Andy Richardson: Put off gardening chores by major calamities of the past

And I can’t carry off a moustache to save my life. They make me look like the illegitimate offspring of Mark Lawrenson and Burt Reynolds. And that’s not good.

My Krueger fixation began when I hired a Sherpa to get from one end of my garden to the other.

The garden had last seen a mower in 2008. It had morphed into a landscape from Jurassic Park II. Krueger-style tactics were necessary to cut a swathe through the ivy and self-seeded rowan trees.

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I took to it with gusto; waging war on the weeds like the human equivalent of Round-Up.

The pile of detritus at the foot of the garden grew so large that it blocked out the sun.

Now, we watch each day as our man-made total eclipse begins at 11.13am.

We don’t have to wait until September 28 at Chez Richo. We get the best of the solar-lunar interface every day. Eat that, Professor Brian Cox.

Our local council only collects green waste once a fortnight. But there’s so much that it will take until 2017 to clear.

So (and this is where I do my sinister laugh, bwa-ha-ha-ha) I’ve been wondering whether there might be another way. . .

Our family’s pretty handy in the ‘pyrotechnic’ department. Bonfire nights last for weeks and involve the sort of displays that make the 20,000-spectator Donnington Bonfire and Fireworks look like a grass fire. Garden fires are a speciality of ours.

In our house, we know there’s been a good ‘un if the blackened garden resembles a slashed-and-burned Amazon after a particularly good day for Peruvian loggers.

My grandfather started the trend on a spectacular bonfire night in 1973. I’m pretty sure it was such an extreme event that it’s my earliest childhood memory. We were enjoying a bonfire party at the home of my Uncle Dave. My grandpop’s wasn’t impressed by his son’s offering and told Dave to stand aside.

“I’ll get this party started,” he proclaimed, as he marched towards the bonfire with a jerry can full of petrol. Vamoosh.

Up it went. And his moustache was singed right off. More recently, my brother decided to clear his garden in Bilston. An enjoyable morning involving a chain saw and conifers was followed by a garden fire so fierce and choking that it stopped traffic on a nearby B-road.

About 30 minutes after we started our ‘work’, five firefighters popped their head over the fence.

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“Err, lads, do you think that might be a little bit much for a Sunday morning.” They were right. The neighbours’ washing was ruined. A former partner might not have minded had she been there. She had a bit of a ‘thing’ for firefighters. Our sleep was once broken at 2am after a group of local hoolies had set fire to the recycling bins in our street. Blue Watch arrived with their impressive hose – though not before I’d dashed into the street and extinguished the fire with the skill, speed and precision of Red Adair.

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The firemen looked disappointed that they had no use for their hose – though my then-partner had other ideas. “Should we invite them in for tea?” she purred, eyeing their hose with a glint in her eye.

What. At 2am? I’m pretty sure ‘tea’ was the last thing on her mind.

Do you know what, it’s time to come clean. I’ve been having second thoughts about setting fire to the rubbish in our garden.

I think I’ll shove it in the green bin. It’s probably safer.