Ordered cedar cladding and soakaway crates today, which should be the last of the major orders necessary to complete. Decking boards from B&Q, and joists from Griggs, arrived yesterday, and we're hoping to build it tonight. All the work is in the prepping of the ground, once that's level it should only take about 15 minutes to finish it!

Came home last night to find our neighbour Alun with a hosepipe down our manhole. Not good! Turns out all our waste has been collecting in the last section of pipe before the manhole, seemingly unable to drain freely away! I checked in the rodding eye halfway up our drive and that was clear. We put the hose pipe down the rodding eye and within 10 minutes it had all cleared out, so I think the fact that we're not using the shower or bath at the moment, but we are using the toilet, means the drain is not getting 'flushed through' as it would be under normal operating conditions. It took about 6 weeks to collect enough gunk to start smelling, so at the moment I'm working on the theory that two showers a day and a bath every so often will be enough to keep the drains clean. The other thing that crossed my mind is maybe some render got lodged down there or something. Not cause for alarm right now, but we're back to a 'no solids' policy until we can get the bath operational, which basically means finishing the tiling in the bathroom. If the increase in water flow to normal working conditions doesnt solve it, then unfortunately it looks like we'll need the pumping station after all. This is not good news at all, as they're quite expensive :(