Preparedness for when

mardatha

They would need 2-3 of them GQ to lie in wait and give them a good hiding, not bothering to phone the cops because they would see them coming and run. Only fear is that they set fire to the sheds next time. Always the hyenas out there circling eh?

GreyQueen

Yeah, that's the trouble. Occasionally you get verbal abuse from youths passing by, inc some pretty vile sexual stuff. I pretend I haven't heard it, because if you give them the sharp side of your tongue, the can come back after hours and trash your plot or burn your shed. They know where your plot is, but you don't know where they live. My plot is on a big and rather notorious estate.

A passer-by on the street updraided some lads for taking potshots at our greenhouses with their catapults and drove them off. Good for her; there were child-sized footprints all around the busted greenhouses the next day cos they'd climbed into the site and broken the glass close up and personal.

Result is that no one on the outer edge plots, like mine, bothers with greenhouses. I was glad the little toe-rags hadn't smashed my cold-frame glass or the shed window. Comes to something when you have to be glad that it wasn't worse. Trouble is, should they catch the beggars and they be convicted, they get a slap on the wrist and that's no bliddy disincentive. Whereas a potential batting...........

I remember years ago, my Dad remarked on the subject of rural break-ins (my family are predominantly village dwellers) that crims ought to be careful as no end of country people have an old shotgun at home. Then that bloke up in East Anglia somewhere shot two burglars and killed one of them and that was only a year or so later.

Tell ya, if Lauran Order becomes a bit scarce, it'll get interesting in some places. I have a rolling pin and an attitude problem.

And now I really must get up to that lottie, laters, GQ xx

[Deleted User]

GQ little perishers, shame there isn't anything that could be applied to the external surface of the doors that would catch their fingerprints and get them identified. We have sporadic incidents with kids on the lotties, usually broken windows and greenhouse glass and kicked in doors after they've been shoplifting from the local shop and gotten high in cheap cider and boxes of sweets, just once in a while though the serious guys target those with rotovators and petrol strimmers but they only break in to those specific sheds, they must know which they are. Re the stolen chickens, makes you wish foul pest could be passed on to burglers and chicken rustlers doesn't it? We are seeing shops close and businesses going under now here in the village, we've lost a butcher, a restaurant, a fairly newly come kids shoe shop and now our curtain and furnishings shop is closing, and I know that in the next few weeks the architect who has offices here is pulling out and going to work from home. Sign of the times I feel and the first real indication that the problems have now reached the deep south. I don't feel so guilty now as I've listened to the recession changing lives of all of you from wherever you are in the UK. Feels fair that we should not be unaffected!!!

GREENBEE hope all is still well with you, more to the point that you are still above the floodline. We had high winds lst night but not so much rain, in fact this morning I was pleasantly surprised to find it actually dry outside.

CRAIGY there is every good sense in stocking up with things the lad is going to need in the future, I always took good advantage of things in the next couple of sizes up which came my way and had a shelf in the cupboard dedicated to this. Saved me much outlay and got some very good quality things which served both girls well, the onlky thing I couldn't pass between them was shoes as they have completely different shaped tootsies. Like GQ, I like (still do to this day!) to have things ready and waiting to go into use and it makes so much sense to pick up things you know you'll use if you find them doesn't it?

We have a bath leak and can't find where it's coming from, I keep finding water on the work surfact in the utility room which is directly underneath the bathroom. We are currently running with the panel off the side of the bath and towels underneath just in case. It's so noisy in there now, odd how a small thing makes a big difference. Have a good one all, Lyn xxx.

elaine241

Mrs LW your leak may come from quite a distance from where you logically think it should be!! We have found water runs down the underside of taps, without dripping!, and makes its way along pipes to the lowest part where it then drips!! To test this we put plumbing/electrical tape around pipes to see if water made it to the tapes and then dripped off, often quite away from where we thought it was leaking ( hope this makes sense). We gradually eliminated possible sources and found the offending area often a seeping pipe joint or very tiny leak from a tap where it went along the underside of the tap, it is amazing how these tiny dribbles add up to fool you into thinking there is a possible big leak.

Anyway here endeth the plumbing lesson! LOL

[Deleted User]

Thank you Elaine, all these things will be thoroughly checked out, bless you, Lyn xxx.

GreyQueen

:(

OMG, and crying and shaking with shock. Went the few meters down the block to my bike shed and it's been broken into as well. The barstewards have cut off the hasp holding a v.expensive non-prisable padlock and beggared the shed's own lock.

My beloved Pashley is still there, chained to a bracket inside the shed. I don't think that chain would have stood up to a cutting attempt so can only assume that they were looking for something trendy and thought the Princess wasn't worth taking............thank goodness for that.

They don't seem to have taken anything from the shed. I've called the Police and have been told to wait for them to attend before doing anything. I have a shed which is completely insecure and out of my line of sight, an unspecified ETA for the Police, I need to get the Council's emergency repairs out, but once I make that call, I have to wait in on them. And I need the hasp-and-padlock replaced and am 10 mins from the hardware store. Arrrggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!

Have just phoned the folks. They will drive up after lunch and help me sort it. It's nothing I can't sort myself bar the fact I can't be in two places at once, never mind three. And heaven knows what's going on at the allotment.:(

The hell I'll be making my pal's party at 2 pm. I won't be done in time and I sure as hell won't feel like putting my game face on and socialising.

Sorry to be a whiner, just being the victim of two crimes in 24 hours is getting to me.

craigywv

awk gq that's blooby awful ! things happen in 3 s so they say , at least nothing. was taken I know that sometimes it would be better if they did just take something and make more sem=nse than just randomly breaking in for the sheer hell of it. thankfully your bike still there xxx

jk0

GreyQueen wrote: »

:(

OMG, and crying and shaking with shock. Went the few meters down the block to my bike shed and it's been broken into as well. The barstewards have cut off the hasp holding a v.expensive non-prisable padlock and beggared the shed's own lock.

My beloved Pashley is still there, chained to a bracket inside the shed. I don't think that chain would have stood up to a cutting attempt so can only assume that they were looking for something trendy and thought the Princess wasn't worth taking............thank goodness for that.

They don't seem to have taken anything from the shed. I've called the Police and have been told to wait for them to attend before doing anything. I have a shed which is completely insecure and out of my line of sight, an unspecified ETA for the Police, I need to get the Council's emergency repairs out, but once I make that call, I have to wait in on them. And I need the hasp-and-padlock replaced and am 10 mins from the hardware store. Arrrggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!

Have just phoned the folks. They will drive up after lunch and help me sort it. It's nothing I can't sort myself bar the fact I can't be in two places at once, never mind three. And heaven knows what's going on at the allotment.:(

The hell I'll be making my pal's party at 2 pm. I won't be done in time and I sure as hell won't feel like putting my game face on and socialising.

Sorry to be a whiner, just being the victim of two crimes in 24 hours is getting to me.

Very sorry to hear that GQ. Have you got the cash for an extra bike lock? I think it might be prudent to make yours even harder to steal now the b*ggars know what is in the bike shed.

I used to have a lock like this on my bike in my teenage years:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/ABUS-Bicycle-Lock-4850-Black/dp/B001BADNJ8/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_t

It doesn't stop someone lifting the bike, but stops it being ridden away. Also very handy on hilly streets when you want to prop bike up against something.

nuatha

GreyQueen wrote: »

:(

OMG, and crying and shaking with shock. Went the few meters down the block to my bike shed and it's been broken into as well. The barstewards have cut off the hasp holding a v.expensive non-prisable padlock and beggared the shed's own lock.

...
Sorry to be a whiner, just being the victim of two crimes in 24 hours is getting to me.

Really sorry to read that.
You aren't a whiner.
Have any of the other bike sheds been hit, or might they have targetted yours, thinking the lock meant a valuable bike?
I hope the relevant peoples manage to turn up quickly.

Some years back, most of the allotments round here would have had a round the clock watch for a fair chunk of the year. Partly it was the fact that most of the allotmenteers would be or have been shiftworkers, but leek growing was a serious business often worth several thousand pounds for prize leeks.
The were several tales about would be vandals being wheel barrowed to casualty after a close encounter with a spade or pickaxe handle.

GreyQueen

I'm calming down now. It was just such a shock coming so soon after the other shed being done over for the second time. And the logistics of getting it sorted out are a PITA. I'm lucky the bike is still there and it's really nothing compared to the hardships of those poor souls with flooding, I shouldn't be such a baby.

Have got a grip now. Jaw set, eyes glinting, GQ girds her loins. Police will come when they come. Folks will come up after lunch with new hasp and padlock. If the Police haven't attended by then, beggar it, we'll re-secure the shed. !!!!!!, I have preps in there! TP, water bottles, a newspaper trolley and my butane stove (all well-hidden under carp and seemingly untouched).

Once the bike shed is secure on the padlock, I will arrange a booked appt with the Council to get it's own lock changed. Hopefully I have enough flex-credit to get a part if not a full day off. Have a brill line manager who'll do their best to help me.

And once things are sorted at the block, we can spin up to the lottie and check and quickly mend the lottie shed. Between the two crimes, there goes my s*dding weekend.

* and breathe* I shall put the kettle on and eat chocolate.

nuatha, my bike shed stands in a row of a dozen. I can't see any others open but there is a rear bike wheel leaning up against the wall which wasn't there yesterday. No tyre, just a wheel with all the gears, so that may have come from someone's shed. As the Police said not to touch stuff, I didn't go poking around. The police who came to the lottie shed on the first break-in last week said they're normally looking for bicycles. I've had the hasp-and-padlock on my shed for years. Most of us do, as the locks the council provide are a bit feeble and there are even issues that some of them open to other people's keys, so even the housing officers recommend that you put a padlock on.

The Pashley, like it's predecessor, is chained in the shed to a bracket with a hardended steel chain but I think I'll use the second chain, the one I use when it's outside a shop, to chain it to the steel shelving unit which is itself bolted to the wall.

Sheesh, all this p*sses me off no end. Thank you for your moral support and sensible advice, you're a bunch of superstars. I've texted my pal to cancel and apologise and explained why, don't want to cause too much chaos to the cooking arrangements, there are several people attending.

jk0, the shed has an Abus hasp, the kind that covers it's own screws, with an additonal metal plate fitted in the gap to stop a pry-bar fitting undeneath, with an expensive Abus brass padlock which is gawdknows where but was bypassed by cutting the hasp behind it.

I have just had Mum ring in; she is bringing a super-dooper hasp-and-padlock rig off her bike shed, and will install it on mine, then we will go to the hardware and get her a replacement, then swing by the lottie to make good up there.

We'll get it sorted. I shall have a cuppa and make some bread rolls. Sod's Law will dicatate that covering my hands with bread dough will cause the Police to arrive, lol.