It's Sunday. A story from Jos Biggs for you plus request for any help you can give.
I do not do sewing.
That statement is an absolute.
At the mere thought of having to sew something I turn into a cross between a short-tempered dragon and a jellyfish.
My definition of rich is not having to mend clothes – instead I can throw them away or recycle them, depending on the state of dilapidation.
I have neither the skill nor the will to struggle with selecting a ridiculously fine thread of a suitable colour; and as for threading needles! If I have to do that then the dragon, complete with full pyrotechnics, comes to the fore!
But the other day I reached a compromise. A pair of my gardening trousers had suffered a wound at a point just above my knee. My options were: Throw them away.
Or: do something about it.
I looked at the trousers – there was years of life in them yet, so I took the second option. (Those who are familiar with me will know that my gardening attire would come a close second in a fashion competition with Wurzel Gummidge.)
I assembled all the scissors that I possessed, spread the trousers out on the garden table, stood back and looked at them.
Immediately a snag became obvious – the trousers had a lining; I would not be able to simply cut them off.
Here the Biggs natural cunning came into play – if I turned them inside out I would be able to cut the lining first.
The second scissors I selected proved equal to the task, and in short order I had demolished the lining.
Now it was simply a matter of cutting the outer layer. Cue Snag #2. How to make sure that both truncated legs were of the same length.
What the heck! I straightened them out as best as I could without the assistance of a slide rule, a set square and a plumb line and commenced cutting.
I now have some brand newish gardening shorts with only very slightly unequal leg lengths.
Even despite this glorious triumph I doubt that I will be invited as a contestant on to the Sewing Bee!
I don’t know what to do – I’m stumped.
It’s the ongoing cat problem. I’ve done everything recommended by the very caring vet from Nexo, and it did improve the situation somewhat – Si has gone from a patchy coated hat rack to her normal sleek shiny black self physically, but she is still a quivering wreck.
She has ‘her’ room (my bedroom) with her mat for her own food bowl and her own water bowl; she has her own bed with her own blankets, and her own litter tray discretely tucked away beside the toilet in the en-suite bathroom.
Her son, the cause of all her problems, is not allowed into the bedroom, and he knows that, so when she is in the bedroom she is fairly calm, but she can’t spend all day and all night every day and every night in just the one room – at some point or another she will have to come out into the rest of the house and the garden.
But it’s not a good experience for her. She is constantly looking around to see where he is – she can’t enjoy being outside as a cat should be because she is continuously on the alert, and it takes its toll on her.
I have to find her another home, and to that end I fathomed out how to take a picture on my phone, but I have totally failed to get the picture from the phone on to anything – Facebook, Whatsapp, even on to the computer.
I can’t bear to go on having an animal in my care so stressed and unhappy – she needs a complete change of scenery.
I keep telling myself that it’ll get better, but it hasn’t – this state of mental turmoil for both of us has been going on now for about 18 months, and I don’t think it is going to get better.
She needs a fresh start. And I need help finding it for her.
