No festivals or kebabs but tip is finally tidied

I was recently asked what I missed most since the Coronavirus lockdown had banished me to Cobweb Castle’s upper turret.

Obviously, I miss having the Boy Childs over for sleepovers.

I miss slipping out on a Saturday night to see a band in a pub, getting slightly merry at a music festival on too much cider and buying a kebab on the way back home.

I don’t miss sitting in traffic jams.

Apart from that, life luckily hasn’t changed much.

Mrs Nurden and I are both working and, at the time of writing, still talking. That’s probably because she goes out and I stay home, typing things like this in my reclaimed office.

The last time it was used properly it boasted a fax machine

(use Google if you are unsure what one of those is).

Since then, the upstairs room magically turned itself into a giant magnet, attracting everything in the house which didn’t have a home.

There were stashes of newspapers saved for essential reference work, a tub of VHS tapes, a machine for printing labels on CDs, two cat boxes and several shelves stacked with 45rpm records waiting to be digitised.

I liked to think of it as an Aladdin’s cave of curiosities. Mrs Nurden referred to it as The

Tip.

The one good thing to come out of lockdown is that I was forced to tidy The Tip. I told Mrs Nurden I have put all the unwanted clutter in the garage waiting to go to the real tip, once I can book an appointment.

In reality, most has been transferred to the spare bedroom used by the visiting Boy Childs.

I have looked at the government’s secret Covid-19 predictions and am confident the grandchildren, now aged five and eight, will both be in their 20s by the time we are finally out of this crisis.

‘The last time it was used properly, it boasted a fax machine - since then, the upstairs room magically turned itself into a giant magnet’