I knew this weekend was shaping up to be a big one when I looked at the half-varnished six-seater table made from Indonesian hardwood sitting on my verandah.
Then there’s the half-paved strip of dirt opposite the flower garden waiting for a two-seater bench.
Then there’s the oxalis-infested triangle of leaf litter and tree debris at the bottom of the garden, which is still only half-covered in cardboard and mulch as a chemical-free attempt to halt the intrusion of wildness into my backyard.
So much to finish, so little time.
On top of all this, there’s a return of the spellbinding Illuminate event in central Shepparton, and for sports fans there’s a packed fixture of footy and netball, as well as the frothy fever-inducing hysteria of a new Tasmanian AFL team.
You wouldn’t be dead for quids.
This is all the stuff of life, which gets us up chasing dirt and diamonds every day.
However, there’s one more thing happening this weekend, but for the life of me I just can’t remember what it is.
Never mind, it will eventually surface like a sunken marker buoy.
For now, it’s on with the show.
Last year’s Illuminate was a mind-boggler without any boggling substances, and we’re looking forward to being boggled again.
Hang on — the marker buoy has just popped up from the depths, signalling the other big thing happening this weekend.
We’re getting a new king.
Charles Windsor will be crowned King Charles III of Great Britain and all its Commonwealth dominions, which includes us, on Saturday at Westminster Abbey in London.
Among the crowded fixtures of our lives, does this event stand as anything to set aside time for?
For diehard royal supporters and anyone over the age of 70 who remembers the last coronation of a British monarch, perhaps it does.
For British people it is undoubtedly a powerful reminder of their continuing involvement in living history and a cherished national spectacle.
But I suspect that for the majority of the diverse Australian population, the coronation will be nothing more than a quaint event in a faraway place that might float through their social media feeds along with more photos of Kyle and Tegan’s flashbulb nuptials.
Ordinary people were allowed for the first time to see what happens at a coronation when Elizabeth became queen in 1953. Before that the ceremony was a mystery witnessed only by a select few lords and ladies.
In the early days of Elizabeth’s reign the television cameras were invited in again. We were held spellbound by the everyday lives of the royals, who wanted everyone to know they were people just like us — with Christmas parties, dog walks, holidays and dinners. Unfortunately, in the process they became ordinary. The cameras stripped away the majesty and awe that had been carefully nurtured over centuries.
The last vestige of the mysterious in tomorrow’s coronation will be the sacred anointing of the holy oil recently consecrated in Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Thankfully the usual ingredients of civet cat glands and whale intestines have been left out to make the oil cruelty-free.
This part of the coronation ceremony will be hidden from the world by placing screens around Charles and Camilla.
The only people to witness this magisterial moment, apart from the royals and the Archbishop of Canterbury, will be the servants who will help Charles disrobe and Camilla’s hairdresser who will fix up her hair afterwards — so the show can go on. Because, after all is said and done, royal pageantry is street theatre and nobody does it better than the British.
What all this means to the majority of ordinary Australians as they go about their weekend of family life, markets, festivals, gardening and sport is perhaps a barbecue conversation or two.
Meanwhile, the only sacred oil I need is another tin of varnish for my verandah table, and I don’t need to send to Jerusalem for that.
Bunnings will do.