A little growth

All growth depends upon activity. There is no development physically or intellectually without effort, and effort means work.

- Calvin Coolidge -

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A drive in the hills, trees, fresh air and sunshine, autumn colours, a walk on leaf-covered paths, Devonshire tea and a slow drive home. That's what I'd planned for today...But it didn't happen.

I spent yesterday in the garden thinking it would earn me a day off to wander around aimless in the Adelaide Hills and enjoy the sunny, but cool, autumn day promised for today. Nope. I ended up spending the day with my work gloves on toiling away at home and, whilst I got a lot done, I'd rather have been eating scones and sipping tea.

I have a large pergola beginning construction in early June, one I ordered all the way back in November last year, and have been clearing away under my existing one which will be removed prior to construction starting. The area also extends from the entertainment area as covered driveway which is where I park my two trailers: Off-road camper trailer and 6x4 box trailer. These needed moving to my other house so I did that in the morning, one by one, thinking that it wouldn't take too long and I'd be on my way to the hills. I was wrong.

To be honest, the moving didn't take too long, but I got home and looked at another job, removing a couple of pull-down track blinds from the existing pergola, which I want to keep, and thought ,how long could it take?

The answer: The rest of the day.

It would have been easier had I taken my chainsaw and sledge hammer to the damned things, however as I have the intention of selling them, returning some of the $3,000 they cost to install, I had to be strategic.

Drilling out rivets, reversing screws and deconstructing it looked easy but I soon learned it was put together in a way that meant it needed to be taken apart in exactly the reverse order it was constructed and, considering I wasn't involved in that process...Hmm, where's my chainsaw and sledge hammer!

I learned something about myself during the process and isn't that a bonus? Personal growth and development often comes from hard work and effort as Calvin Coolidge suggests above.

Here's what I learned:

• Even after all these years of wielding tools I still have the ability to hit my thumb with a hammer.
• Hitting my thumb with a hammer hurts now as much as it did the last time I did it.
• I'm really good at making up excellent swear-word-combinations when I hit my thumb with a hammer.
• I should have written-off the $3,000 and taken the chainsaw and sledge hammer to those fucken blinds.
• I really love curried egg, lettuce and mayonnaise sandwiches. (That's what I had for lunch)

Ok, so maybe I'm embellishing a bit; I didn't learn about the sandwich thing, I already knew that. The rest though...Great lessons indeed.

I got the blinds down and inspected my handiwork.

I'll have to buy some c-channel to replace some that, some how or other got totally fucken destroyed, in the demounting of the blinds but I should be able to return about a thousand dollars for the two blinds and I'm happy with that - It's a lot of donuts and coffee.

I squeezed in a couple other small jobs, packed up the tools, tidied up and managed to get done about 16:30 as the day started getting cooler; that's about an hour ago from the writing of this post.

I washed up, had a coffee and reflected on my day.

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I can't really complain about it as it was productive; the work needed doing and now it's done I feel pretty good. My thumb, not so good, but the rest of me is happy enough. I wandered about my garden and yard areas with my coffee looking at it, enjoying it, making mental notes for what I have to do in the next week or so and thinking how amazing it's going to look come spring. It was a nice way to finish off the day.

I would have loved that drive but maybe I'll take it tomorrow; I've ticked off some chores and without those hanging over my head maybe I'll enjoy it just that little bit better?

How about you, have you had a good weekend?

Were you doing chores like me or did you relax, take time to enjoy yourself with an activity or event? Maybe you even smashed your thumb with a hammer like I did? Let me know in the comments below.