Show me the green stuff
From left, David Nutt, Phil Mills and Peter Fage come to grips with their new machinery at the Taupō Croquet Club.
Inflation is an itch in an awkward place and people are going to great lengths to try and scratch it out.
From the editor Dan Hutchinson
Just this week, the fine folk at the Taupō Croquet Club contacted me to say they are having to mow their own lawn these days because the Taupō District Council no longer does it.
The council, of course, is on a forced march towards rates capping and is busy scratching out all sorts of things deemed not essential, to bring future rates rises under inflation.
And you might not think that mowing your own lawn is a big deal. Of course, the council should not be doing that.
But a croquet lawn is not just a matter of popping a litre of high-octane fuel in the mower and half dozen Waikato Draughts in the fridge.
It’s akin to mowing your snooker table. You need a fine finish, or people’s balls will end up all over the place.
Taupō Croquet Club member David Nutt explains that the closest game to Croquet is in fact billiards.
Keeping a smooth surface is a tricky business and, David explains, one Auckland club spends upwards of $30,000 a year on its surface.
Taupō isn’t quite as cashed-up as Auckland and a classic example of that is the opening of the City Rail Link in the big smoke this week.
There are probably quite a few children in Taupō that have never seen a train in real life.
Trains are for common folk though and croquet is not common.
Mary Queen of Scots played it, and King James of England played a game called Pall Mall which was similar to croquet. The birthplace of that game in London is still called Pall Mall.
Creating an even playing field is essential for the integrity of the game and a trio of men at the club have taken it upon themselves to do the job.
David says it must be possible to control the distance and direction travelled by each shot to within a centimetre.
For this, lawns must be in pristine condition.
David says it is well worth the effort and on a spring day in such a beautiful setting, having fun playing or working with friends, “nothing beats it”, and they are saving a lot of money.
It did get me thinking about ways I could save money and the obvious thing was to stop mowing the council’s grass outside my own property.
Now, that might sound petty to you, but you probably don’t live on a corner on one of those roads where the verge is bigger than the road itself.
I’ve probably got about a quarter-acre of council lawn to mow – just a little bit more than my actual section.
Nevertheless, I know if I stop mowing the verge, it will not get mowed.
Eventually the grass would get tall enough to become a fire hazard, it would lower the tone of the neighbourhood and bring shame to my family.
The other alternative is to chop down one of the council’s large ornamental trees and use if for firewood.
Before you fly into a half-informed, social media-style rage, I would point out the tree in question has only been pruned once in the 10 years I’ve been there and that was by an abstract artist.
Because it is on a corner, it has also been involved in at least two motor vehicle accidents and is not in the best health.
In neither of those cases was the tree at fault, and no-one was injured in these accidents. But I do owe it a debt of gratitude for stopping vehicles that would otherwise have come to rest in my garden.
I propose replacing it with a memorial apple tree. This would have triple benefits insofar as I would get free firewood from the deceased tree, protection from driver error, plus free apples that would self-harvest whenever a car runs into it.
If you have a great idea for saving money, feel free to drop me a line.