Dreams of a man cave
I've experienced being jealous twice in one weekend. Normally I’d keep it to myself, but this is my therapy. I’m outing myself. I was lucky enough to be invited to watch some football and as it’s my favourite part of the footy season, I jumped at the chance.
The sun was sunshine. The birds were singing. What’s not to love about this time of the year?
The event was at a friend-of-a-friends type of arrangement, so it was all going to be a new experience.
When we arrived, we were ushered out of the house. Towards the outside. The football was going to be watched in ‘jealous’ space number one.
The man cave. The bar. The lodge is at the bottom of this person’s garden. I’ve carried out lots of radio reports on the shed of the year and different dedicated super sheds, however, this was my first time being a guest at one.
No work to do. No microphone in hand. Sit back, cold beer, chat and watch sport. It was fantastic.
This particular family managed to create a lovely mix of ‘nearly’ a pub blended with ‘nearly’ a front room. I loved it.
They had music playing. A tiny deck area. A handmade bar with two pumps for beer. Mini fridge. Some spirits. It was fantastic.
I’ve never been in one long enough to let the jealousy cultivate but this time it was kicking in.
I’d love one of these garden-based bolt holes, somewhere that doesn’t have to follow the rules of house decorating.
A space where you can have crazy ideas like a fake stuffed moose head on the wall that’s got a bottle open in its mouth. You can fill it with fairy lights that would turn Nigella Lawson green with envy.
You can feel like a publican until you get bored and then everyone else can help themselves for the rest of the night. It was brilliant.
A great excuse to invite people over as well. I was jealous.
There’s no chance of building one in my garden as my garden is the same size as a barcode on a packet of crisps. I’m going to have to move house.
The second wave of childish jealousy came when they fired up the ‘pizza oven’. This essentially was an open woodburning stove with a pizza oven on top.
It kept everyone warm while offering the host a chance to bamboozle us all with Celsius and Fahrenheit chat. Brought out to the garden were freshly prepared balls of dough that have had twenty-four hours to prove. Hand stretched and coated with sauce, torn mozzarella, and finished with basil and olive oil.
Cooked outside. Stars in the sky. Who are these people and how did they manage to get so organised as to create this alternative universe?
This was the wave of jealousy number two. Cooking outside always tastes better. The pizza outside tastes amazing. Now, I could get a pizza oven in the garden, but I don’t think I could justify heating it up to a million degrees Celsius just for two pizzas.
That’s where this all comes together. Create something that’s so cool you want to show it off and at the same time it creates an excuse to bring people together.
The next day I spent time watching videos of very gifted people saying that building your own Peckingham Palace (or whatever you choose to call it) was as easy as baking a cake.
This I doubted as even when I’m baking a cake sometimes it sinks into a crater. However, I’m going to let the jealousy do the work. Maybe I can join this top-tier group of people who have pubs at the bottom of their gardens.