So far it has been a bit of a disappointment.

Here I was, gearing up for a two week siege and basically fuck all has changed. Far from being isolated I have been free to come and go as always.

They have done a lot of work all right. They have shifted the cone a few times and the “loose chippings” sign is now dumped in one of my hedges. They have also kindly dumped a lorry load of piping and ducting over the fence into my garden. Obviously this is part of the stuff that is to be buried under the lane and has been delivered early. They might have asked?

Anyhows there has been a lot of activity but not on the lane. For some reason they started digging out on the main road instead, digging along my grass verge for quite some distance. I’m surprised they didn’t cut my secret water supply or the telephone/Interweb stuff. Whatever they were doing, it made a lot of noise and caused the usual chaos you get when there are temporary traffic signals.

They now tell me that they are starting on the lane on Monday. Fine but for the fact that I was counting on them being nearly finished by then and I had laid in stocks under that delusion. Now my stocks are running low and it looks like I won’t get any deliveries during the week. That includes oil as Herself has been feeling the cold so the heating has been on a lot. Bugger!

We did have a power cut during the week but it was during the evening after the diggers had gone so I can’t blame them. Being rural dwellers the cut didn’t really affect us, as we are well equipped for such eventualities. I quickly whipped out the oil lamps, candles and gas camping stove and life continued without a hitch. The only casualty was a television programme Herself had been recording.

I ordered a curry delivery last night. I had to wait a while as they were very busy, but we were in no hurry. The only problem was that I forgot to switch on the porch light and the delivery bloke [who hadn’t been here before] assumed the back door was the front door because it is still floodlit by the light that won’t switch off. Anyhows he waded through the long wet grass and dog shit before banging on the back door.

He scared the shit out of me.