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Copyrights reserved by the author. If you are in doubt, please click on 'Copyrights' and read the details. George and Daisy by Paul Main.
"You can't take it with you when you go!" Said my wife Daisy. "In that case, I won't go," I informed her, in the middle of grooming my Grandfather's stuffed owl, which was looking the worse-for-wear. I don't think he'll last another winter. The poor creature takes after me in being set in his ways. Daisy and I have been having a friendly, knife-throwing argument over my frugal behaviour. Asking a man to cast off his entire hoarding, penny-pinching ways is like expecting him to stop wearing pyjamas for bed it just can't be done. "You've got to get a grip on reality and stop living in a wishy-washy dream land," said Daisy, from the pages of her Barbara Cartland. It's not my fault; I inherited a miserly streak from my Victorian kindred. Having to survive on wartime school dinners must have had an effect on me too. I was the only pupil who actually ate all his greens and put my hand up for more. To this day I still suffer sago "frogspawn" pudding withdrawal symptoms. In class I was known as "Glutton George" and I would show off my apple-eating skills, which would include eating the core of the apple as well as the pips. I think I was born an obsessive-compulsive hoarder, stashing away useless objects such as reading glasses with only one lens, odd gloves and an array of pencils, when every time you use them the granite would pop out of them. At twenty-one I met and married Daisy, who believes in getting rid of anything and everything that is showing the slightest sign of wear and tear. The mixture is an ideal one, but with my hoarding, tendencies and Daisy's clear-away mania, our marriage tends to list heavily of empty cupboards and drawerss on her side and a plethora of old tat on mine. The art of scrimping must be practised if it is to be perfected. Take sock darning for example. I have become a master craftsman at it, because I hate having to buy two socks when I only need one, after all, when you have a puncture in one car tyre, you don't normally replace the other three but Daisy maintains that sewing-up holes is a cave woman's job. When not a hole-free sock is to be found in the house, I proceed to thread a needle with wool from an old cardigan wastefully cast aside by my wife. The fact that the sock is black is of little importance. After all, the hole is usually below the shoe line. "Just where has all your making-do-and-mending got you?" Daisy asks in our bedroom. She has a point, take our wardrobes, hers resemble the changing rooms at Harrods, mine, when I open it, could be mistaken for a rummage sale at the church hall. The trouble with Daisy is that she has no imagination for survival; she has even given up accompanying me to the charity shops, all because I insist on haggling over the prices. Daisy is keen on getting a computer; I'm still having trouble with the video settings and the microwave. I fear her next wild move will be changing our car simply because the ashtrays are full. In the end I have to give in over the stuffed, almost feather-bare owl. The owl had outgrown his place of honour over the new hi-fi system, and I had to admit, the owl didn't seem to command a place in my life anymore. On the way to the rubbish tip with the poor creature, I called to Daisy. "There you see, who said I couldn't take it with me?" The End
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