Just what is a gadget?

The Oxford Concise Dictionary defines a gadget as a small, ingenious device or tool.

I would go a step further and say that a gadget is a small ingenious device or tool that you thought would be invaluable at the time of purchase, but in actual fact was never used. I would also include ’devices or tools of any size’.

We moved to Onchan about nine or 10 years ago, after our country cottage in Greeba, our home for 46 happy years, had become incompatible with Parkinson’s Disease.

We now live in a three bedroom bungalow that you would have thought would be more than adequate accommodation for two elderly folk to live out their lives in peace and comfort. And so it would be if it wasn’t for gadgets and stuff.

I like gadgets. I think they’re great, and I can’t imagine a world without gadgets.

One of the best things about them is that when you eventually realise that the bread slicer that you bought is in fact, not the best thing since sliced bread, you can usually persuade someone else to adopt it.

I thought that, starting with the outside, I would do a quick stock-take of gardening gadgets and stuff. I won’t bore you with lists but, considering that we only have a couple of small plots of grass, two greenhouses and two hedges, and taking into account the fact that an itinerant gardener called George cuts the hedges, we have enough gear to make a living out of a decent sized small-holding.

Not to mention a garden shed which is stocked with enough tools to build a larger garden shed. Anyway, nothing to get rid of in that department.

OK then, let’s take a look inside the kitchen.

Electric coffee maker, food processor, blender, slow cooker, ice cream maker, a couple of juicers...

I’m all excited about the two new, absolutely indispensable, important pieces of equipment that I have just had to buy, and can’t wait to tell you about.

I may have mentioned in the past that I am addicted to jigsaw puzzles, and the bigger and the more complicated that they are, the worse the addiction becomes.

I normally do my puzzling on a flat board that I store under the bed, with the loose pieces spread out onto a second board, also kept under the bed.

As you can imagine, it’s not particularly convenient. So I did a spot of research on Google, and there it was, a flat board 36ins by 27ins.

The board was in fact a sandwich construction with a plain top and four slim drawers, (two each side) to spread out the loose pieces.

I matched up the puzzle board with a wheeled, adjustable, (height and width) trolley that also had tilting deck. The thing was designed to fit over a bed, or in my case, roll effortlessly from room to room. Brilliant.

The second essential piece of equipment designed to help the progression of a elderly man through his autumn days can only be described as luxurious.

Now it must be a long number of years since I had a bath.

No, I don’t smell, I shower. I think that having a shower is quicker, cheaper and safer than climbing in and out of the bath.

The one snag with either method of keeping clean, is getting dry afterwards. I have often thought that it would be a good idea to have a full size body drier shaped like an Egyptian sarcophagus. It would be hinged to open and let you in, then closed and heated, to dry you off.

I Googled Egypt but there were no second hand sarcophagi for sale, so I tried ’hot air driers’.

I was talking to a foreign gentleman, who coincidentally sounded just like an Egyptian, and knew all there was to know about hot air driers. My miracle arrived last week.

It’s slim, white, full of holes, and does the job in spades. Wonderful!

* A decade ago Pullyman - aka Michael Cowin - was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease, a condition that affects people in different ways. Michael discovered writing and Island Life is featuring some of his musings. Sometimes topical, sometimes nostalgic, read about life as seen through the eyes of Pullyman.