My wife said ‘I’d like a new kitchen’
And I had a Saturday free
With ambition designs for the project
We both had a wild spending spree

We picked up a range made of flat pack
And then went to the café to eat
The choice of hot food was extensive
And we both had a Swedish meat treat

My mancave was short of some gadgets
So, I thought I would pick up a few
You know, gizmos I’d need for the project
You can find in a big B & Q

Like chrome plated long nose snipe pliers
With a bright coloured high friction grip
A high-powered well-balanced hand drill
With a full set of carbonised bits

To help with the cutting and drilling
I bought me a fancy work bench
I got several adjustable spanners
And an American style monkey-wrench

With devices galore in my kitchen
A heart full of hope and a song
The flat pack was open and waiting
And a belief that nowt can go wrong

The kitchen was stripped of its cupboards
(Destruction sound so much like me)
The skip filled with trash and detritus
The air filled with cursed deities

The cupboards assembled, but wobbled
With left over dowels and screws
They collapsed right back into flat pack
And the air turns a little more blue

It can’t have been too many gadgets
So clearly, I needed some more
And after a hot steamy cuppa
I bought most of the rest of the store

I picked up a taper pin punch set
The label said “high tension steel”
I don’t know if that makes a difference
I just thought that it had a nice feel

Who needs a wall grooving chisel?
I don’t know but had one to hand
A magnesium carbon disc grinder
In case I was tempted to sand

I tried ultra-thin premium somethings
A large milling thingamajig
A jig made for holding a widget
And widgets from small up to big

By midnight the flatpack was kindling
There was no Sunday roast the next day
There were no scrambled eggs Monday breakfast
For a week we just ate takeaways

Come Friday raw bacon and sausage
Were beginning to look appetising
The wife gave me fairly blunt warnings
That showed her blood pressure was rising

It was time for a nail gun and ladder
And extension bars for my all sockets
It was taking so long I bought knee pads
And a tool belt with 15 large pockets

The riveting gun seemed quite boring
But I just loved the boring device
I had not a clue how to use them
But simply to own them was nice

Counter sinks for sinking the counter
A compressor for compressing some air
I also bought 3 different augers.  No reason
But because they were there

With the credit card pushed to its limits
And a month filled with heartache and trouble
I was craving hot food or a cuppa
From a kitchen all gadgets and rubble

But every contraption just vexed me
I was starving and then lost my cool
I condemned all of the useless devices
My wife just blamed one useless tool

We had not had a hot meal in ages
Since the meatballs we bought at IKEA
I guess gadgets are pretty much useless
If the one using them has got no idea

I was talking to a friend last night, it was idle, beery chat
Footy and his sports car and other simple things like that
We talked about computers and why his was always pish
And also, in the world today how they’re so ubiquitous

He said he was frustrated as his always let him down
She never works, he stated, with a personal pronoun
I said hold on a minute, could you please explain to me
Why use a gender pronoun? Why define as he or she?

He explained it was a woman.  It makes irrational demands
That only its creator can truly understand
It’s always talking in the background and I don’t know the code
So sometimes without warning it will randomly explode

It remembers everything I’ve done; I think that this is evil
And this gets me into trouble with its unforeseen retrieval  
And as soon as you have got one you then get a big surprise
As you have to shell out weekly keeping it accessorized

Happy with this logic I got up to buy more beer
The barmaid wasn’t happy and she made that fairly clear
I heard that conversation and your friend is talking *****
Okay I said. I’m listening.  So tell me what is right

Like a man, you want a good one, but you have to wait for years
But as soon as you’ve committed a better model then appears
They’re supposed to make things easy and minimise mayhem
But half the time the problem to be solved was caused by them

They are full of useless data and they can’t think on their own
When you get one you’re excited, that is until you get it home
They never tell how you look in your favourite little dress
And they are easy to manipulate if you know just where to press

It is good to have a backup because the main one can go wrong
And you won’t get their attention until you turn them on
And no matter what they tell themselves when they have their little chatters
Like certain other things in life its how big they are that matters

As a language it is easy, and anyone can see
To reverse the meaning of a word is elementary
To say ‘not well’ is 2 words. Why not pare it down to one?
Just take a word and prefix it. To reverse it just add ‘Un’

‘Un’well is also poorly, which is never any fun
The opposite of doing it, is leaving it ‘Un’done
If it ain’t fair it’s ‘Un’fair. If not kind then it’s ‘Un’kind
A contract with no autograph is a paper that’s ‘Un’signed

So like I said it’s unhard to make a word reverse
Simply add an ‘Un’ to it and it becomes its own inunverse
But so often with the language a rule can be misunleading
And there are other prefixes. To learn them keep on reading

It’s ‘A’ if it’s not typical, which might sound rather bland
But a ‘Mis’ if you can’t fire or you didn’t understand
It’s an ‘Il’ if its not legal, but an ‘In’ if unsecure
An ‘Ir’ makes it not regular and an ‘Im’ says it’s unpure

It’s a ‘Dis’ to uncontinue, it’s a ‘Post’ if it’s not ‘Pre’
It’s not ‘Un’ but prefix ‘Counter’ if you fight insurgency  
A friend nor longer friendly is not an ‘Un’friend but an ‘Ex’
But yes, it is the prefix ‘Un’ if it’s not what you expect

I will ‘An’ to your aerobic I will ‘Anti’ to your freeze
I will ‘Non’ if it is undescript just to put you at your ease
This might seem overwhelming but before I simplify
Please note if things are humid you should ‘De’humidify

So check if it’s an ‘Il’ an ‘In’ an ‘Ir’ an ‘Im’ or ‘dis’
A ‘Counter’, ‘Anti’, ‘Post’ or ‘De’ an ‘A,’ ‘An’ ‘Ex or ‘Mis’
If these are unappropriate when all is said and done
Yes, there is a modest chance the prefix might be ‘Un’

But in case you think you’ve got it; you’ve still got much to learn
Both flammable and ‘In’flammable mean the thing can burn

Sometimes a change is an upgrade
For a better existence we crave
And thus we now live in a warm house
And don’t shiver inside a damp cave

Or maybe we tire of fashion
And yearn for a day very soon
When we cast off the custom of corsets
For breeches and pantaloons

The new normal might come some gusto
That’s embraced with an unbridled glee
Ditch gramophone records and big bands
As we rush to get colour TVs

Other times change is unwelcome
Its just something we have to embrace
Politics, illness, bad neighbours
Or wearing a mask on our face

Our life will have only one constant
Which I shall now pass on to you
The only thing certain and for certain
Is the change that we have to live through

It might not be something we long for
But before long it will stop being new
To have a new normal is normal
Because its normal to have something new

Take a word and mix the letters and the result can be absurd
But an anagram is a word mixed-up that makes another word

Or if you blend a couple words it can be quite satisfying
If the spin-off words are helpful and the result is clarifying

A ‘Sycophant’ ‘acts phony’, which is something ‘The eyes’ ‘They see’
While the ‘Snooze alarms’ too early says wake up ‘Alas no more Z’s’

‘A decimal point’? - ‘I’m a dot in place’ and there are other spots
Would you believe ‘The morse code’ reorders to ‘Here comes dots’

Be cautious when you marry, not of your wife who has no flaw
Don’t forget the ‘Woman ******’ who will be your ‘Mother-in-law’

That one was rather damming the next one’s better I’ll admit
When I become a ‘Father-in-law’ I will be a ‘Near halfwit’

Who would have thought ‘Astronomer’ readjusts to say ‘Moon Starer’
But Knox the ‘Presbyterian’ would have thought he’s ‘Best in Prayer’

The huddled masses may revere New York’s ‘Statue of Liberty’
And shuffled letters also state she was ‘Built to stay free’

Oh ‘I bet the wound's lethal’ the junior policeman will have said
Of course, replied the coroner it was ‘Two bullets in the head’

December comes I ‘Search, Set, Trim’ for the perfect ‘Christmas Tree’,
Kids hiding in a ‘***** room’ which is like a ‘Dormitory’

In ‘The countryside’ ‘No city dust here’ if I’m ‘Silent’ I can ‘Listen’
And ponder my ‘Indomitableness’ or is it my ‘Endless ambition’?

‘I am not active’ in ‘Vacation time’ I will rest and heave a sigh
With joy I watch a ‘Butterfly’, and see it gently ‘Flutter by’

A minor risk? A ‘Slot Machine’, the result is ‘Cash lost in me’
A lethal risk? Revealed too late, ‘Radium came’ for ‘Madam Curie’

The last “surprising anagram” in this poem that I hope was fun
If ever asked what’s ‘Eleven plus two’ reply it’s ‘Twelve plus one’

If tears could build a ladder
If heartache made it strong
If grief could be my escort
I’d bring you back where you belong

I’d climb each rung of loneliness
I’d overcome the pain
I’d ignore the one way system
And I would bring you back again

But I know that I can’t do that
And the loss I’ll have to bear
It will hurt to not be near you
Until I can join you there

I hit a low with your good bye
At first I could not see
The ‘good’ within the goodbye
Was an upbeat prophesy

What was worse, what I’d reverse
Is what I came to know
The life of hell that I would live
After your first hello