Sparks is not on site on Monday 13th, having a job to do up in Dublin, but he leaves Mum and Dad with a good job to do. They have to spray all the available wood now left in the house for woodworm; rafters, wall plates, lintels, joists, floorboards and any other kind of framing or plank left visible after all the destruction of the last few weeks. This will involve 5 gallons of nasty chemical which are liberally labelled "Harmful to the Environment", Death to Fish, Kills 99 percent of all known life forms and so on. They must tog up in disposable paper overalls , safety goggles and dust/spray masks like forensic examiners from "Crime Scene Investigations".
We, the dogs are included in the "environment" so for the duration of the spraying we are squared away into the caravan and not allowed out. Mum does all the downstairs and shoulder height stuff which can be reached by the nice long wand on the knapsack sprayer. Dad gets to go up the ladder and probe up into the rafters and the roof ridge. The overalls, gloves and dust masks get ruined with the spray. One of the tins is the version with green dye instead of the clear, diesel-coloured oil. The rubber fronts of the fairly cheap gloves bubble up and go all soft when hit by the spray, leaving them looking when discarded' like warty green toads. This all ends up on the bonfire heap. Because Dad has some juice left after all the indoor wood was wet with the stuff, and the pile of tinder wood was well infested and a bit too close to the house for comfort, Dad gave that a good spray over too.
A messy job, but worth doing.
Deefer
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