Monday 24 September 2007

The glad game

Admittedly leaf blowers are one of the most ridiculous and disgracefully wasteful gardening tools invented. You all know and think that – in fact I think we could conclude that it is a given as Kerry O’Brien repeatedly stated in his interview with the PM last week on the 7.30 report (the power of KathnKim what).I cannot for the life of me understand how Diana Bubbles Fisher supported the leaf blower machine on the Inventors, particularly with its rather utilitarian colour scheme – the only functional thing about the mother,leaf blowers not Bubbles.

Saturday just past was an exceptionally blowy day in Sydney – the type of wind to whip up school kiddies and murderers. I strolled down the road to purchase my newspaper wishing that the newsagent would just let me buy the Spectrum but remembering how she got annoyed with me when I left the other section wads last time – and while she is always polite, excessively so, I feel that a serial murderer or feverish poison pen letter writer lurks at her inner core waiting to be revealed by Alan Bennett, so she must not be crossed, when I passed the Anglican church and witnessed Reverend Philpot and four male seniors (grey power?) in the midst of a gardening frenzy.

Boughs were being felled, clivia uprooted and one senior was using a leaf blower with a fervour that’d make Paul the Apostle seem docile, let alone sane. Talk about a whirling dervish. There were leaves already blowin’ all over the joint without the good padre’s little helper pointing that ridiculously noisy and insensate nozzle everywhere. The prospect of heaving all them Saturday sections home and the frightful wind were already placing the Mistress in quite a fit of tetch but senior and his leaf blower formed the final bee in my bonnet.

And then my blasphemous thoughts and state of vexation were interrupted by a curious longing and need for a sugar dusted jam doughnut so I bought one from Victor’s Patisserie. It was duhlllishous.

7 comments:

David Nichols said...

On a recent visit to a well-known regional NSW town this week I saw a man in council getup with a leaf blower chasing a solitary leaf down the otherwise (but for him and me and it) deserted mall at 8 am. I thought, gee, he's dedicated. The next day same time and place same man doing roughly the same thing. I realised, oh, he's just an unpaid eccentric in a council fluoro jacket.

Mistress Bel said...

Or was it a tribute to Marcel Marceau?

A fluoro jacket is a passport to all forms of important business these days. I like to don one of a Saturday morning when i do the household chores and take out the recycling.

Leaf blowers are more coveted than metal detectors these days.

boy moritz said...

My Dad raised us on leaf-blowing. I'll make sure he doesn't see this.

Anonymous said...

My only regret about our leaf blower is that it is electric and therefore has to be plugged in and restricts one's range to close to the house. I would love to roam free through Wipples with the blower. You may not be aware Leaf Blowers also suck up stuff too . Everyone in Bendi wears fluoro jackets now.

Mistress Bel said...

They certainly do not seem to act like Hoovers; they just seem to blow leaves about. Surely they would go by the name of leaf catcher if they did something remotely constructive. It does make me wonder whether you have the same drama with leaf blowers as you did with Hoovers i.e. when the smell of burnt rubber signifed the HOover's belt breaking and its guts about to spill over the carpet.

I was thinking of giving a lime fluoro vest to that Daddy Hairs for his b'day but as everyone is already wearing them in Bendi, the Daddy has no doubt just set another trail ablaze.

Anonymous said...

I can confirm that some leaf blowers do suck. These models trail a huge scrotum which plumps up the more leaves one sucks.

On flouro jackets I saw one in the vicinity of Galston Gourge that brought the mistress to mind; learner driver at the wheel beside instructor wearing vest. Peripheral vision issues there.

Mistress Bel said...

yes you are right Tom. FJG has one of those and i took a snap of her using it. I should place it on blog.

Peripheral vision when motoring could be a problem. I am concerned about my dicky perpetually ricking neck while motoring.