Musings from the Trenches: Home Extension for Beginners and Lunatics.

We will begin at the middle, as is best with these things. Or rather, Phase 2 of The Big Dig. After many proddings from friends and family, I have decided to embark on a Blog journey/observation of the trials and tribulations of a young couple of chronic DIYers as we try to extend our house. If nothing else, it will serve as a useful piece of police evidence when we both murder each other with a muddy shovel in the weeks to come.
   This is the story of Jade and Alex. The scene is the Trenches. Circa 2013. Protagonist: Jade, twenty something teacher, 5 foot 1, Leo. Antagonist: Alex, deranged villain and worst kind of textbook engineer. Minor characters: Neville and Mildred, pigeons; various bits of digging equipment and two sets of long-suffering parentals. There is also a manic terrier called Colin, who may crop up from time to time in the bottom of a bucket or swinging from a washing line.
Yesterday was a bleak day. After torrential rain flooded our foundation trenches, Alex and I found ourselves knee deep in sucking mud, howling abuse at each other over a clogged water pump. After being screamed at to "come hold this wire, quickly!", my frantic fumblings led to a massive trench wall collapse and I became even less popular. Freezing cold, covered in wet clay and starting to panic that I couldn't move my feet, I decided to respond in an appropriately adult way: 'Fine, fix it your bloody self then'. Strop, slosh, pull-at-stuck-boot, strop, stomp, splash, slide, stomp, stuck again. Boot flies off and I fall into another trench. As my students would say, FML.
   Today has been slightly better. Torrential rain has eased off and in between light showers we are able to shift another couple of tonnes of earth as Neville and Mildred look on suspiciously. 1pm arrives and is heralded by the landline ringing out. Extricate self from muddy boots, smash 2 glasses as I shuffle into the kitchen which naturally coat the floor in instant, lethal fairydust. 'Hi Jade, it's Mom! We are in Leicester and are popping in to see you. We won't stay long but we thought we would bring Colin to see you!'. Next couple of hours pass in a whirlwind of muddied stilettos and surreal shouts of 'Colin! Stop eating that wet cement now!', 'Dad, Colin is weeing up the skip!'. The obligatory octagenarian neighbour called Colin looks across from where he is powerwashing his driveway with a less than indulgent expression as we haul the non-plussed dog, now in a fetching mud facepack, back into their 4x4. As we lean against the skip and survey the carnage only a Jack Russell teen is capable of creating, phone rings again. Alex's Dad: 'Oh hi! I just got out the bath, would you like me to come over and help for an hour?' Alex wipes the mud off his watch: 4pm. Calling it a day methinks.:)