Thanks, Sonia...

Hi Sonia...

Thanks for your kind condolence.
I tried emailing you via your blog, but the message bounced as being a 'permanent failure'. Thought you ought to know!

Thanks again for your kind thought. Chas


***

Hey! We got some ditching done! It's all got even more urgent since a man has just paid me in advance for my old Fergie winch, and is going to be travelling 200 miles to collect it. The problem is that part of our main ditch (which drains a ten-plus acre field... not our own) has sprung a leak and has turned a previously firm and drivable track into a squishy nettle-infested quagmire, laced liberally with waving tentacles of bramble.
The winch weighs 6 cwt (~300kg) so it needs mechanical lifting. Ken next door says he can't do it because he would be sure to get his tractor stuck, and would need to call out Kevin and his 4WD JCB to haul him out. Hence, better all round if I cut out the middleman and call Kevin direct. Sound sense. But the JCB would make an unspeakable mess of what's left of the track, and the track would remain impassable once he'd hauled out the winch. This matters because we have other tools, including a plough, in that old shed, and they too will need mechanical lifting at some point. So.. a bit of a problem.

So we thought about it. Eventually we thought that maybe if we can dredge out the appropriate part of the ditch we could lower the local water table and let the rain go down to the cwm faster at the same time. Nett result... the quag would slowly drain and the track would become drivable by normal tractors again.
Very good.

We've made a start, by hauling out a 15 foot tree that was lying horizontally on the ditch bed, sending down roots from its trunk. Nature is a marvel, eh? Also, sawing out a few hazel branches to allow proper access to swing a pick-axe. Needless to say, this process involved careful trimming back of a couple of dozen ten foot bramble whips as well. Much scope for harmless fun and exasperation, and having one's woolly hat snatched off and dropped into the ditch.
En route, I discovered a hole in the otherwise shallow ditch bed, slightly deeper than my welly. Could it be, we wondered, that this hole is undermining the ruined wall between the ditch and the track, thus allowing water to flood where it didn't oughta be flooding? Could be. So the next job is not just deepening the flume, but dumping the spoil into the hole, thus a) helping to block it up a bit, and b) disposing of the rubble creatively. I love dual purpose jobs. And filling in an underwater hole would be another first. I'm looking forward to it.

Will it work? We shall see. Not today, alas, as it's bucketing down again. But soon.
Meanwhile, I've hauled the tree and hazel branches round to the house ready for sawing up for next winter's Rayburn-fodder. There's enough to heat the house for at least half a day.
Like I said.. I love dual purpose jobs.

I'm still waiting for my new webpage to sell Guide Yourself to Happiness from. How can it take so long?
Meanwhile, I've definitely decided to concentrate on putting the Grand Oeuvre onto the www and to not bother with preparing it for a paper publication until I see if there's any actual interest. It's an awful lot of work, preparing a book for publication; especially in paper.
Great relief.


Have a great day, dear reader. Chas