Beware, the bin police are coming.

Byline: DENISE ROBERTSON

HIM Indoors has been in hospital for a few days and the 1,001 tasks I never knew he performed have fallen to me. One of these was refuse collection.

I managed fairly well. The various bins and boxes went out on time, were emptied and I returned them to their rightful places. Except I muddled them up.

By the time I realised I had put the cardboard bin in the household waste place, someone had thrown in some household waste. I panicked.

If I left it, the thought police would come for me, they would never empty our bins again and we would disappear beneath a mound of trash even before we'd had time to pay the pounds 1,000 fine.

It would make the papers. Conservationists would picket, shouting "Unclean, unclean!" I tried so hard to get my arm down to retrieve the offending matter that I almost overbalanced and wound up with my legs in the air above the bin.

I looked for a passing police car to throw myself on its mercy, I even considered getting Him Indoors discharged on compassionate grounds to sort it all out.

"Get a grip" Number Four son said when he arrived. I've calmed down now but it made me think. If I can be that scared that easily, what happens to frail, live-alone pensioners when they realise they've transgressed? And what is happening to our country when refuse collections can cause so much angst?