I love to think of myself as self-sufficient, and I enjoy the sort of practical tasks there isn't much call for in town: clearing ditches, unblocking drains, that sort of thing.
It's the type of job that has a big impact and gets noticed - unlike, say, housework, which I hate.
Last week, the drain at our gate stopped up again: it had never been the same since its ends were blocked by gravel graded into the ditch during road repairs. So there I was grovelling around in the water with my usually trusty length of black pipe. I keep it by the gate and it's long enough to reach past halfway along the drain, so if I don't find the blockage from one end, I usually find it from the other.
But I wasn't having much luck. Still having a bung knee, I was working standing up, which didn't help me get a good angle, and the pipe was bending as it whammed into something solid.
I paused for a breather as the neighbour stopped for his mail. "Do you want a hand?" he said, and I jumped at the offer. He went home to change, returning on his quad bike with a length of metal pipe and a hammer. As he started ramming the pipe into the drain, neighbour two stopped to dispense some advice.
Neighbours three and four also stopped to help, interrupted only slightly by neighbour five, who waited while we reorganised our cars to let him pass.
I thought we looked quite professional peering into the drain and pondering unblocking techniques, and just like the real pros, we mostly stood around offering advice while one or two of the party did the dirty work.
The metal pipe was pushed into the drain as far as it would go, then whacked with a hammer, and slowly, slowly, it went in more. I kept an eye on the other end of the drain, from which no water came. We must have compacted the blockage even more.
The working party pulled the pipe back out, causing a single big glug of water, then hammered it back in. And this time, things started to move. Water began to flow, washing away the gravelly debris that had caused the problem. And after a good stir-along with my flexible black pipe, the drain was as good as new.
We retired to our separate houses, full of good neighbourly feelings about our successful co-operative effort.
Now: how do we keep the gravel out of the ditch?