I’ve been told that at least one reader looks forward to reading a Decor Extremus posting every Saturday morning (total flattery I know) and that recent tardy posting habits are to be redeemed by good behaviour and regular posting forthwith.

So here I am on a Friday night processing the decision not to go to Dannevirke tomorrow and blogging about it.  Now I suspect most of you have no notion that Dannevirke is the place to  be tomorrow – but really it is – because there is an auction – not only an auction – but an estate clearance of a collector. Valhalla I hear you say, as you open google maps to find just were Dannevirke is.

Dannevirke is in Central Hawke’s Bay. It was a town set up by Scandinavian settlers in the end of last century. Although I don’t wish to incur the wrath of the locals the best thing about Dannevirke is an amazing item of 19th century human hair picture making at the local museum – worth the trip in itself.

The collector in question, whose estate is being sold up was a share-milker who simply went to Maidens & Foster for years and bought the things no one else wanted and put them in a shed. I wonder if he had the idea of a private museum in mind as so many of his generation did or was he just a horder?

I have peered and peered at the images of M&Fs site but in the end I’ve decided against the 90 minute drive on the basis that we don’t need more stuff – this in itself is not only a unique conclusion, it is something of a delusion – because next week I’ll be hauling more objects over the doorstep and perhaps just perhaps kicking myself for not going to Dannevirke tomorrow

DLJ