Where shall I start ? ....

Not a good week since Tuesday. Weather crap. Problems with my broadband and phone line. Feeling crap. Weather crap. Bored out of my brains, stuck indoors for two days, apart from about a 15 minute walk with Emma in the rain. Oh, did I mention the weather was crap? Well last night it got even crapper. After three days of grey and drizzle we then had gales and lashing rain all night from about 7pm. At 3am this morning (except I thought it was 4am as I didn't bother to put the clocks back before I went to bed) I was awoken by the most godawful noise which frightened the life out of me and Emma, she barked the place down, and I had to get up, get dressed and go outside in the pissing rain to see what had happened. I thought the telegraph pole wires had all come down to be honest. Well it turns out to be the stupid metal cabinet which is fixed to my wall outside, and the door had been wrenched off, but was hanging by a thick piece of wire. I wedged it up as best I could. Meantime, Emma wanted a wee. I wanted a wee. I made a coffee, then tried to get back to sleep. Bang bang bang. No chance. I then had to get dressed again, and go out with a torch and a pair of secateurs (all I could find) and hack the bloody wire through and throw the door on the ground. I got drenched. I could also see that there were live wires and electric going into the box. Sod it. I decided I wasnt phoning the emergency number and then having to sit up and wait for someone to come out. If it blew the neighbourhood power, tuff. If it blew my bedroom wall away, well tuffer.

Turns out this box which hasn't been touched in the entire time I've lived here and Western Power or BT when they've been here have never known what it is, houses an alarm system for the panic buttons that are in all the old peoples bungalows round here in case they need assistance. Mine was disconnected when I moved in, and I know for a fact the one opposite doesn't work either, cos the cable was caught in a tree and was ripped down over three years ago, and is dangling in the garden. So my point being, I get all the hassle and it's nothing to do with me. Great eh? In the meantime, I have made another startling discovery. I have had problems with my phone line and broadband remember? Each time it's been fixed, it's short lived and amidst much head scratching, nobody can get to the bottom of it. Well inside this box on the wall was a telephone socket. Out of pure interest, I got a phone and plugged it in to see if it was live - it was. So I tried ringing my own number with my mobile and guess what? It's connected to my line! Bloody furious I am. So all the homes round here that have the warden alert use my phone line! It also means it's not filtered like it's supposed to be for broadband. And what's more, I paid BT £150+ to have a new line put in here when I moved in 6 years ago because I was on a party line and couldn't get a decent internet connection at all. It seems whoever carried out the work just connected it into the existing line, so I have always been on a shared line still. How dare the council in the first place use a private house telephone line to use for their system? I shall be on the phone tomorrow for sure! I've also reported my finding to my isp who are still trying to sort out my fault.

Today, it stopped raining mid morning, and after the council repair man had been and screwed the box back together as a temporary repair, I took Emma to the lakes, the leaves had really got a good bashing last night, it was a golden carpet along all the pathways, really pretty.

That's about it for now, I will now try to upload the photos I took although it may be hopeless because my broadband speed is now stuck at about 440mpbs instead of 7meg. It's also now pitch black outside at 5pm, so I have to go shut the birds in. How very depressing. :(

The Evil Box from Hell