Advent Nails

Carole and I changed our walk route today and headed in the opposite direction along the canal to Boothstown. I sorted Judy's post then we walked back along Leigh Road. It was interesting to nosy at the houses there, it used to be known as Millionaires Row but a lot of the houses looked rather run down today. Some of them were owned by some dodgy people and I met one of them a few years ago.

I looked after one of the houses for the Summer whilst the family were on holiday. I walked their dogs every day, I sorted Fedex deliveries, I watered flowers and I passed payments from people on to another family member.....hmmmm you are thinking, you did what??? I was very naive and never thought anything odd was going on at first. The family were very well off, they had a villa in Florida, posh cars and all that goes with a lifestyle I will never have. I'd been to a children's party there once where Cristal champagne flowed for the grown ups as much as the pop was flowing for the kids.

Anyway the Summer passed and the day they were due home arrived. It was my first day back at school after the holiday and so I checked the house and sorted the dogs then went to open the electric gates to leave for work. As they opened seven cars drove in, a uniformed man held up his ID. Officers with dogs, cameras and goodness knows what else surged out of the cars. I was asked to put the dogs away and show them where the security cameras were. "The family are due home anytime now," I said. How wrong I was....apparently they had been arrested at the airport as they got off the plane an hour earlier.

Well to cut a long story short I didn't make it into work that morning. I had to go round every room with them as they searched..."When we are involved we are only looking for guns, money or drugs!" and photographed everything. Thankfully they knew I was innocent, I think they had been watching the house for a while, and they were very nice to me. There were other raids around the country and seventeen others were arrested for multi million pound fraud, money laundering and goodness knows what else. I never saw the family again. He was involved in a huge court case and went to prison and she went to live in America, I think the aftermath is still going on. Me?? I just miss those two little puppies.

I don't know why I'm writing about this ha ha ha, so to go right back to the beginning....Carole and I walked back to her house for a cuppa and a sit down before I walked home. I took a sneaky pic of Carole's advent calendar....no common or garden chocolates for her, no sireee!! Carole has a nail polish hiding behind her daily doors.