If Salvador Dali....

If Salvador Dali used a Dandelion clock to tell the time,

Maybe it would look bedraggled, just like mine.


I have been so fed up with the flood water along the lanes, that today I started a one woman gully clearing campaign.

My car does not appreciate the wet. Being feisty, low slung and Italian, she conks out at the mere whiff of a shower, so the recent deluge has sent her into a flat spin. Still, every flood has a silver lining, and at least the AA men now know their way to my door.

Armed only with a garden spade, wellington boots, and yes, my waterproof trousers, I drove to the first hotspot, well wet-spot, I suppose. It only took a couple of minutes to dig the silt and weeds out of the gully before there was a pleasing gush of muddy water spreading out into the field beyond.

The second flood was significantly deeper as I found out when the plimsoll line on my boots was breached and they filled with chilly water. The ditch that drains from the lane, under the hedge into the field beyond, was completely blocked with branches and soggy vegetation.

A few bashes and pokes with the spade and hey presto! A bore wave, resembling that of the river Severn whooshed along the ditch clearing out the remaining debris as it accelerated.

I turned, with splashes of mud and a broad grin on my face, to see a chap in a car lowering his window and enquiring if I was alright.

"Yes fine thanks, just doing the job of the council."

"I hope you get a reduction in your council tax"

"Yeah right!" I said, as he drove off in his best four by four by far, creating a bow wave and a turbulent wake.

I squelched back to my car, sat on the edge of the driver's seat, (with the door still open, in case you were wondering) lifted my legs high in the air and watched the water emptying out, before partially stripping and driving back home.

If the practice of employing 'Hedgers and Ditchers' was still followed, there would be no need for my actions.

Roads would not become waterways after heavy rain, and their surface would not breed so many potholes.

The rain water retained in the ditches would soak slowly into the surrounding land, watering crops and replenishing the aquifers.

Wildlife habitats would be created and maintained.

Oh the good old ways, those country folk knew what they were doing!!