Back for good

Cavan Calling: At last, after moving three times in six months, we are back in our house. Moving house is a much over-rated pastime. It's exhausting and dirty - it's astonishing how much ink comes off the newspapers used for wrapping china.

It also leads to a severe shortage of patience and understanding. I have lost count of the number of times Tony and I have threatened each other with returning to England. There have been moments when it would have been a race

to get to the airport first. I remember reading somewhere that moving house is in the top three of life's most stressful experiences. We agree entirely.

The house is now beginning to take shape, however. We've both managed to calm down and are starting to enjoy our home. The thing that's concerning Tony is that we haven't managed to get the television sorted out. Tony is a news junkie and likes to watch all the bulletins - just in case the revolution starts and they've forgotten to tell him. The television needs tuning in and a satellite dish fixing to the house.

Someone did come out to do this, but according to Tony he ran off, cursing our builder (who had sent him) when he saw where the dish had to go.

I find this a little odd - I thought satellite dishes were usually fixed to the side of the house. At the moment we can receive only BBC 1, so last month that meant an almost constant diet of sport.

From my point of view the bonus of this is negotiating a very good deal with Tony. I will empty boxes and put things away and he can watch the sport . . . while working his way through the mountain of ironing that has built up during the last few weeks. The deal is working well.

I'm hoping to be able to turn my attention to the garden soon. I haven't been able to do any gardening this year, and I've really missed it. The garden will be a huge project. It is currently a sea of mud, through a combination of builders and heavy rain. Nobody warned us that this time of year can turn into monsoon season.

I've been told that the weather has been unusually bad, however, and that summer 2003 was wonderful.

It is not particularly cheering when it seems that every time you poke your nose through the door you get wet through. My friends in England tell me it has been just as bad there. I suppose that's some consolation.

The main advantage of our acre of garden is that it is a blank canvas - untouched, waiting for me to start. The downside is that I've never gardened in these circumstances. Removal exhaustion has probably numbed my imagination, as I'm somewhat stuck about what to do.

My own gardening preference is for lots of flowers, but I'm not certain a hillside in west

Co Cavan is the most appropriate or feasible spot. I remember a couple of years ago, at the Chelsea Flower Show, Mary Reynolds, a young designer from Ireland, won a gold medal for a garden designed to look like part of the Irish landscape.

I'm trawling through past Royal Horticultural Society magazines to find photographs of it - and, hopefully, inspiration. I would like to have a pond. I love water in gardens.

By the old road into Blacklion is a pool surrounded by rocks and fed by a small stream. It looks like one from a fairy story, deep and mysterious. Given the amount of clay in my garden, it shouldn't be too difficult to create something similar, perhaps on the side of the garden where it would catch the reflection of the moon.

The problem may be keeping our springer spaniel, Millie, out of it. She thinks all water is for her to dive headlong into.

Tony and I often go down to Loch MacNean to walk the dogs and satisfy Millie's aqua lust. It's a very beautiful spot. Even Tony, who's a bit of a lounge lizard, can be persuaded outdoors for a walk there.

There are plenty of places to sit and stare at the lake and for Tony to have a cigarette. This kind of defeats the purpose, but I suppose he is out taking exercise in the fresh air - and it gives him a break from the ironing.

Next week: on the home turf