I should know better

Just about the moment I finished the last post, I was cut off. No phone. No internet. I asked my cousin to report a fault, and shortly afterwards found my calls redirected to my mobile.

Now, with BT that is usually a Bad Sign. It means they are settling in for a long haul. Nevertheless, the next afternoon a technician turned up.

"It`s a line fault just outside the house," he announced cheerfully, eyeing up the nearest pole. But another check put it further away.

"Where`s the next one?"

I pointed into the wood.

He stared at the tangle of brambles and undergrowth carpeting the outskirts of the wood with the sort of horror you would expect from Frodo on his first glimpse of Mount Doom.

"I`ll need support," he muttered. And vanished.

And that was it for a week. Meaningless texts about how they were aware of the fault kept on coming . I later discovered that they have a whole library of these and presumably pick one at random.

I imagined the guy, much like Captain Scott, trying to organise a team of volunteers for an Expedition to the Pole, with the other BT men backing off, stammering "Not me - I have a wife and children - take him instead !"

When after a week a text arrived suggesting it would take another week I took on BT head on and dropped the name "Telewest" in a suitably menacing manner. And the truth came out.

The Pole stood on Council land. And the Council had tried to demand a full survey and application for planning permission to replace it. A battle had raged round the leaning wormy piece of timber, with red tape and forms in triplicate flying.

The Council lost. Iam online again, as from last night.

And as you might say, in Pole position.