Granny Shed, My Arse!!

Ok, so since my shoulder operation, I’m doing a bit of a social experiment. I need to gauge how well my daughters are going to look after me in my old age and where – if they have any – their particular caring attributes lie. The strongest old age bum wiping candidates so far are definitely daughters 1 and 2, with daughter 3 a close third and daughter 4 bringing up the rear, (excuse pun) with her comment just now of: which shoulder is it? 5 days after the op.

Last night, I was being vociferous about an itchy armpit. Go upstairs and check it out Mum, daughter 2 said helpfully. She followed me up, which I took as a cue for her willingness to take part in an examination. She helped me off with my t shirt, but physically recoiled at the thought of any close inspection. I know what I need, I said, talcum powder. Daughter 2 looked confused. That’s what you use for greasy hair, she said, perhaps thinking I had let a bush grow under there. Ah, talcum powder – that old bastion of traditional baby bathing. One minute everyone was liberally sloshing it over their sprogs, like pouring icing sugar on a Victoria sponge and the next minute – oh my god, that’s going to kill them – stoooooop!!! Bloody hell, it’s not like we were all pouring the stuff down their cake holes, but no, it’s the next deadly weapon, arsenic, cyanide, Johnson and Johnson’s talcum powder…

For my first day’s teaching, daughter 1 put my hair up for me, thus catapulting her to top of the future bum-wiping pops. She also cooked tea for that evening and told me off for over-doing it in class. Daughters’ 2 and 3 have shown a generalised concern, with daughter 2 texting me the day after the op on her Dad’s weekend to check how I was – this got brownie points. Daughter 4 ‘liked’ a photo I put on Instagram unrelated to shoulder and tagged onto this some concern.

So, with four daughters, in theory I have plenty of hope that one of them will wipe my arse in old age. Meanwhile, speaking to my mum tonight, she tells me that my little sister has been researching granny pods to stick at the bottom of the garden. Why would you want to be shoved in a shed, I cried, when you own a perfectly gorgeous house? She forwarded me the details. Sheds these are most definitely not – I’m sure I saw Grand Design’s Kevin McCloud, peeping out of one of the floor to ceiling, bi-fold glass doors. From which, one can scoot safely on a zimmer across the decking, past the tumbling water feature and down the garden to the grandchildren. I showed the girls. I reckon that I could quite happily live in that at the bottom of one of your gardens, I told them. There were no replies forthcoming, just a lot of feet, scuttling away.

Kevin McCloud and I both approve of this Granny Pod