The turf-layers were most precise. The turf must be kept watered (it began raining more or less the moment the half Pole had fixed the mains supply to an outside tap), and leaf free. But no feet must touch the grass because imprints will be left as if in wet concrete (really?). What do do?

In my shed I have a number of boards that once were bookshelving. If I lay one on the grass, taking care to keep all my weight only on it, all will be well. I can balance and crouch and bend and lift whichever offending fallen leaf is within reach. I then need to sling another board to a different place and leap between them to gather the next lot of leaves. It seems unbelievably silly and is a lot of fun. Next year, when de-leafing to this pernickety degree presumably won't be necessary, it can be a good grandson game. How many leaves can they pick up without their feet touching the grass? If it weren't for the dangers of having to traverse the building site that is my flat to get to the garden, it could keep them busy all this half-term. Pity.

And before anyone asks, I pre-emptively stored the bookshelf boards out of the shed and under the garden table because the shed is, of course, the further side of the new lawn. 

I now understand the reason for sweeping the endlessly falling leaves from my grass. Its mindless repetitiveness is a form of meditation, made indispensable by what is being revealed indoors. Inadequate floor joists, mould, heating pipes propped on random bits of timber, walls wedged up with chunks of plywood. All of it, I am guessing, the excellent standard of building work produced by the contractors the council once employed. More leaves tomorrow. That is a certainty.