Ever since I bought this house, eleven years ago, it has had a leaky toilet downstairs. I had a half hearted attempt to fix it – when the cistern filled, it reached overflow and the overflow pipe leaked so I took off the lid and bent the float arm to try to cut off the water supply earlier so it didn’t reach the overflow.

It didn’t work as I’d planned because the valve itself was faulty. I knew I could fix it by getting a new valve and fitting it – an easy job that I’d done before. BUT these jobs are always made more daunting (to me anyway) by trying to do them alone – just in case of mishap. So, I stuck an ice-cream tub under the leaky overflow and left it…….for eleven years!

When DM moved in, he said ‘no problem, let’s buy the part and I’ll do it’. So we bought the part, took it into the loo and placed it on top of the cistern in its box, which of course is little use to anyone!!! That was about three years ago. All it’s done since then is gather dust.

Over the last week or so, I’ve become aware that the leak has got worse – much worse – so much so that last night, I had to paddle through water to go to the loo. Not good for all sorts of reasons.

The valve got taken out of its wrapper only to discover that it’s not the right one – the one we’d bought was suitable for a side inlet and ours is a bottom inlet. Pah! Oh well, I was working at home this afternoon so DM popped down the road to Homebase, bought the right valve and we utilised the time I’d normally spend travelling home fitting the new one.

As with all of these things, they are never as straightforward as you expect but we got the job done by my usual blend of ‘muck and magic’. This is the old crusty one!!!

We’ve been put to shame today by some friends who tell us they are in the process of decorating their house for the second time since they moved in and they’ve only been there three years. I’ve been here for eleven years and I’ve not even finished my first go round of decorating. So, now we have to get on with it. Bathroom next – then downstairs loo properly, then hall and stairs and we’re done……well, at least till we start again – groan! Still, on the bright side, being in one place for eleven years was completely unheard-of for me before I came here. I suppose I should consider this an achievement in itself. Roots. It baffles me totally that the first place I put down real roots is the one place in my life that I’ve hated living. The house is gorgeous but the location is depressing.

Last year I photographed something lurking at the bottom of the garden!