Wellie Boots And That

The wife bought some wellies on eBay the other day. Green ones. For gardening.

Thing is, our garden isn't even the size of a tennis court. You don't need fucking wellies. You're hardly likely to go down in quicksand or mud, up to your neck. Even if you do manage to get past the dead gazebo - which is still dead and lying on its broken metal back with its legs in the air.

The wellies were never really a necessity. Just an eBay thing...again...

Anyway, the good lady wife, the trouble and strife, is forever banging on about how she's a country girl who used to help out with the harvest on farms for pocket money - but she doesn't know how to put a pair of wellies on.

Me, I was born in Salford and to a large extent brought up in Burnley - I didn't even know what a field was till I was about twelve years old, and wellies were just something your parents bought you because they were cheaper than proper shoes.

But at least I remembered how to put the bastard things on.

"I can't get 'em on!" she wailed. "They're my size but I can't get 'em on!"

Resisting the urge to tell her that it's probably because she's got fat legs, coz I love her really, I asked her to demonstrate.

After much grunting and gasping, she still couldn't get the first wellie on. She got her foot stuck in the heel area. But what she was unaware of, is that I was studying her wellie wearing technique. She had it all terribly wrong.

Now - I've got bigger feet than her, but the wellies looked like they might fit me.

"Give us one here..." I sighed. Before proceeding to put the wellie on in one flawless manouevre. A bit tight, admittedly, but on never the less.

"How did you do that?" she asked.

Now, I haven't donned a wellie for many a year, but I remembered how to do it. So I told her: "You point your foot down the welly, grasp the top at the back, and wiggle...bang. Job done. Welly donned."

"Ooh aar" she said. (Or some similar country expression) "I see."

So then she did it. An expression of pure contentment crossed her visage without comparison since she beamed like the morning sun when we were honeymooning in Rome, the morning after a smarmy Italian waiter made a fuss of her the night before.

Was fuck all to do with me.

Where was I? Oh yes...she's happy now that she can get the wellies on. Although she'll probably never wear them again. She'll probably go on eBay again to buy a box to keep the wellies in, then a wardrobe to keep that and all the other bastard boxes she got off eBay in. With all the rest of the shite.

I'm not quite sure what the point is of me telling you all this...but when I started out, it was intended to lead up to something relating to carbon footprints.

Funny that, and a bit ironic - because in the days I wore wellies I had not the slightest idea what a carbon footprint was. Or is.

I'm tired now. She's gone up. I just hope she hasn't taken the wellies with her.