (hello Namibian person), which is great, but we also have something called “Unknown Region”…

Now I’m not wrong when I say that there is not an inch of this world that is unknown. So who, or what, has been looking at the blog from somewhere not on this planet? Is there life on Mars, or on one of the moons of Mars? This is very very weird and unexpected!!

Lastly, a bit of new graffiti on the underpass.

Maybe the Klingons want to start a revolution in the underpass. Possibly suggest that you work out how our letters work, first. Or go to Russia where everything seems a bit backwards!!

Until next week!