WE missed a golden opportunity at the mega garage sales down Old Bar way last Saturday.
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For we badly need one of those suits the World Health Organisation (WHO) people wear when they're checking for Ebola outbreaks. We're sure there would have been one available in the myriad of garage sales that went ahead last weekend. We probably would have picked one up cheap, as well.
Now fear not, we aren't expecting any such calamities such as Ebola to befall Struggle Street just yet. However, we are concerned that there could be an outbreak of some other malady in the area.
And we blame the season of spring for this. We may have mentioned this in the past, but spring isn't this correspondent's favourite season, what with blooming flowers causing hay fever and the NRL finishing.
However, we have an even greater concern at the moment. This correspondent actually decided to undertake some spring cleaning in the week just past. Really, we did.
And we took on the mother of all jobs. We cleaned our microwave oven.
It was truly a monumental task and one that shouldn't have been attempted by a cleaning rookie such as this correspondent.
It all started innocently enough. We were heating up some repast or other when we noticed that our microwave was looking a tad on the unloved side.
A quick wipe, we deemed, would do the trick. That was our first mistake. No, opening the microwave was the first mistake and we knew we should have had something to eat down at the pub that night, but anyway.
For we soon discovered that the microwave was home to many strange species. They must have mutated in all the heat from the spaghetti on toast we've been frying all these years. Hardened surgeons would have fainted at the sight.
Needless to say it wasn't pretty.
But we laboured on, wishing we had a face mask for safety's sake. It took what seemed to be an eternity but we finally completed the task.
Then, again for whatever reason, we thought it would be a good idea to clean under the microwave. We suppose there have been poorer decisions made in the course of history - Hitler invading Russia quickly springs to mind along with Ricky Ponting sending England into bat in the second test in 2005. But this one ranks right up there.
Whatever the stuff was that had made a home under the microwave certainly wasn't woman-born. We've never seen anything to compare it with. It was like something out of a Stephen King novel we would guess although we've never actually read a Stephen King novel. We're a poorer person for that.
But back to the point. It took sweated toil to scrape it away. We were unsure how to dispose of it once that task was completed but in the end we buried it. That's the last we'll see of it. We hope.
With this complete we were a physical wreck and a cooling drink was needed. Then we opened the fridge and saw the state it's in. It needs a clean even more than the microwave did. So that's why we need one of those Ebola outfits.
If anyone has one spare please contact us at this workplace. Or maybe we'd be better off ringing the World Health Organisation. They'd probably be better equipped for such as task than we are.