Decisions, decisions......

Baggy and Calum took Gloria Gardener over to their other house today. Clever Bird was worried that the place looks so neglected. Despite the contract for the tenants clearly stating that they have to maintain the garden the last one didn't touch it. There is a little border all along the front of the cottage and it is so overgrown that it's crawling up in front of the windows. Well, it was. No more. Three hours of cutting, pruning, weeding and digging later, the border looks rather neater. Sadly although Calum and Gloria did a sterling job, Creative Clara not only forgot to take before pictures, she also forgot to take after ones. So you'll just have to take her word for it, that they worked very hard.

While they were there, four different locals, two of whom neighbour the cottage, tried to persuade Calum and Baggy to move in - because "the house deserves to be loved again". Hmmmm! But for the first time Baggy actually managed to be at the house without crying, so that's a step in the right direction. The poor place is so neglected though. All the carpets need replacing. The very large dog who's been living there has wee'd on most of them and contrary to the estate agent's view that they were okay because they've been professionally cleaned, they really are not okay. The whole house needs painting inside and out, but there's not much point in doing that until the three roofs have been totally taken off and re-laid. The garden is a jungle - but as it doesn't legally belong to the house it can stay that way until the situation is resolved - or not. The damp is terrible! Hopefully the roof being fixed will sort it, but that too remains to be seen. Just having all the windows open today for a few hours seemed to help - but the smell! The smell has been there for as long as Baggy's Dad lived there and Baggy always thought it was the smell of stale tobacco smoke, as her Dad was a pipe smoker. And, no, it wasn't one of the lovely fragrant tobaccos, it was a really pongy one! But her Dad died over four years ago, so there's no way that was the smell. The smell was, and is, the damp! It wafted out of the windows as Gloria and Calum worked. But damp or not, it still reminded Baggy of her Dad's tobacco, but this time, instead of that making her cry, she found it rather comforting.

Having made a tiny start on getting the cottage looking a little more loved, Baggy and Calum felt a lot better about it. They now feel that they can probably do quite a lot of the sorting out themselves - time permitting. Then they need to figure out what to do with it once it's sorted. Every time that Baggy thinks she's made a decision...........