Honestly…

I’d had a good morning. Dressed in my city jeans, city shirt and city shoes (favourite camel JP Tods bought from the USA), city perfume, city makeup, jewelry, clean hair … you know, the sort of thing you do when you are going shopping. Not dressed up to the nines but a damn sight better than the last five months of aged shorts or farm jeans.

I went to the kitchen shop and replaced some of my aged cooking utensils, to the bathroom shop and bought new loo brushes, to the carpet shop to get samples so that we can replace our damaged carpet, to the hairdresser’s to track down Morrocan oil, to the newsagent’s to buy glue to stick down the tape that binds embroidery hoops ready for next week’s Master Classes.

Then took lunch to the farm for OH who was foot-paring today.

And that was my mistake.

He was in the farmyard close by the barn, opening gates.

‘I need your help to move the barn paddock (all paddocks have names) mob to the yards.’

‘But I haven’t got my boots.’

‘You won’t need them. Take the ute, I’ll take the four-wheeler.’

So I parked my car. Hopped out, walked daintily across damp grass looking down, seeing water stains gathering on the shoes. Sighing. Climbed up (like a rock wall for me) into the ute, and took off into the paddocks after OH. We rounded up the flock and began to drive it toward the yards … not so bad, shoes might dry, and the dust inside the ute mightn’t leave too many marks on my pale blue shirt.

Got to the yards and the mob did the time-honoured thing of stalling at the gates, thinking ‘yes, no, yes, no’ and making a break past us. Stopped them.  Back to the gates. Realised that I would have to get out of ute to start making appropriate sheep-moving noise: ‘Hut, hut, hut, HO!’ Whistling, clapping hands. (The kelpie pushes with a  little too much force so we only use her right inside the yards). Sighed as I jumped down onto sheep poo. Hopped from pad of grass to pad of grass, cursing OH, sheep and life.  Doesn’t he realise how much I love my JP Tods? Stones, dirt, manure … gee thanks, darl!

All done.

He and the contractor began work and I took myself off home, climbing the cream carpeted stair and forgetting to look underneath my shoes to make sure they were clean.

Left a trail of sheep poo all perfectly imprinted with the JP Tod rubber stop marks.

It’s sooo lucky we’re getting new carpet!