I was meeting a client at the weekend in the Odeon on Harcourt street and there were copies of Top Gear’s Jeremy Clarkson’s book, “The World According to Clarkson” on some of the tables there. I think it came free in the Sunday Times.
It’s a very funny book if you like Jeremy Clarkson‘s type of humour and I thought I might give you an extract of it here which gives a funny perspective on DIY around the house:-) I hope you like it whether you are a tradesman, a wannabee DIY expert, or a frustrated spouse married to a wannabee DIY expert!! Its a few years now but it still might make a good pressie for Christmas if you’re looking for ideas…
[Start of Extract]
Sunday 7th January 2001
Another Day’s Holiday? Please, Give me a break
According to a poll, the vast majority of people questioned as they struggled back to work last week thought that England should have followed Scotland’s lead and made Tuesday a bank holiday.
Two things strike me as odd here. First, that anyone could be bothered to undertake such research and, second that anyone in their right mind could think that the Christmas break was in some way too short.
I took ten days off and by 11 o’clock on the first morning I had drunk fourteen cups of coffee, read all the newspapers and the Guardian and then… and then what?
By lunchtime I was so bored that I decided to hang a few pictures. So I found a hammer, and later a man came to replaster the bits of wall I had demolished. Then I tried to fix the electric gates, which work only when there is an omega in the month. So I went down the drive with the spanner, and later another man came to put them back together again.
I was just about to start with the Aga, which had broken down on Christmas Eve, as they do, when my wife took me to one side by the earlobe and explained that builders do not, on the whole, spend their spare time writing, so writers should not build on their days off. It’s expensive and it can be dangerous, she said.
She’s right. We have these lights in the dining room which were supposed to project stars onto the table below. It has never really bothered me that the light seeps out of the sides so the stars are invisible; but when you are bored, this is exactly the sort of thing that gets on your nerves.
So I bought some gaffer tape and suddenly my life had a purpose. There was something to do.
Mercifully, Christmas intervened before I could do any more damage….
[End of Extract]
Well that’s it, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. If you didn’t pick up the Sunday Times at the weekend you’ll have to buy the book to see how it ended 🙂 And if you are a wannabee DIY expert, or a frustrated spouse married to a wannabee DIY expert, just remember, you can get all of that stuff fixed around the house by posting your job on www.tradesmen.ie!!
Best Regards
Oliver Dempsey
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