poliphilo: (Default)
poliphilo ([personal profile] poliphilo) wrote2006-12-10 01:35 pm

How The Stairwell Didn't Get Papered

Carl was up most of the night. Evil car thieves had been racing their ill-gotten gains up and down his street before crashing it into some blameless citizen's pride and joy. Carl rang the police, then foolishly sat up waiting for them to show. They didn't.

So this morning he turned up here proposing to paper the stair-well. He positioned the ladder on a narrow ledge over the abyss. It creaked and bent under his weight. Then he asked me to stand under it and help him measure the paper. Look, I've got too good an imagination; ladders scare me anyway- and all I could think of was what it would feel like to be skewered by a jagged shard of metal ladder with Carl's bulk behind it.

We sent him home. 

He'll come back the week after next with his son-in-law. The son -in-law will hold the ladder. And Carl will (hopefully) have had a proper night's sleep. It won't be any safer in real terms but perhaps it will seem so.  At least I'll be able to keep well out of the way.

[identity profile] jackiejj.livejournal.com 2006-12-10 01:04 pm (UTC)(link)
...skewered by a jagged shard of metal ladder with Carl's bulk behind it.

Haha!

I am yearning for pictures of your house at Christmas...must we wait for Carl?

[identity profile] poliphilo.livejournal.com 2006-12-10 03:53 pm (UTC)(link)
We've been waiting for Carl since July...

No, that's not entirely fair- we said he could go off and do other jobs while we rested from his labours.

But will it be finished for Christmas? I doubt it.