Perhaps you recollect about a month ago I regaled you with the saga of my attempted assembly of a waterproof cover for our chariot, well here is the next, and I sincerely hope last instalment. After breakfast this morning my neighbour arrived all ready to help me to put the wretched thing together. Because of the layout of our garden space is limited and the thing appeared to require an inordinate amount of space in the construction stage he suggested that we do the job in his back garden and it seemed like a good idea at the time. There were three of us, although the instructions claimed that one or two people would be enough, the idea was the Pa would take photographs of the construction at key stages. We got out all the pieces and off we went. As I mentioned before, the instructions were no use at all and were to put it politely somewhat misleading. After a while it became apparent that it would need two of us to hold the thing together while the other secured the screws in place, so the camera was put aside.
Having assembled the main frame we decided to take it to its permanent location to finish the job, at this point we discovered to our chagrin that it would not fit through the arched gate in my neighbour's garden, so with some muttered oaths we disassembled just enough of it to get it through the gate. This took a considerable amount of time. Mean while indoors my son and his fellow dungeoneers were unbeknown to us ordering pizza for lunch.. Having hauled the thing to its allotted space outside the front door we reassembled it and went on to the next phase, putting on the cover. On this subject the instructions were not so much vague as total gobbledygook and so as they say we were winging it.
The frame resembles a huge pram cover and there was no indication as to which end was the front so of course we started off by fitting it the wrong way around. Realising our mistake we turned it with great difficulty and began again. The instructions had said that one person should be inside to fix the Velcro straps to the struts, I started off inside the thing, God it was hot in there. After about twenty minutes all three of us were inside holding various bits together and trying to release my hair which was hopelessly entangled in the Velcro and at this point unbeknown to the three of us the pizza delivery man arrived. According to my son some of the remarks such as “I can't get it in.. and “you've put it in the wrong hole,” were misconstrued and together with copious amounts of cursing were the cause of a good deal of mirth.
The heat was unbearable and calling loudly for iced water we emerged like three dishevelled butterflies from our PVA cocoon! It actually began to resemble the photograph on the box and we congratulated ourselves as we drank our cold water, thoughtfully provided by my son - he and his comrades had until then limited their involvement to offering words of advice and discouragement and frequent bouts of raucous laughter. We could not have got any more people under the damn thing anyway. We were as it turned out premature in our celebrations, in order to fit the penultimate piece it was necessary to pull one end of it to pieces yet again, all former swearing was as nought compared with the language that this discovery called forth.
The final piece we were not able to fit at all as we had during the course of our peregrinations lost a couple of bolts. In spite of this the blasted thing was up and usable and we all staggered off to recover from our exertions. I am not convinced that the cover will not blow away in a strong wind and intend to add some weight to the seemingly flimsy pegs which are supposed to hold it down and the final part will be fitted as soon as I buy replacement bolts. One thing I am sure of is the cat Twiggy will adore it, she was inside as soon as we had finished and I am sure she thinks that we put it up for her especial use. Later after everyone had gone we had the steak burgers I had prepared earlier with buns, lots of caramelised onions fresh tomatoes and salad. I do not think that my back will ever be the same again but much worse are the aching ribs caused by several hours of laughing my head off, during the construction and after when my son informed us of the effect that our pantomime had on passers by of which we had been completely unaware. If there is a moral here it escapes me at present, unless it is “Laugh and the world laughs at you.” Or some thing like that!
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