Perched precariously atop a rickety ladder, wondering how I had been guilted into strimming a tree for Marian, I wasn’t best pleased to have my foray into gardening interrupted by a passerby.

At least the shocked drivers, agog at the sight of a girl with a strimmer in hand attempting to dance and attack a tree like her life depended on it, couldn’t stop.

But this gentleman had questions and was not for ambling on by.

‘That doesn’t look too safe.’

‘No well I’m not planning on falling over.’

Enough chat move on please.

But no, he wanted to know why the man of the house wasn’t doing the work…

Well, for reasons beyond my control, they have sadly passed and ‘its all women in here.’

And anyway I thought as I plugged my headphones back in…even if it wasn’t, why wouldn’t I do some gardening?

Ok I was tricked into by Marian, but really are we so programmed to see this as men’s work?

Maybe I should have asked him to give me a hand, mine being so delicate that wielding heavy machinery might crack a nail or be too strenuous for me a poor female.

I see it even in the books I’ve been reading lately. What starts out with a strong female lead, a great back story and the potential to not be the weak damsel in distress, soon turns into a wishy washy sap waiting to find ‘the man’.

Ok maybe it’s my choice of reading material, but it seems as if the appearance of a man, usually just as our heroine is at breaking point, makes it all better.

Rather than feisty, the ladies in question are more likely to fawn at a man’s feet and break down and suffer a febrile fit.

I do realise this sounds like the ravings of a sad, singleton, but I’m not sitting here surrounded by cats bemoaning my single status – rather just hoping that these lasses wouldn’t weep and wallow while waiting on a knight in shining armour, but rather saddle up Annie Oakley, get your gun and do some dragon, tree or even bush slaying of your own…