Ciao. I’m a bit worried about what I’m going to  tell you. Maybe I shouldn’t… but maybe it will be alright… What concerns me is that what I have to say might change your perception of me (assuming you had one).  What will you think of me? You see, I’d rather you imagine me as a glamorous and exciting mermaid than a cleaning woman or housewife. On the other hand, you aren’t Brad Pitt – are you? Does it really matter? Doesn’t Brad like a clean patio? He might be extremely interested to read this. Va tutto bene, okay…

Every winter the concrete paviors on our terrace patio get dirty, greenish and fungal; I don’t know exactly what it is but it’s very hard to remove, I should know because every summer I have to get it off  somehow. Anti-fungicide solutions have never solved our problem and Chris and I usually resort to good old elbow grease and detergents. Mermaids and their mates prefer to spend their summer days usefully engaged in cycling and picnics rather than scrubbing floors so last year we bought a water-pressure cleaner for the purpose and it still took the whole day between us to remove all the discolouration.

This morning I did it all myself, without getting housemaid’s knee (or even mermaid’s tail in my case), in about 3 hours… using thick bleach. Now it looks bellissimo (please excuse the Italian but since I’ve discovered the Italian detective series, “Montalbano”, I want to burst into Italian at every opportunity. Yes, I’m picking up the lingo – it’s a subtitled series!).

The Mermaid Easy Method:

Firstly, do not try to get it all off in one go – do it in workable sections. Wet one section, about 7 square metres in my case, and pour blobs of neat thick bleach on alternate wet paving slabs; then spread the bleach with a mop across the entire section. The reaction is almost immediate. If some areas are resilient, do it again and scratch with a small yard broom instead of the mop. Four litres of bleach cleaned our whole patio (over 20 sq mtrs). Obviously, be careful using bleach and don’t get it onto your cute shorts or your skin.

Shorts? Skin? If, like me, you want to make the most of the sunshine (though it will almost certainly cloud over whilst you’re out there), always wear a pair of shorts. I put on my cute, very short, blue and white spotty shorts and bikini top – well, I like to keep up appearances for the neighbours. You don’t want to look dowdy for them – do you? Chubby, yes – dowdy, no! Speaking of neighbours, Ron came out onto his terrace while I was working (glad I had my nice shorts on) and seeing him reminded me that I promised to keep my eye out for a new girlfriend for him. But I’ll tell you all about that next time…

Here are some before, during and after photographs of the Mermaid Easy Method in practice. Arrivederci!