It’s wonderfully rainy today and I want to get out there in boots and raincoat, investigating this brilliant yellow field of oilseed rape that we saw yesterday evening from Hughenden Park, whilst wandering through budding buttercups. I love that blue-green crop adjacent to the yellow of the rape, too.
But I have to stay in for the landlord to come and look at why the ceiling is bulging and stained with leaks. We suspect a blocked gutter but since I have nagged him about it for six months and he’s done nothing, I felt justified in waking him this morning and threatening to hire a ladder myself and charge him for labour and expenses. He became suddenly worried for my safety. So I suggested that I might phone the Council and tell them of my negligent landlord forcing me to live in damp conditions. It’s rather an exaggeration, but necessary to get him to do anything at all. He knows I am too good-natured, despite the bluster. There is no sign of the expected workman yet . . .
a wayfarer’s notes 