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| This is Lydia, she is far more beautiful than the likes of me and such a wonderful person |
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| And this is me Johnnie, i like to think i'm quite nice as well! :) |
Thursday 17 November 2011
oh and this is us :)
you will look back on this and laugh one day..yeah right!
Right....to start this is not a rant, i've had more than my fair share of those this past week i just thought i would document it as a 'diary' entry for our blog so when things are going good i can remember the long hard slog it has taken to get there (although i am not likely to forget).
DAY 1
It all started last Friday awaiting the exciting phone call from our wonderful bank manager who had filled us with promise with regards to our business loan, 'fantastic idea', 'no problem at all for the money', 'you will sail through so leave it three weeks until you start the soul patch and when you absolutely need it'. Well thanks to the whole of the E.U collapsing and Britain going into economic meltdown we got flat refused as they are not lending to start up businesses, not face to face you understand, just a cheery answerphone message on my phone,oh hi johnnie this is **** from the bank just ringing to say you didn't get it, ok thanks byeee have a nice weekend.
Now after the world fell out of our open mouths i will admit i did the very weak thing and went out got a little tipsy and tried to figure out how the heck we were going to carry on!
DAY 2
After waking up in 15 minute intervals throughout the night and worried to death i got up very early as we had the big day up at the patch of putting the polythene on the tunnel finally! We had very luckily again managed to obtain the help of our wonderful workforce to anchor down the massive sheet of polythene and bury it in the trenches. Feeling a little down i was instantly revved up again at the thought of such an exciting day and after all something always turns up. Now our tunnel came from a grower that unfortunately went under but sold it with some polythene to go on it. It comes on a huge 9 foot roll but is folded 4 times over so is quite hard to examine unless you roll the whole thing out....not an easy thing to do, or roll back up after!
Well you guessed it, after rolling it out on Saturday morning it was six foot short in width and had been sold the wrong roll that would not fit the tunnel................! (fill in your own expletives)
We went on the net and found out a new roll to fit would be £700, and my new 'non loan' self said it was an impossibility. Now before i write this let it be known there was a cup of tea involved, much discussion of what could be done and how, different suppliers ect ect.
I don't know who's idea it was,it was a bit of a blur and i thought to be quite honest they were joking but we ended up cutting up our concreted, lovely erected tunnel and shortening the legs...and down it came.
Considering i went up there that day to cheer myself up and see some final progress on the tunnel to see it all on the floor i will admit i was very very worried. The boys sprung into force and we made good progress putting half of it back up in a couple of hours. It was noted and discussed and agreed that we would not concrete the posts in but stake them in the trenches and tension block them in and finally bury them in the very heavy clay soil.
This worked really well and after five hours the tunnel was up besides one last block on the final hoop. I looked at it with a certain amount of pride and was so pleased that the idea had worked and it was back up. And then i turned around.
ONE KNOCK AND A BADLY SUPPORTED BRACE.
I turned back around and it was gone. A whole days work from four guys gone in about 0.2 seconds. It fell like a line of domino's thank god no one was standing inside it as x10 9ft thick steel bars collapsed with a 50ft ridge coming down on top of that. I have never in my life dropped to my knees, you know like they do in the movies, i always thought it was a bit far fetched but drop i did. If you know me, my bad Italian heritage makes me fly off the handle and shout and scream and throw everything out of the pram. It takes a lot but when it goes it goes. This time nothing. No words, no screams, no kicking inaminate objects. I just felt like i was just watching it from somewhere else and looking down on myself. Suffice to say i went home. I went to bed at 9pm and slept right through till 9am.
DAY 3
I got up dusted myself down went back up there with my dear dear friend Ben and put it back up...with lots and lots of concrete. It is never coming down again.
I literally had nothing left in me Sunday night and managed to give myself a chest infection but getting up and putting that thing back up was literally one of the hardest things i have ever had to do. You know when its your turn, as it really becomes your turn but we have had a really good run of it lately so i have been waiting for something to rear its ugly head.
When your world starts to crumble away and you find yourself scratching at the sides to hold on, i just hope you have the people i have around me to grab my arm and haul me back up to terra firma. In my opinion no one can survive in this world without a loving wife, a wonderful family and such generous and caring friends. I love you all dearly.
DAY 1
It all started last Friday awaiting the exciting phone call from our wonderful bank manager who had filled us with promise with regards to our business loan, 'fantastic idea', 'no problem at all for the money', 'you will sail through so leave it three weeks until you start the soul patch and when you absolutely need it'. Well thanks to the whole of the E.U collapsing and Britain going into economic meltdown we got flat refused as they are not lending to start up businesses, not face to face you understand, just a cheery answerphone message on my phone,oh hi johnnie this is **** from the bank just ringing to say you didn't get it, ok thanks byeee have a nice weekend.
Now after the world fell out of our open mouths i will admit i did the very weak thing and went out got a little tipsy and tried to figure out how the heck we were going to carry on!
DAY 2
After waking up in 15 minute intervals throughout the night and worried to death i got up very early as we had the big day up at the patch of putting the polythene on the tunnel finally! We had very luckily again managed to obtain the help of our wonderful workforce to anchor down the massive sheet of polythene and bury it in the trenches. Feeling a little down i was instantly revved up again at the thought of such an exciting day and after all something always turns up. Now our tunnel came from a grower that unfortunately went under but sold it with some polythene to go on it. It comes on a huge 9 foot roll but is folded 4 times over so is quite hard to examine unless you roll the whole thing out....not an easy thing to do, or roll back up after!
Well you guessed it, after rolling it out on Saturday morning it was six foot short in width and had been sold the wrong roll that would not fit the tunnel................! (fill in your own expletives)
We went on the net and found out a new roll to fit would be £700, and my new 'non loan' self said it was an impossibility. Now before i write this let it be known there was a cup of tea involved, much discussion of what could be done and how, different suppliers ect ect.
I don't know who's idea it was,it was a bit of a blur and i thought to be quite honest they were joking but we ended up cutting up our concreted, lovely erected tunnel and shortening the legs...and down it came.
Considering i went up there that day to cheer myself up and see some final progress on the tunnel to see it all on the floor i will admit i was very very worried. The boys sprung into force and we made good progress putting half of it back up in a couple of hours. It was noted and discussed and agreed that we would not concrete the posts in but stake them in the trenches and tension block them in and finally bury them in the very heavy clay soil.
This worked really well and after five hours the tunnel was up besides one last block on the final hoop. I looked at it with a certain amount of pride and was so pleased that the idea had worked and it was back up. And then i turned around.
ONE KNOCK AND A BADLY SUPPORTED BRACE.
I turned back around and it was gone. A whole days work from four guys gone in about 0.2 seconds. It fell like a line of domino's thank god no one was standing inside it as x10 9ft thick steel bars collapsed with a 50ft ridge coming down on top of that. I have never in my life dropped to my knees, you know like they do in the movies, i always thought it was a bit far fetched but drop i did. If you know me, my bad Italian heritage makes me fly off the handle and shout and scream and throw everything out of the pram. It takes a lot but when it goes it goes. This time nothing. No words, no screams, no kicking inaminate objects. I just felt like i was just watching it from somewhere else and looking down on myself. Suffice to say i went home. I went to bed at 9pm and slept right through till 9am.
DAY 3
I got up dusted myself down went back up there with my dear dear friend Ben and put it back up...with lots and lots of concrete. It is never coming down again.
I literally had nothing left in me Sunday night and managed to give myself a chest infection but getting up and putting that thing back up was literally one of the hardest things i have ever had to do. You know when its your turn, as it really becomes your turn but we have had a really good run of it lately so i have been waiting for something to rear its ugly head.
When your world starts to crumble away and you find yourself scratching at the sides to hold on, i just hope you have the people i have around me to grab my arm and haul me back up to terra firma. In my opinion no one can survive in this world without a loving wife, a wonderful family and such generous and caring friends. I love you all dearly.
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| The tunnel back up again and staying up! |
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