Tui and My Gareen Poo

Tui is my houseboy. He comes with the house I rent. Therefore, he is no easier to get rid of than the pine-green leather chair in the living room. Both really should go, but... well... if they were gone, then I wouldn't be able to rant about them here.

Tui has perfected the art of apologizing. Besides drinking whiskey and taking care of the pool, it's really all he does.

"Oh, I sahdy Jil, watuh in poo gareen, I make calean tomodow."

Tui really has only one job as far as I'm concerned: To make sure that the water in my pool isn't green. That, and to change lightbulbs. We're running at about a 50% success rate there: Only 50% of the lightbulbs in my house are burned out at any given time.

The pool has a leak in it, so it loses an astounding inch of water per day. Tui sticks the hose in the pool and turns it on to refill it. Unfortunately, sometimes he forgets and leaves the hose on for 24 hours, so that the pool is nearly brimming. At least then Tui can forget about forgetting the hose in the pool for a week or so. I have $40 water bills. That's an assload of water, trust me.

It was Tui's idea to fix the leak in the pool by digging a 7-foot deep trench around the pool and filling it with cement. I caught him with about 10 peasants armed with shovels getting started on the project and put an end to that idea.

"Tui, why don't we just empty the pool, and then waterproof the inside?"

I've never witnessed a better example of a lightbulb going on in somebody's head.

Unfortunately the lightbulb effect is all that I got. The peasants left, and that was the last either of us made mention of it. I'm content at just paying $25 (out of the $40) per month on keeping the pool full... albeit often green. Tui is content to have forgotten the matter altogether.