Week One

Phew! I guess I made the mistake of thinking it would be easy….

First of all the old terrace had to be removed. Picked all the slabs off then demolished the wall – very good for removing frustrations! Apart from the bottom line which had obviously been superglued to the ground.

On Saturday Darren the Digger came – a wonderful bloke with a dinky little digger. He arrived before the skip did, so couldn’t really get started, although he did, with two nudges of his digger, remove the entire bottom line of stone that I hadn’t been able to shift.

Then the skip turned up. I had already warned my neighbours at the end of the lane that a few people would need to turn round down there, so the skip man went along the lane. He seemed to be taking an awfully long time to come back, and then we heard the sound of sawing. He had knocked a tree down. Not only that, but when he needed to turn round, the neighbours (Dave and Lynne) saw him and said ‘we’ll nip out ahead of you our dog is sick we have to get to the vets’. Sadly the skip man didn’t mention he’d knocked a tree down, so Dave and Lynne had to find a saw and start sawing. I whizzed along to help by shoving and pulling. Eventually the tree was free and we dragged it into the side so that Dave and Lynne could get going….

And we started clearing. There was a lot of rubble. A midi skip holds about 3 tons. Darren estimated there was 24 tons to remove. Bummer. I phoned the skip people – no more skips available. I phoned around, and found one somewhere else, to be delivered ‘Saturday’. The idea had been to push all the earth along and make a new landscaped bank. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha! Neat rubble, no earth whatsoever.

Plan B: Create perfectly hideous retaining wall out of revolting rubble and shove other rubble behind it. Guy and I started building what we considered to be a very splendid wall. Darren said it reminded him of ‘Builders from Hell’. Funny man. Endless rubble. Darren went and got a flat bed lorry, loaded it with rubble and took it off to a mate’s land to dump it.

Darren doesn’t eat lunch. So neither did we…

Then the second skip arrived. I had whizzed out to borrow Guy’s car (parked further away in the village) to get extra cash to pay for all the extra skips, hours etc. Found skip man completely lost – he suggested I hopped into the cab and off we went. Driving up the lane, he got the lifting mechanism completely stuck on a neighbour’s tree. Solution: Stuff foot on accelerator and ignore damage to tree. Didn’t work…. Eventually went backwards, dropped skip to dangle off back, carried on up lane. Scary stuff. Also tried to run over neighbour’s sick dog when turning round. Luckily didn’t succeed.

Dumped skip (and I do mean dumped – he left it on it’s side. Very helpful). Darren the Digger managed to manhandle it (strong bloke) and we carried on. Two skips full, one revolting retaining wall, and 4 trips with a flat bed full of rubble to the mate’s land. Guy went to inspect the tree that the second skip driver had hit. Major damage to tree. Tree hanging on telephone wire precariously over public footpath and only route of access for us and our neighbours. Phoned emergency tree surgeon. Went to apologise to neighbour (who was very sweet) and then to other neighbours to tell them the lane would be blocked for a bit.

Tree bloke arrived within an hour. Seriously cute tree surgeon – anyone need a tree felling? Sort of Aussie surfer look – gorgeous! And his assistant was tall dark and handsome with lovely teeth. They probably thought I was gorgeous too. I had been caught in the rain and was covered in mud by this time. Not my best look….. They spent twenty minutes drinking tea then felled tree. Enormous logs and zillions of branches all over the lane.

Darren still moving rubble by this time. Rubble wall revolting but still standing. Tree blokes went. Darren flattened what was left and went. Guy went (off to a gig – how he stayed awake I don’t know) and I had a VERY LARGE glass of wine. Forgot I hadn’t had lunch. Result: instant sloshedness. Started clearing up tree debris. Plonked the logs on the drive – too knackered to move them anywhere else. Realised logs in way of skip removal. Tough!

Sunday – DAY OFF! Ok, so I got up early and did three barrowloads of stone removal, then I got CLEAN and my brother and his wife came to lunch. Stiff as a board….

Monday – moved MORE stones. Filled the second skip completely. Moved all the logs (again) out of way of skips. Flattened new flowerbed area above revolting rubble wall – looks ok. Apart from the revolting rubble wall, obviously. Stiff as a board again, better after 9 hours stone shifting. Think I may be a bit stiff tomorrow though….

Total hours worked: 21 hours solid physical labour. And that was just me….
Casualties: 2 trees, 1 knackered dog, 14 new bruises, couple of cracking scratches.
Achieved: terrace gone, flat area, revolting rubble wall, two very full skips.
Wine consumed: 3 bottles. (In my defence, 1 ½ were at lunch on Sunday)
PS: The neighbour’s dog will be fine – she had an infection but it’s treatable.