The ice cream scoop of victory

Back in early August when I was feeling blue following my foot surgery, Philippa, Kathryn and Anne came round to share a takeaway. Anne kindly brought ice cream…. and her own ice cream scoop.

Proudly she demonstrated its ergonomic design. She showed us how it thrust through ice cream like a snow plough through…well, snow. No other scoop worked as efficiently.

After they had all left the scoop was still here.

"Probably she’ll pop back for it."

But she didn't.

"Perhaps you could take it round to her, Nigel "

But Nigel was busy covering my household tasks as well as his own. 

Over the following weeks the ice cream scoop shifted from one part of the kitchen to another until finally its role became clear. 

It was to be SYMBOLIC.

When I could walk well enough to take the scoop back to Anne's I would be a good way down the road to recovery.

At last, on Sunday the moment had arrived. I tucked the scoop in my coat pocket and clumped off on my crutches. Anne was certainly going to be overjoyed to see her long lost scoop again.

At the door she was glad to see me and invited me in politely.

Although it was hardly the exuberant reunion of scoop and owner that I had been anticipating.

“Aren't you pleased to get it back?”

“To be honest, Clare, I thought I must have accidentally thrown it in the bin.  So I went out and bought a new one.”

So we are both winners – I am beginning to walk again, and Anne is now the owner of a double-scoop household.

Not for Weddings

Having decided to get doves (see last post), Nigel became proactive. He ordered a dovecote. We were surprised at how expensive dovecotes are, and how large.

When ours arrived we peered inside to see if there were en suite bathrooms with power showers and anti-mist electric mirrors.

Nigel and a helpful neighbour got it pinned to the wall.

Now all we had to do was source the doves. 

We had to be quick as doves need to be cooped up for six weeks in order to bond with their new home.  We had six weeks right now, following my foot surgery, but as soon as I was better, we would need to go away for the weekend visiting our parents once more.

But even with Google at our fingertips we were drawing a blank.

A site called “Preloved” was offering doves.  I was not sure I want “preloved” doves. It sounded a little weird.

But we joined the site anyway, only to find them gone.

Another breeder insisted on answering our queries only in single word answers and after a while, we gave up the struggle. Yes.

Time was going on.

Finally Nigel found a supplier who said, “Not sold for release at weddings” – the hallmark of quality.

Only snag was they were in Great Yarmouth, nearly three hours from us.

We asked the questions we were supposed to:

“Are they bonded pairs?”

“Sorry, no – too young.”

“Well, have you been able to sex them then?”

“Very difficult with doves.”

“And have you wormed them?”

“Don't usually bother I'm afraid.”

Hmm.

But time was ticking away.

“We’ll take them!”

And that was how we came to drive all the way to Great Yarmouth with a large cardboard box, and bring it back again full of snowy white doves.

Feathered Ambition

Doves have been special to us ever since our courtship. When we moved to our current house we were delighted to see that there were doves nesting under the solar panels opposite. (See previous blog.)

However the owners of the solar panels were less impressed and blocked the birds’ access with wire netting. Still convinced that it was their home, the doves returned for a while but soon it became rarer to see them. 

I missed them.

Then I overheard a conversation in an upmarket junk shop in Cornwall. A woman browsing amongst the stuffed owls and Formica table tops was telling her companion how she had been given three pairs of doves as a wedding gift and now had a whole flock.

My ears flapped. My mouth gaped. I looked down to see I was gripping an antique prosthetic leg.

Hastily I put it down and left to ring Nigel. "We could get our own doves!"

Nigel did some research. 

There was an obstacle. In order to feel that our garden was their home, the birds would need to be cooped up here for 6 weeks. 

"But when would we be at home all the time for six whole weeks?"

When I've had surgery on my foot. That's when.

So we are seizing the day and getting some doves. At last I will not be the only one being "cooped up" at our house.

A foot like a root vegetable

A red letter day was looming on the calendar. I was due to get x-rayed to see if my foot operation had been a success.

Fiona texted, "You know, don't you, that your foot will come out looking like a root vegetable. Take fake tan and a razor with you."

So not just any root vegetable then: a hairy root vegetable.

Perran said "Dead skin. There'll be lots of dead skin."

I peeked at my leg just inside my cast. It did look a tad...scaly.

All was about to be revealed. I hoped it would not be so bad that Nigel (accompanying me) could never again regard me as an attractive woman.

Perhaps there is the basis for a reality TV show? 

Forgotten celebrities desperate to revive failing careers could have their legs broken (perhaps by Timmy Mallett with a golden mallet), get put in plaster, and get judged on the quantity and quality of leg-hair and dead skin they managed to produce over six weeks. 

There would certainly be a “big reveal”. Not sure how they'd fill in the other six weeks of the series though.

Perhaps they could follow the celebrities as they discover that having a broken leg doesn't entitle you to park in a disabled space.  Or as they wait for ages outside the disabled loo because it doubles as a baby change facility.

But all this speculation was just a sideshow. Due back to work on Monday, I really needed the op to have worked.

At the hospital I tried to read the face of the radiologist. She was giving nothing away.

Finally the consultant greeted me, beaming. 

The bones had knitted.

Time to move on to a plastic boot and crutches.

“Thank you thank you thank you,” I said.

“We're not home and dry yet,” he said.

But at least the plastic boot covered up my hairy, scaly leg.

Get Well card from Liz