Men are from Mars; Women are from Venus

The man who converted our house installed a log burner in the lounge. And the lounge is upstairs. People love our house and I personally think that there is a lovely feeling of security when the main hub of the home is on the first floor. However, the gentleman who decided to put a fire source upstairs clearly hadn’t considered the logistics of a log burner. For one, they need logs. And the size of the burner that sits in our lounge belching out dust onto my carpets and furniture is the size of a student flat. One of the mammoth sized logs that it takes would keep a small Scottish village in firewood for a year. Consequently I have muscles in my arms that would rival those of a German Shot Putter due to carrying the fuel for the sodding log burner up the original, steep and downright dangerous stairs. I challenge myself everyday that I can carry more logs than I did the day before. I even bought a proper log bag from one of those catalogues that come free with the Sunday papers. I used to scoff at items such as this. “Bah” I would think, “why not use a Sainsbury’s bag for life instead and you could save fourteen quid?” But the purpose made log bag can carry so many more logs than the Sainsbury’s bag for life. So much so in fact that when it is full my knees are shaking by the time I have staggered to the top of the stairs and I am cannoning off the door frame as I enter the lounge.

Thankfully my Chimney Sweep is always so busy that I have time to organise the loan of a defibrillator before he arrives to undertake the job for which I pay him. When he does arrive (early) with his brushes and home made vacuum created from an oil drum, he always pauses at the bottom of the original, steep and downright dangerous stairs, raises his eyes to the heavens before looking at me with a sigh and a shake of his head. And when it comes to the moment that he needs to check that his brush has popped out the top of the chimney, he asks me to go and have a look from outside as it would take another three hours for him to get down the stairs and back up again. He earns his money does Mr Swimney Cheep, just by carrying all his gear upstairs. I mean, how in the name of all that is holy did the bloke who built the house expect a log burner upstairs to be practical?

I was thinking about all this the other day when I was waiting at the level crossing. I had waited a year and a half for the barriers to lift (Steve Wright had played two songs) and I rang to see why the barriers were still down. It turned out that there had been a power cut and that was the reason that all the barriers in the local vicinity had failed in their down positions. As I found an alternative route around a field and under a bridge, I suddenly realised that a man must have devised the level crossing. Why? Because a woman would never have thought to make the barriers come down and stay down should the power fail. I suppose that's what you would call teamwork.